[Mobile-Portable] Wire Size

[Earl Needham]

At 12:02 AM 8/20/2007, Bil Seymour wrote:
><snip>
>     My question is: How much bigger should I go?  I am thinking about
>8-gauge.  Will this be adequate?  (The length is approximately 15-feet.)

         I think that size would be fine, and you can find it at 
places like Nunn Electric.  You might actually find it at Lowe's or 
similar, but I'm not sure.  Probably any supply house that caters to 
home builders.

>     Another question: What is considered state of the art, now, for an
>in-line fuse holder?  I might as well upgrade to the best style of fuse,
>while I am doing the upgrade.

         Well -- the car audio people have some nice-looking stuff, 
and some of their amps are pretty powerful.  You see installations of 
3 kilowatts fairly often.

><snip>
>     Final question: Does anybody have any experience with these new (to me)
>DC power supplies.  They are said to maintain a reliable 13.6-Volt output
>regardless of the input voltage (within reason).  In principle, they seem
>like a good idea, especially when running the HF rig for prolonged periods
>with the engine turned off.

         Your results will depend on several factors. First, will 
your transceiver operate acceptably on 12 VDC vice 13.8?  If so, you 
might not want to mess with a battery booster.  Next thing to 
remember, is that these things WILL run your battery down if you're 
not watching what you're doing.  Best thing to do would be to run two 
batteries, through an isolator, with the battery booster on the 
secondary battery, and use that to power your transceiver (and any 
other aux gear you like).

         7 3
         Earl

KD5XB -- Earl Needham
Clovis, New Mexico DM84jk
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/cw_bugs
Quoting from the Coast Guard: ZUT