Thread: What Gauge Wire? How much?

So i got my subs and my box and i wanna wire them but im not too sure what gauge of wire to go with.
Im going to get a wiring kit later for it to wire up to the amp, deck and battery but i wanna know what gauge wire to wire the subs in the box with and how much wire would i need (feet).

They are JBL® GTO1014d subs if that makes a difference.
i know it says to use 4 gauge for my wiring kit cause my amp will require it. (JBL GTO14001 amp).

but i wanna know for the sub wiring.
Thanks alot.

Youd be fine with 12 gauge, but if you wanted you could bump it up to 8 gauge if your speaker terms will support it.

^^that wat i have on mines

Originally Posted by sportred04

^^that wat i have on mines

8 or 12?
I dont wanna get too thick..


Plus how many feet...

Unless you can actually see the lines...I.E. you have a plexi setup where you can see the back of the subs. Id stick with 12ga. And the ft. depends on how far the amp is from the subs.

so 12 gauge.. then how many feet of it?. im asuming i dont need much.

brakes, reset,.....he means 12 gauge for the subs. id run 4 on the amp. unless your running alot of power 4 will be enough. just make sure you get good grounds

Depends on how far from the subs to the amp terms. Those subs are single voice coil, so you will only need two lines for each sub.

so just buy like a roll of it (12 gauge)? im sure that will be enough. and yeah the amp says run 4 gauge. (like in the description thing when i ordered it)
its a powerful amp. 4 gauge or thicker. but il go with 4.

16awg is all you need to the speakers. Promise. Power wise? I'd suggest 4awg.

k so i bought 12 gauge and a 4 gauge wiring kit.
the guy said u would NEVER need more than 12 gauge for what im doin. He said u would be fine with 14 or even 16. but whatevs i went with 12 cause it was a good deal too so. he said even the competition stuff doesnt need it (more than 12).

Originally Posted by GrandPrixGTP1

k so i bought 12 gauge and a 4 gauge wiring kit.
the guy said u would NEVER need more than 12 gauge for what im doin. He said u would be fine with 14 or even 16. but whatevs i went with 12 cause it was a good deal too so. he said even the competition stuff doesnt need it (more than 12).

The larger wire is just to make it look cool when you have a setup where you can see the back of the subs.

good grief.

Click here to calculate power loss vs. wire types

In the above calculator you'll notice that you don't lose very much power. In my own setup I calculated how much power I would lose at 600 watts using 16awg with a 5 foot run. It was approximately 12 watts. Assuming that everytime you double your power you only gain 3 decibels...

I would presumably lose .09 decibels. Large speaker wire doesn't accomplish anything...(sigh) unless of course you do SPL

Sorry for being a jerk. In car audio you always hear "well I do this..." Is there ever any hard evidence/science behind how and why? Car audio is riddled with snake oil marketing and I don't like it ;P

I run 0 gauge to the amps and 14-16 for the speakers. Can you buy stereo 10ga wire ?

Originally Posted by ck115

Well, to satisfy that calculator i should be running 8 guage :P But anyways, theres nothing wrong with going above recommended specs, especially with something as cheap as wire. If i could only have a 38 watt loss instead of 144 watts, i would choose the 38 watt loss.. Although that may only equate to a .41 db loss with 16 gauge wire, its nice to know that you can prevent these losses very easily... Plus, like Keithgtp said, thicker wire looks more impressive than little 16 gauge wire :P

And that's why car audio fell apart. People were more worried about perception than function. The end result is that most stereo's don't sound good. At least what is "perceived" as "good" equates to people throwing in subwoofers left and right. Not many people care about quality...as long as they're "bumpin"

Originally Posted by ck115

To an extent your right, but thats not the point. Using a thicker wire with less resistance is never going to harm your setup, only help it. Less resistance = less heat = win. For 1.50 a foot for 5, 6, 7, 8 feet is not a lot different than 1.00 a foot or whatever the cost is. If you want to be cheap, use thin wires.

typical more is better concept huh? Although we're talking a few dollars here that mentality applied elsewhere really hurts progress. To what extent does that mentality run over into the rest of the system?

Also, you did a good job of selling the idea but do you have any real world numbers that shows 16awg is "thin" for this given application? Does 16awg wire really put out that much heat that it's a safety concern? Do you really know how much wattage ACTUALLY goes through your wire playing music? Does anybody reading this know the definition of a watt and able to apply that knowledge functionally? Apply 20 watts(heat) to any mid and I can pretty much guarantee a fried coil. There's a reason people are scared of damaging their speakers with 30w solder guns *winkwink* I don't care what ratings you use in a discussion; music is VERY dynamic and specifications will NEVER give a clear perspective on hardware performance. Car audio is nothing more than a pissing contest these days. Anybody promoting that their subs are receiving "1000 continuous" watts as a daily driver is probably just having a hard time trying to expound on something they know nothing about.

You know what's really impressive? 130 decibels with 1 watt. There's a system out there with those claims. You know what...I believe it. There's also "passive" amplifiers that have no power and produce "5 watts" at very good sound levels.

I'm not mad at you...just tired of "this bish pushes 5k"...followed up with an install that has enough wiring to replace california's power grid. You know what I think is unsafe?...Big ass wire laying everywhere that's easily snagged and grounded out on panels or chassis because every time you try to tuck it away it still looks like you're trying to smuggle lil jon across town.

This rant also goes in line with those people that think they need to spend $100 on rca for a "clean signal"