Wire guage for winch?????

[boots]

Well had an exciting adventure today. Make a long story short we almost lost our 1 ton wrecker due to electrical fire. Mechanic wired it straight to a HD semi battery with 4 gauge wire, wich I'm sure was the first thing to catch. The short wires on the winch, from solenoid to winch motor are 2 gauge as sold. It's my contention that it should have been wired with the same from the battery actually should have probably been even larger, possibly 0 or even 00. I can't find my wiring chart right now nor could I find an amperage rating for the winch, REP8000, Your thoughts? Battery mounted Driverside front under hood, solenoid off center toward Passenger side so probably 3 feet of cable +/-.

Thanks
Shawn

 

[BobK]

I used 2g welding cable.connected right to the battery from the winch.

Here is a cross section of the orig. winch wire(red one) and the 2g welding wire.

 

[79Beast]

Really, the correct wire size depends on what winch you have and how long a run the wires make. I have a 8000 lb Ramsey that came with 4 guage and a Warn HS9500 that came with 2 guage. Both sets of cables are only about 3' long. If I was to have to replace the wires, I'd err to the side of overkill. That said, I've got 50' or so of 2/0 laying around that I'd use since I already have it. Unless you have to use really long cables, I think 0 guage would support pretty much any winch out there.

 

[gzzgfw]

I run a ramsey re10k worm gear winch. My battery is in back. I use 00 gauge copper.