made a serious extension cord

[tinamcjittles]

Woww, just a hair deeper and would've been perfect :/

 

[mckutzy]

Wow... The Avalanche is 18.44'. I've never heard of a tiny garage like that before, a 300c would barely fit...IF.... My Fifth Avenue would be the same...
Crikey that's small...

 

[supermanotorious]

yeah, it's missing the "sidewalk" that is usually at the back of the garage along the wall with the door in to the house, oh well, we have a HUGE carport too so the boat and Avalanche can go under there, in fact I just might move the boat this weekend which should really prolong the life of the cover

 

[supermanotorious]

I'm now wondering if I could use 6ga as an extension cord for my 12,000lb recovery winch, I know you generally want heavy heavy wire and I have 4ga installed on the truck now, I imagine it would be ok in a pinch and probably for sure if not maxing the winch out, the idea behind this is mounting the winch to the rear hitch in case that's the only way out

 

[anderkart]

I'm now wondering if I could use 6ga as an extension cord for my 12,000lb recovery winch, I know you generally want heavy heavy wire and I have 4ga installed on the truck now, I imagine it would be ok in a pinch and probably for sure if not maxing the winch out, the idea behind this is mounting the winch to the rear hitch in case that's the only way out

4-gauge cable is fine for a front mounted winch because the cable is only 3' to 5' long. A long battery cable running to the rear of your truck should be 1 or 2 gauge, because that long distance is going to create a lot more resistance while under a heavy load.

You could probably save money by using two strands of 6-gauge as your positive cable, and then ground your winch to the trucks frame back there. Although you'd need to make absolutely sure your trucks batteries have a (4-gauge or larger) ground cable connected directly to the trucks frame, not just to the trucks body...

 

[B.M.800]

Sid is one of my bros, he knows the things I create and or fix, so it's no surprise to me, he is surprised I cant think of a simple solution to this issue

to elaborate, the old house went live on the market this past Friday, if I get the asking price there is enough equity to buy a <2,000 sq ft steel building on our new land and all of my tools will be moved there, the garage is a temporary workstation as I have orders placed and must meet deadlines, and for now, that big ol' cable is coiled on the garage floor and we found out during the closing period, my truck doesn't fit in there, that should tell you it's not the biggest/deepest garage out ther

You know if you get going fast enough you'll make er fit!

I just got about 25ft of 6/3 Im making an extension cord for the ole buzzbox.

 

[anickode]

I'm now wondering if I could use 6ga as an extension cord for my 12,000lb recovery winch, I know you generally want heavy heavy wire and I have 4ga installed on the truck now, I imagine it would be ok in a pinch and probably for sure if not maxing the winch out, the idea behind this is mounting the winch to the rear hitch in case that's the only way out

I wouldn't. A 6 ton winch can easily draw 300 amps. 4awg is barely sufficient for even a short run and low duty cycle at that kind of load. 20' of 6awg would likely just melt. If it didnt, the power loss would be huge.

You can buy duplex welding cable, however. That's heavy gauge welding cable that is molded together like lamp cord. Just big.

Shoot, get a real long set of 4+ gauge jumper cables and lop the clamps off. I have a 25' set of 2awg cables in my truck... Can't remember what they cost, but it wasn't crazy expensive.

Do you use Anderson connectors? If not, something to look into.

A quick voltage drop calculation below. 24' of 6awg (seems a reasonable distance to reach the back of a truck from the front with some working slack) at 300 amps would yield 8.3 volts to your winch. And that's assuming your battery and alternator are big enough to handle a 300a load with no no voltage sag, which is unlikely.

Mind you the 300a is just an arbitrary number. My old 6 ton WARN could draw nearly 400 amps at full load.

 

[supermanotorious]

funny you should mention that, check out this thread and this one, my dad just made a 2ga extension for his truck so he can connect the winch to the rear hitch using the Anderson quick disconnects