Is 6 gauge good enough for 20 foot jumper cables?

[Karl Williamson]

I got a good price for these; half as much as for 4 gauge. I presume these are suitable mostly. Any expert advice would be appreciated

 

[mattadams]

Karl - first things first, 20 feet seems like an awful lot of jumper cable. I believe mine are around about 10 feet long? You tend to loose electricity the longer and the less guage. I'd say they'd probably get the battery started and temporarily charged but it might take a while longer, and they might not last as long. Someone correct me here...

 

[flyguy]

Hmm...I was pondering using some extra speaker wire at one point....

nick

 

[Maniak]

We have 2 long sets of jumper cables.. The one I made was 20 feet long using 2 guage wire.. Works great.. never gets warm..

The latest one we bought is 20 feet long using 4 guage wire.. never had any problems with it..

We always buy the longer onces since it never fails that the vehicle we need to jump is someone elses and we can't get to the front of the vehicle.. It is nice to just pull in behind them and run the cable.

If I can find my chart I'll post it which shows how many amps you can safely draw per foot per wire size..

 

[EB Bauer]

I just ripped of the cables from an arch welder and made my own. They are big but sure get the job done quick!

 

[Tom Wilk]

I agree with Maniak; I had to jump start my Ranger a couple of years ago, and I could not get my car in front of it. I ended up using some #6 stranded copper I had laying around to extend my 12 foot cables. The #6 along with all the extra connections barely had the capacity to start the poor thing.

Go with the #4, make sure it is copper, and make sure that the jaws have a strong grip. You want as good a connection as you can get.

 

[Kyle K.]

big bad jumpers

we run big ... 2 awg to 2/0 awg to the front and rear bumper , or thereabout, then use welding lead connectors, then 10 - 15 foot 2 awg jumpers, hope this helps.