A couple of wiring questions

[stephenp1983]

This will be my first attempt at wiring so I just want to make sure I understand everything.  I have a u360 joystick with the wiring harness that will go to 8 buttons.  I will not be using a seperate intereface.  The ground wire on the harness won't be long enough so I'm going to have to get some more.  So here are my questions:

1.  Do I need to get solid or stranded wiring.
2.  Does anyone know the guauge of the wire that is on the harness?  I think it says 26 awg, and does anyone know where I can find wire like this.  Home depot didn't have any that small.
3.  This is similar to the tool I bought will it be sufficient for crimping the quick connects:http://www.homedepot.com/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/ProductDisplay?storeId=10051&langId=-1&catalogId=10053&productId=100352047
4.  When stripping the wire for daisy chaining the ground how much wire should I have exposed, and do I just twist it on to another end of the wire and put it in the quick connects and crimp?

[stuckpixel]

Solid or stranded will work fine. Really depends on what you like working with. Stranded is a bit more pliable, but either should be fine.

As far as where to get it, any electronics store (or Radio shack if all else fails) should have the wire.

The link didn't work for me, so I can't tell you whether the tool is good or not, but if it's a crimper it's probably fine.

Twisting the wire works fine, just need to make sure that both hit the contact on the quick-disconnect one way or another.

[stephenp1983]

Is the contact the little metal peice that sticks up next to where you slide the button micro switches on?

Here it is:

[stephenp1983]

I think I'll need a wire stripper that has a bigger gauge.  That one stops at 22 or 20 I believe.   I didn't see any at homedepot that went any to 26.

[crashwg]

I believe higher gauge would be the correct terminology for what you are looking for.  Bigger gauge would be a smaller number...

As for the questions. 

1. I'll second that it doesn't make an awful lot of difference.  It's really a matter of taste with this application.

2. For the gauge of wire you use I'd say to just go with the closest thing you can find at the first store you go to.  At the voltages we're talking about it makes no difference.  I probably wouldn't use anything larger than maybe 18g though...

3. The tool pictured will work just fine for crimping.

4. You want to strip enough wire so that when inserted into the QD the bare wire is just barely past the crimped part.  And yes, twist, stick and crimp.

[Kaytrim]

I personally use 20 gauge stranded wire.  It handles crimping better than solid wire.  The solid wire can break if you crimp to hard.

[stephenp1983]

The wire I bought on accident was around 18 and it seems to big.  It's also solid, and I can definately see how it could easily break.  I'm going to go to radio shack and look for either 20 or something around that.  I guess it won't matter if whats on the harness now is a little higher of a gauge will it.

[stephenp1983]

Last question and I think I'll have everything covered.  When crimping do I just want to smash together quick connect from end to end, or should I only be crimping it one time?

[Kaytrim]

One time should be enough as long as you squeeze hard enough.  Also make sure you use the crimp setting that is the same or slightly smaller than the wire gage.  A little practice is necessary to get a good crimp.  Test the crimp by lightly pulling the wire out of the QD once or twice to make sure you have a good connection.  If the wire comes out you didn't crimp hard enough.

TTFN