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5V Line on PC Power Supply
PL1:
--- Quote from: whynotpizza on June 12, 2013, 06:05:33 am ---Do you think 22gauge wire (single stand for Ground and multi-strand for Power) is enough to handle this small amount of current?
--- End quote ---
This table indicates that 22AWG should be good for power transmission up to 0.92 Amps.
Scott
lilshawn:
i wouldn't push 22ga far or high...and i'll tell you why...
a weird thing happens with small wire gauge, you end up with "loss" in the wire, this is because the diameter of the conductor is small. It's only a couple of milliohms, but the wire itself has a little bit of resistance. this problem gets worse as the current it carries gets bigger... This is because the wire can actually heat up making this problem even worse in several orders of magnitude. (as temperature increases so does resistance.)
22 ga wire has 16 ohms of resistance over 1000ft (ideally, and of course NOTHING is ideal) so a foot has .016 ohms which isn't much, but you start throwing high current and high temps at that wire, it's likely to get pretty high. Don't forget you'll need to double that because you have 1 wire for positive and another for the neg.
in conclusion, if you are going a short distance (maybe less than 1 or 2 feet) it's probably fine, if you have 6 feet to get there, I'd choose something bigger or move your power supply closer to where you need.
I would also stick to stranded not solid wire. if you flex solid, it has a chance of breaking. I guess if it's all you got and the wire will never move go for it.
Don't be afraid to splurge on a few rolls wire, it's cheap and it never goes bad. it never hurts to have extra laying around, you never know when you need an extra clothesline or need to hang up some parts to paint.
MonMotha:
550mA (about half an amp) on AWG22 is probably fine over a few feet, but in general I like to use no smaller than AWG18 for power transmission in appliances. The reason has just as much to do with mechanical strength as it does electrical issues. A lot of people use AWG20 for this, but I prefer to only stock #22 and #18.
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