Prove this please

[evermaxx]

Okay so a friend has an alright system

I was checking it out and I seen that his ground wire is 8g but his power wire is 4g.

I told him it could fry his amp because of this, im correct right?

He said its been fine, but I would hate for his amp to take a crap just because of a 4ft wire.

[FroznBeavrBALLs]

how much power?

[evermaxx]

Not much, its a 600w infinity amp.

[kam311]

Eh it's not the ideal situation but it'll probably be okay on 600w

[FroznBeavrBALLs]

i have heard that its ok for your ground to be 1 size smaller than your power. like Kam said, its not ideal but thats not alot of power. tell him to upgrade his ground to 4awg and he would be good.

[ALPINE408]

ground should be as big as power or you might as well just do everything in the smaller wire

in electronics the circute starts with the ground side not the power so ground is just as important as power if not even more important

can you fry an amp that way with big power yes your buddie is fine but it can perform much better with the right size wire

[Emoxihax]

depends on the distance of the wires

if the ground is literally right next to the amp where the power is from the battery up front

that would be fine

[SnowDrifter]

Your electrical system is just that. A system. It is only as strong as it's weakest link - in this case, the ground wire to the amp.

I don't think it will break anything - but it's certainly not ideal. IMHO get the biggest wire as is practical

[Wicks]

Kirchhoff's second law

The principle of conservation of energy implies that:

The directed sum of the electrical potential differences (voltage) around any closed circuit is zero, or:

More simply, the sum of the emfs in any closed loop is equivalent to the sum of the potential drops in that loop, or:

The algebraic sum of the products of the resistances of the conductors and the currents in them in a closed loop is equal to the total emf available in that loop.

Basically, the current throught the positive wire is the same as the current in the negative wire only in the opposite direction.

With 600W, you're only in the realm of ~40a so a short run of 8ga is fine.

The longer cable run should be the largest wire if you have to choose (assuming the smaller wire can still appropriately handle the current).

Extra resistance on the ground wire could lead to noise and ground loops.