siamese with 18ga or 20ga?

[fas 0]

For 12v cameras does anyone use siamese cable with 20 ga wire instead of 18ga? There are some places that sell the siamese with 20 ga and it's cheaper. I'm guessing the only factor would be how long of a run, but 20 ga should be safe, right? The 20ga should even be easier to work with.

[jeromephone 6]

I would not mess with the 20 ga how much can you really save? 18 ga is easy to work with and you can get a longer run without a voltage drop.

[cachecreekcctv 0]

I agree on the 18 versus 20 guage verdict. Wouldn't use 20 guage at all. Check out current carrying capacity of both. Especially when using 12 VDC. There is a reason that Electrical Codes have minimum sizes for residential,commercial, industrial, etc. Even have used 16 guage THHN many times. Must run THHN in conduit , though. Check this out for yourself though.

[securitymonster 0]

18g here...

[rory 0]

what type of 12V cameras?

 

If they are cheap Bullet cameras, sure, in fact just use some all in one video/power RCA cables .. just watch the distance.

[fas 0]

nuvico day/night ir. I will stick with 18ga. I just wanted to see if anyone else was using 20ga and how it holds up.

[rory 0]

with IR i would stick to 18AWG regardless of the camera ... just in case.

 

PS. that is a cheap bullet

[JMANOFNVS 0]

Where did you see 20ga siamese? I have never even heard of it. Here is a link to some usefull info on this kinda stuff although the wire guage calculator is for 24vac. http://www.pelco.com/support/tools/ and this one is good too http://www.westpenn-cdt.com/techref.html

[rory 0]

OEM cable tends to be 20AWG

[fas 0]

I looked at so many places recently I forgot where I saw 20ga. I remember it was cheaper though, but not by much. I am not going to use it anyway.

[Jasper 0]

It is around. It has its uses, but not for a professional job.

 

I bought some awhile back. Ended up buying the better siameese cable. Glad I did because that thin stuff would not pull well and was just generally cheap. Which is what I paid for it so I wasn't too suprised.

[rory 0]

Jasper I think you had the all in one cable that has Power and Video Plugs right? If so that is RCA, i just used one of them for a bullet camera install. It was 150' cable so I cut it down to the distance i needed.

[Jasper 0]

I don't know for sure. I never cut the cable like you wanted me too, to check it out. It was advertised as RG59 95% copper braid siameese calbe? You know where I got it from so you probably know what type it is, although they have two types of the thin type. One might be the RCA stuff and the other one is the stuff I bought.

 

I don't know. All I know is the stuff was really thin and I wouldn't pull it around any corner or over any raw wood.

 

So was it the same stuff I bought that turned out to be plain RCA cable?

[rory 0]

should have seen the one i just ran, though it was 150' my distance was only maybe 50-70', from a bedroom, through a hole in a 3 foot thich wall, tie strapped along with other cable (tested it as I went to make sure no interference), across then up then across again, then off on its own stapled to a wooden beam for about 15 feet and into a weather resistant gang box ... where i left slack inside and spliced the end to where i cut it. Covered the gang box in clear silicone and good to go ...