gauge of wire, battery to fuse wiring

Hey all,

I have two questions here... I am currently wiring up my Santa Fe with Aux Lights and a quite a few electronics (for storm chasing) however I want to ensure that I am wiring this correctly to ensure that no fires or melting of wires will happen. I am looking at wiring power from the battery, through a fuse, into a main relay which runs to a fuse box and other relays



The 6 other relays are powering 8 pairs of lights (16 lights 55w each)The first question is what gauge wire should I use for this?

The second question is can I do either of the following and if so, whats the best choice?

Option A


Option B


Option B(2)


Thank you ahead of time for your help!

Option B is probably the most logical, reliable, safest. If you were to do the "double wire" method if 1 wire were to somehow fail either from being damaged or otherwise disconnected you would then be drawing an excessive amount of current through the remaining wire causing an unsafe condition possibly resulting in a fire. There exist on the web many charts and calculators for figure what gauge wire you need for a given amount of power being drawn. Also err on the high side though and go to a bigger size if you are unsure. Also, you may want to eliminate the relay on the lighting side as it is unnecessary if each pair of lights will have its own relay, and would need to be of a rather high current carrying capacity which increases the cost quite a bit. You would be better served to have the main power wire for the lighting come from the battery to a fuse block (obviously with an appropriately sized inline fuse close to the battery) and have a fuse for powering each set of lights and run those circuits to the appropriate relays for each lighting pair, and then maybe have an additional fuse just to provide power for the switching logic, i just did that basic idea in my jeep a few weeks ago.

Having your other accessories such as radio equipment on a fuse block controlled by a relay surely could be beneficial so as to allow simple on and off of all accessories at once, just watch out for radio and other equipment that needs constant power to retain memories, in which case they must not have the power removed and can be turned on and off only from the device itself.

If you have any more questions feel free to drop me a msg.