extending remote start wires?

I'm not familiar with that particular alarm so I don't know if it has built in relays or external relays, but in either case I would run small wires between the brain and the dash and then install relays for each high current signal under the dash.

If the relays are external you can just extend the coil wires.

It would end up being a lot cleaner install instead of having a bunch of 10-12 awg wires running all over the car!

If they are external you just mount them under the dash and extend the small wires that control them.  If they are internal then you have to add a few more.  The advantage here is that you don't have to worry about wire size issues.

You won't get one answer to this question because this isn't standard practice.  There are too many unknown variables.  If you want to determine the "correct" answer you would need to take current draw measurements off of each wire you are trying to power and then find a wire with enough ampacity and minimal voltage drop for the loads you are working with.

However, in general, when extending large wires, it is good practice to size them up one guage.  You will also need to really think about the size of the power wire you are using, as it too may need to be resized.  Again, ampacity and voltage drop will be your two points you need to control.

KPierson wrote:

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If they are external you just mount them under the dash and extend the small wires that control them.  If they are internal then you have to add a few more.  The advantage here is that you don't have to worry about wire size issues.

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There can't be only two external relays for a remote start system, there are generally 4-5. 

Let me try to answer your question another way.  The wire was sized to deliver 30A with minimal voltage drop for the length of wire supplied.  If you extend the wire, the current capacity won't change, but the voltage drop will.  The voltage drop will be based on the current draw of the wires you are hooking in to.  Since we don't know what kind of car you are talking about (or more importantly the current draw of each wire) it is impossible for us to give solid advice. 

In this case, if you are dead set on mounting the alarm in a non traditional location, I would AT LEAST use bigger wire for all the heavy gauge stuff.  You may be able to get away without doing it, but since you don't really know what you are doing you should do things as safely as possible.

Why exactly are you wanting to mount the alarm some place else?

I regularly clamp ampmeter wires from the starters you would be suprised how low the current draw is on most wires even though they use heavy wire.

Usually the parking lights draw more than any other switched power.

sorry for confusing you, all the wires at some point will connect to the brain, but if your wires are low current trigger wires used to activate relays that invert polarity then what we're sayin is you would simply have to lengthen these thin gauge wires and locate the trigger relays for the remote start close to the connection points which would result in you not having to extend  the heavy gauge wires,i'm not famliar with the unit you have, so answer me this, is the wires you you want to lengthen heavy gauge or light gauge.

So your remote start wires are internal to the brain.  I don't know what the other two relays are - possibly starter kill and trunk pop or even door locks? 

I personally don't think you'll gain anything by doing what you want to do - it won't make the care more secure - it will just make the installation more difficult and give the installation a much higher chance of failure (and could possibly cause issues with the car).

If you are dead set on extending those wires though, I would go with Lonerangers advice and at least go up one wire size.  Make sure you solder all the connections (any other type of splice in this application is begging for failure) and insulate the splices well.