6/4 SOOW ampacity rating for Progressive HW50C installation

kdubinwa

Well-known member
I need to grab 4-5 feet of 6/4 SO wire for installation of my HW50C in a Bighorn 3160EL. Home Depot has 6/4 SOOW rated at "45 amps" and Lowes has 6/4 SOOW rated at "36 amps per conductor".

Will either work for my install?

Note: I was a little surprised to see a cable rating below 50 amps at Home Depot. With twin hot leads in 50 amp service the 36 amps per conductor rating at Lowes sounded more reasonable, but an electrician I am not... Can someone please clarify?

Kurt
 

Bohemian

Well-known member
I need to grab 4-5 feet of 6/4 SO wire for installation of my HW50C in a Bighorn 3160EL. Home Depot has 6/4 SOOW rated at "45 amps" and Lowes has 6/4 SOOW rated at "36 amps per conductor".

Will either work for my install?

Note: I was a little surprised to see a cable rating below 50 amps at Home Depot. With twin hot leads in 50 amp service the 36 amps per conductor rating at Lowes sounded more reasonable, but an electrician I am not... Can someone please clarify?

Kurt

Take this with a grain of uncertainty. I am not informed in electrical standards. There are two (2) hot leads in rv 50 amp service. Each capable of half the current. That seems to me to be 25 amp per leg.
 

avvidclif

Well-known member
Big grain of uncertainity. Each leg is capable of 50A for a total of 100. To hook up the PI surge protector all you need is 6-3 w/g NM-B. The SOO would be nice as it's flexible and the NM-B is solid and STIFF but the NM-B is rated 55A.
 

sjandbj

Well-known member
SO and SOOW 6/4 carry the same ratings. I would question Lowes rating as that does not match anything I found from the manufacture’s web sites regarding this cable. The SOOW is a newer cable rating. When you think about most of the cords that connect the 5er to the outside pedestal they are 3 conductors of 6 gauge and a 8 gauge wire. The 8 gauge wire is only used as a safety ground so it can be a smaller gauge wire. I the V there are 2 hot legs and each one is connected to a 50 amp circuit breaker.Since there is no 220 volt appliances in the fifth wheel all the return goes thru the white lead. I am not a certified electrician but it seems to me if the 50 amp cords that connect the trailer to the main power can be 6/3 with one 8 gauge ground the the 6/4 would also work.

Regards,
Steve
 

Gaffer

Well-known member
Check out this table http://www.stayonline.com/reference-circuit-ampacity.aspx
Do not use solid wire. There is a reason why you won't find any in your truck or car. You wiggle solid wire back and forth enough (vibration) and eventually it will break. The shorter the wire, the greater the ampacity regardless of the tables. #6 is plenty big for this purpose. You will never use 50 amps.
 

jhardin

Well-known member
I may be reading this thread wrong but, the progressive instructions state to use 6/4 stranded wire. There are places to tie down the Red, White and Black . There are 2 press on connectors that comes with the protector that are to be pressed onto each end of the Green wire and then attached (by screws or bolts) to the inside wall of the surge protector. Be sure to keep the input and output correct.
 
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