Motor wire rewiring

[conrad13]

What is the best gauge for a lightly upgraded M4. Where is the best place to find this wire?

[aZn_triXta07]

R/C Hobby shops, the shop I go to recommends 18GA but I bet other skilled gunsmiths here will beg to differ :P

[DarkAngel]

the wiring is easy, home depot.
the issue is getting the proper motor clips
Ive been looking everywhere but i cant find small enough motor clips that fit the motor.

[Renegade)]

Originally Posted by DarkAngel

the wiring is easy, home depot.
the issue is getting the proper motor clips
Ive been looking everywhere but i cant find small enough motor clips that fit the motor.

Canadian Tire sells small crimp on clips. Just cut off the plastic use plyers to connect them to your wire ends, little bit of solder if you want, then heat shrink the whole thing up and your good to go.

[Syn]

I don't have 16 AWG but I have some 14 AWG 600V Nylon wire laying around. Is this any good or will it give too much resistance. How do I set up the multimeter to check? ie How many ohms should I set the dial to?

[CDN_Stalker]

#18AWG Teflon insulated wire is what's used in TM mechboxes, so it'll be fine. Where to get it................... anywhere that sells Beldon wire.

[Syn]

http://forums.airsoftmechanics.com/i...hp?topic=604.0

[CDN_Stalker]

Originally Posted by Syn

I don't have 16 AWG but I have some 14 AWG 600V Nylon wire laying around. Is this any good or will it give too much resistance. How do I set up the multimeter to check? ie How many ohms should I set the dial to?

Your meter, even if a mulit-decimal point display, will show only as much resistance as your leads have. Keep in mind (few seem to know this) that wire is typically given a resistance rating per 1000 feet. So your trying ot read the reisistance of a foot long piece of wire with even a $200 meter will show the same resistance as if you put both lead ends together with no wire in between.

And, because the motor is an inductive load, then you are dealing with impedance, not resistance.

Honestly, from what I recall of the wire charts at work, there is only a 1.5 ohm difference between #14AWG and #16AWG per thousand feet. Considering my 2 decimal point Fluke meter at work with leads connected shows a minimum of 0.3 ohms.................. don't bother to try to measure wire resistance with a multimeter.

BTW, I've wired up a G&P SPR with the same wire I mentioned above, #18AWG Teflon aerospace wire, and it barely heats up (nor does the motor) when pulling a 150SP spring back in rapid fire or semi.

[Syn]

Originally Posted by CDN_Stalker

snip

Honestly, from what I recall of the wire charts at work, there is only a 1.5 ohm difference between #14AWG and #16AWG per thousand feet. Considering my 2 decimal point Fluke meter at work with leads connected shows a minimum of 0.3 ohms.................. don't bother to try to measure wire resistance with a multimeter.

ok thanks, I thought it was nothing to worry about. I'm rewiring from the battery connector to the mechbox connector using that wire. The JG wire was flaky today, so I put in deans connectors and will be finishing up tomorrow. Test fired with the new wire seems fine.

[CDN_Stalker]

Originally Posted by Syn

ok thanks, I thought it was nothing to worry about. I'm rewiring from the battery connector to the mechbox connector using that wire. The JG wire was flaky today, so I put in deans connectors and will be finishing up tomorrow. Test fired with the new wire seems fine.

Good stuff.

Incidentally, I just about shat myself when Jackals/Chef dropped off his CA M14 for me to resolder his wire connection to his motor (it ripped out on him), I swear it was literally #22AWG STOCK wiring!?!?! Our typical wiring specs of old at work (aerospace wire) list #22AWG as being able to handle 5A confined, or 7.5A open air................ in an AEG............. yikes!

[gvanzeggelaar]

As for motor connectors uncompany.com has packs of 8 i think. Promotheus makes them

[m102404]

CDN_Stalker pointed me to the right sized connectors (4mm wide, sorry threw out the package, but my thread is in the Doc's section posted last week I think) found at Radio Shack, Home Depot/Rona, Canadian tire. They had a red plastic coating. They fit fine, but the ones I got have quite a long barrel/body, the end the wire attaches to not the terminal end. If you trim a bit off, they'll fit nicer in a grip. Little bit of solder and they hold really tight (but there's a thread somewhere here about crimping vs. soldering by guys that know a lot more about it than myself).

I've used 18guage "hobby" wire and 16guage High silicone wire. The 18guage stuff I picked up at Radio Shack is stiff (which makes routing the wires in the mechbox easy, but I'm finding it a bit of a pain for hooking up batteries in M4 stock tubes/crane stocks (it doesn't "fold/collapse" very nicely when you want to shorten the stock). The 16guage stuff is really nice for wiring up batteries.

Again, the above is just what I did (last night, rewired an old mechbox from front to rear) and there's certainly many others on the forum that are better at this and more-experienced than me.

Hope that helps

[CDN_Stalker]

With the stiffer wire what you can do is cut it longer next time you wire a stock, twist both wires together then wrap around a stick or something to make a coil such as what telephone cords used to be like. That way they compress easier, and pull out to do the battery hook ups. Not the best wire to use though (I use it because I have a fair bit of it) for that application, but it works and is more resistant to cuts.

[m102404]

I'll probably use up a bunch more (I've got spools of it as well) wiring it up as a coil as described. Would shrink wrapping the two wires together before coiling it help it keep it's "springy-ness"? or would it just make it too bulky? (for rear wired M4 aegs)

Bit off topic...but, any thoughts on the current MOSFET rigs? I've been looking at Gandalf's SW-AB-LONG setup from extreme-fire.com. He's working on a 3-round burst varient now and it's cool. Safe/semi/3rnd/FA. Semi works normally, but when you go to the normal FA position and do normal "single shot pulls" you get a 3rnd burst, then if you hold down the trigger for a little while longer it cuts into a normal full auto burst. Pretty neat.

If I go the mosfet route, I may put off cutting everything over to deans connectors until I get a couple of those units. I'll source some different wire at the same time and do a complete make over all at once.

Jeez...wish it was spring...then I'd be playing instead of endlessly tearing into my gear and messing around with stuff.

[CDN_Stalker]

Heat shrink would work better since you wouldn't have to twist the wires together.

As for MOSFET use in AEGs, I don't have a heck of a lot of knowledge about them.