What is the name of the red and black wires called?


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Old 07-04-14, 07:38 AM
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What is the name of the red and black wires called?

I have one of those LED lights (5mm) and it has a battery housing/case. There is a red wire and a black wire that comes out of the battery housing and eventually leads to the 5mm LED light bulb.

The wiring is way too short for me. I need to extend it by another 10-15 feet or so. The problem is I don't know what the wires are called. I'm sure this is very basic information for most of you experienced electricians, but I'm completely new to this stuff. I need to know what to call those wires so that I can ask the store if they have 15 feet of it.
 
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Old 07-04-14, 07:49 AM
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Its called wire... Try to read the side of the wire and see if it has a size - its probably 24 AWG at most.

Then go to the store and ask for XX Gauge wire. If you can't see anything on the wire then you need to work out what the amperage requirement is. Again if its 3 AA batteries or something then I would just get the same size wire as what you have in the device (take the whole thing to the store). You'll also need a way to connect the two wires together.
 
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Old 07-04-14, 07:52 AM
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It's just called wire. 18 gauge wire from the auto pats store or thermostat wire or lamp cord or speaker wire. With a low amp battery set up it doesn't much matter. Most of us would just use what was laying around in or junk room.
 
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Old 07-04-14, 06:35 PM
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thanks! Do I need to solder the wires on to extend the length or can I just twist them together (the tips)?
 
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Old 07-04-14, 07:02 PM
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Not sure what tips are but cut the existing wire about two or three inches from the end and splice wire to wire.You can solder or use butt connectors or use wire nuts. Twist is not the best way but usually works.
 
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Old 07-05-14, 04:20 AM
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Thanks. So I ended up finding some wiring from a computer shop. The guy just cut me some long wiring and just gave it to me for free. It's much thicker than the LED wiring but he said it doesn't matter, in fact the thicker wires are better.

So I took it home, soldered the ends and made the wiring long enough to go from my driver's seat travel along the floor and up the side of the rear seat and behind it then up along the trunk framing and affixed it onto my rear cam as it did not originally have a blinking LED light.

This way I can just turn it on and off with the switch by my seat instead of always having to go to my rear seat and turn it on and off everyday (it's not connected to the car 12v battery but self-powered by 2 AAA batteries).

I took a pic also of the end result as you can see the bright red LED flashing blinker right under my rear cam.
 
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Old 07-05-14, 04:30 AM
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I have a couple more questions to ask:

1) for the battery housing, I simply used velcro (attached one piece to the back of the housing case and stuck the other piece on a flat surface). So when I want to take it off to change batteries, I can just remove it easily and then put it back on (instead of re-taping it using double-sided tape).

But I thought of even a better idea. What about using thin magnet plates? Can I just stick a magnet plate on the flat surface and then the other magnet plate on the back of the housing case and then stick onto the magnet plate? It would be easy to take off and put back objects. What kind of magnet pairs do I need for this? I'm sure they have to be the opposites so they attract and not repel?


2) I know that when I leave the batteries (AA or AAA or 9V) in the car, it can get very hot during the daytime and the temp inside the car I'm sure can reach very high levels. This would be bad in the long-term shelf life of batteries right? I was wondering, would wrapping the housing case that has the batteries in it with thermal reflective tape (ie. gold tape or even something cheaper like aluminum foil) help to keep the temperature down for the batteries or will it not make much of a difference to even bother?
 
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Old 07-05-14, 04:59 AM
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I thought you were running this camera setup off 12v DC car batteries. Where do the 1 1/2v or 9v batteries come in to play? Aluminum foil or tape will give absolutely zero insulative qualities. You will need to use xps foam or similar. Where is the battery pack located? Certainly not in the rear windshield
 
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Old 07-05-14, 08:42 AM
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ah, I will clarify. My 2-channel car cam (front and rear cam) are both connected to the 12V car battery. I'm still looking for options to add another camera (whether it be car cam or just a cheap camcorder) to be self-powered (via external battery pack of some sort) as I don't want to add another camera setup to my car battery and drain it even more. This 5mm red LED light I just added is for the rear camera because the rear camera doesn't have it's own flashing LED signal so I thought I'd just add my own LED flashing light powered by 2 AAA batteries in a housing case and wires extended to go all the way to the back of the car. It has an ON/OFF switch on the casing so I can turn it off during the daytime and turn it on when I'm parked overnight.
 
 

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