Almost Died
 

Or at the very least almost burned myself to death.

So I am a pretty good with wires and electrical, but I have a question, how many AMPs does a battery put out?

So doing a little modifications, wiring in some lights and a radar detector to get away from all the wires in the way. So instead of tapping into another wire for power to keep from overloading anything I decided to run wires straight from the battery, insert a heavy duty Inline Fuze with a 20 amp fuze in the engine bay, Used 10-12 gauge wire to run it to a 20 amp switch I installed. I ran 14 gauge wire to the radar detector and ran more 14 gauge wire for the lights i will install later.

The weird part is yesterday night I tested everything and it all went well, radar detector ran fine and no wires went into meltdown! Now today i hooked everything up and was about to back together and I had a feeling that i should check everything again, I put the Fuze in and flipped the switch, BAM wire meltdown, smoke filled the interior, luckily nothing was burned or damaged except for the wires.

Soooo luckily the fuze popped and nothing got out of control.

Do i need to up my wire size?

I have looked around for amperage amount but haven't found anything.

You have a short circut somewhere my friend!! 10g wire is fine and 14g is good also for most normal 12volt loads like a radar detector, radio, ect...
What kind of lights are you using??? Most cheap foglamp kits use 16g wires so I don't see a prob if they are interior lamps.

First of all - "almost" doesn't count.
Second - the battery doesn't "put out" amps. It just supplies as much as you can pull from it. A healthy battery can supply over 100 amps for a short duration. That said, it takes very, very little current to kill you. So, I guess the proper answer to your question is "enough to actually kill you".
Third - Step away from the wiring. You are totally out of your element. Upping the wire power handling capability will just allow us to remove the "almost" from your thread title.
Get help from someone that knows what they are doing so that doesn't happen.

100 amp ain't nothin I play with that while ankle deep in water.......Good stuff

The specs for your radar detector should say how much current it draws. Amperage for your light is just the wattage divided by 12 volts. You can look up what size wire is appropriate.

It's hard to electrocute yourself with a 12 volt battery. It takes a couple of tenths of an amp (more or less) to kill, and usually body resistance is high enough to stay below that. But the safety margin is only an order of magnitude. Fairly easy to kill yourself with 110 volt house current, lots easier with 220, and even an moron can succeed with a 600 volt subway third rail.

But you can sure start a nice fire or get some great burns from the hundred+ amps that a shorted battery can put out.

Ken

I can tell you that the way you hook your wires up are totally wrong.

You should let someone who knows what they're doing to handle this

Death in 3D I'm at the movies! anyway, you should re-step your steps.

Well, a car battery will theoretically put out about 600 'cold cranking' AMPs...

My radar detector (a Valentine One) will draw less than ONE AMP. (and is fused accordingly at 1.5 amp)

The wire size between the cigar lighter and the radar detector, as supplied from Valentine (22 gauge telephone cord @ ~ 10 feet) will handle about 5 radar detectors.

So, wire size isn't your problem. The Fuse isn't you problem.


Wiring is your problem!

As MM said:
Something is pulling current. I'd guess that you have a short to ground, somewhere. Hopefully, you can just remove all that you have tried to do. If not, finding wiring problems is where the experts get the big bucks.

Good luck.

ps. Search.... There are threads here about hard-wiring your Radar detector, and what existing circuit to tap. Me, I just use an add-a-fuse from the kick panel & run the wire up the A pillar and under the headliner.

RX-8 Batteries, basically 3 were/are used during the cars production life..all 12 Volt naturally.

Early models had a 50 Amp Hour Rating
Later Models (after Starter upgrade) went to a 75 AMP Hour Rating.
Series II RX-8's went to an 80 AMP Hour Rating.

AMP Hour rating is the number of Amps that can be drawn from a battery until it is totally discharged or flat.

Most cars have a 50 AMP Hour Rating which means you can draw 4 Amps for just over 12 hours before Flat, or 2.5 amps for 20 hours.
So an 80 AMP Hour can do 2 amps for 40 hours, 4 amps for 20 hours...

This is to show how long it takes a battery to discharge or run flat...it is just a reference as to a Batteries Discharge rate, generally speaking the higher the AMP Hour the more devices can be run from it without sacrifice when more AMPS are required at engine start or crank.
As an example the Engine Immobilizer and Car Alarm (if fitted) was draining too much power overnight so Mazda increased the batteries AMP hour rate.

AMP Hour has nothing to do with Actual Cranking AMPS used Cold or Hot.

As others have suggested a short in your cabling and or the device you are installing.
For any wire to melt from a short your breaker fuse is there to protect wiring and the device itself is too heavy. If your device is drawing 2 AMPS then why are you using a 20 AMP fuse?

Check you are also "Earthing (-) Grounding" your device correctly.
Have you accidentally damaged or cut the outer insulation on the "supply line +" against any metal or cars bodywork (Ground -)??