battery terminal tech

RenegadeT

RenegadeT

no shirt,no shoes,no dice
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Mar 24, 2005
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Stokesdale-Greensboro
The ends of my 98 12V Ram's battery cables are pretty crappy, needing replacement. The negative ones can be pulled off with little effort, tightening them up is impossible.
These look good...http://www.pullpal.com/terminals/terminals.html
I'll be able to use my current cable, just need to solder lugs to them and bolt 'em to the terminals.
Can similar terminals be found locally, or is there a better solution?
 
Someone on here said that soldering terminals will weaken the wire at that point. Since I have never attempted it, then I would not try it. I have never had a problem with the crimp style. Also if you look around you can find a pos. or neg. cable with the ends already attached and all you have to do is remove the old cable and install a completely new one.
 
chassisguy said:
you;ll never be able to solder to old oxidized copper
Click to expand...
I do it all the time. I cut the cable back about one inch, & use Plumbers lead free solder with good plumbers flux. A plumbers propane torch (Bernzamatic) will do the trick. The key is to dunk the end in a bucket of water, right after the solder solidifies. This will remove the acid based flux so it won't corrode the copper. This method provides a much better connection than crimping. I just clamp the terminal in an old pair of vise grips then heat the terminal & fill it up 1/3rd of the way with melted solder. Then while keeping heat on the terminal slowly push the wire down into it.
 
I got my lugs all soldered to my cables, just need to reassemble everything. For the record, you should not fight gravity...remove the cable from the truck and insert the cut/prepped cable into lug full of solder from above. Otherwise you risk pouring molten hot solder on your hand :handed:

Where can you get heatshrink tubing large enough for battery cables? I've tried Lowe's and Northern, but forgot while at Napa.
 
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