New Gen neg battery cables

SHALER

Member

In a cold climate, Are the braided negative battery cables 50 year old products that are begging to be replaced by 1/0 cable or some decent equivalent?
 
I'm not a big fan of the flat braided cables. I use round cables and haven't had any problems. They are more flexible and fit under the platform better.
 
. Right from the neg of each 12V Battery to a starter mounting bolt with a beefy cable . None of those cables from the bulk bin a Walmart. No bolt on battery cable ends either .
Even just 0.5Volts makes a difference in cranking rpm. It is common to loose 1.0V to 2.0V in a relatively good looking system . Using a volt meter across each connection while cranking will find surprisingly high resistance connections.
 
There's a place for them if some flexing is needed and not a lot of room, but you'd be better off with welder ground cable for a flexible link. When making cables find "tinned" ends not just plain copper, and then crimp, solder, and heat shrink coating and get this from a truck/tractor repair shop.
 
I was in walmarts the other day and noticed some new battery cables. they have more of a wrap around steel band on them. had them on a 8n once. really a good terminal fix. short ones were 4.84, I would check them out the next time our there.
 
You asked a pretty vague question.

But buick got it right...

It's easy to use a voltmeter and look for voltage drop across various parts of the system.

Doing that will narrow down what's bad.
 
To clarify Bob, here's the deal - the 3010 and 3020 both start relatively "normal" in cold weather. They do have tank heaters that I use. So no critical issue at the moment. But I have seen mention of good cables as critical to cold winter starting referenced numerous time. Would not be much of an investment in materials and time to replace the braided cables, so I thought I would ask if they would be considered a 'weak link".
 
(quoted from post at 12:46:36 12/04/18) To clarify Bob, here's the deal - the 3010 and 3020 both start relatively "normal" in cold weather. They do have tank heaters that I use. So no critical issue at the moment. But I have seen mention of good cables as critical to cold winter starting referenced numerous time. Would not be much of an investment in materials and time to replace the braided cables, so I thought I would ask if they would be considered a 'weak link".

Yes, I understood you.

And it is really easy to grab a voltmeter and check the voltage drop across each cable while cranking, then you will know FOR SURE where the "weak link"/most voltage drop is and you can clean connections and/or replace cable(s) accordingly.
 
An easy way is to use a voltmeter connected to each end of the cable. Without cranking, the voltmeter should show 0V.
Then when you crank, the voltmeter should read the loss of tension. Stay safe.
 

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