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loose pos battery cable

eleft36 said:
My bolt has a 10mm hex head in addition to the phillips slots.

Not much room to get a wrench on it and no way to to use the slots.

Al

:USA
:CONNECTICUT
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Thats what I dont get --- the phillips slot for a screwdriver !? No way in the world to use a screwdriver on it installed!!! :yeahright
 
R. Lewis said:
Thats what I dont get --- the phillips slot for a screwdriver !?
Click to expand...

A perfect example of a designer not actually using the "Great Idea" he came up with. I bet he never even looked under the hood of his car. Much less tighten a bolt. :)
 
gator508 said:
Eleft, Hoop,

Thanks guys, I didn't think there was much to be done besides tighten it up really well. I think the cable connection could be better designed, just an alloy bolt of sorts with a phillips cross hatch on the head.
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Use the correct 12mm thin wall socket or wrench that fits the hex head, only use the phillips cross to speed tighten, not final torque. The fastener heads are too soft for phillips head only, to the torque specified in your manual...about 72 in-lbs for the cable, the eyelet fastener is around 65 in-lbs (few phillips fasteners could survive that much torque). :small3d007:
 
I have been riding bikes for many years and always had a similar method to attach battery's some times a captive nut sometimes a loose nut but 10mm open end spanner is the tool of choice for me need 2 if the nut is not captive

Brian
 
Only product I use on electrical connections is grease to keep them from corroding. Don't think I'd want to use any threadlock - might need to get the connection loose someday..;) Just gotta keep checking & tweaking, when needed.
 
You should disconnect the neg cable from the battery. This way you won't have too worry about shorting the wrench out on something. After you have the pos cable tight you can tighten the neg cable withou fear of sparks. This should be the way that you do all batteries.
kemo
 
Battery terminals do not become loose because the nut on the bolt turned counterclockwise on its own. They become loose because the heat of the current flow expands the terminals which compresses the soft lead and tinned copper connection. After the terminal cools the metals remain compressed. After this repeats a few dozen times, the terminal will now be "loose". After you take up this "slack" once or twice, the soft copper & lead can no longer compress and the terminal will remain tight.

Some of you may remember back in the early '70's when home were wired with aluminum wire and they had a ton of fires and problems. It was not the aluminum wire itself that was the problem. It was the screw terminals in the switches and receptacles that got "loose" all by themselves. It was due to the compression of the wire under the screw terminal from heat expansion & not the wire itself. We don't have soft aluminum but we have soft lead instead.

Take a new battery and cable. Install the cable and double nut the terminal. The terminal will still get loose from the initial soft metal compression.
 
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