How much welding cable to rewire a Precedent?

[yawood]

I'm sure this has probably been covered before but I can't find the answer in a search.

I am planning to make my own cables from multi-strand 2 gauge welding cable. How much cable will I need to buy to make the set (all the battery cables plus the A1 and A2 cables)? The cart is a 2012 Precedent.

[Wakko47]

Are you crimping or soldering? Have you done it before? I only ask because I just did SWMBO's Precedent and soldered. A couple of the cables didn't come out just right, and while they were 100% functionional, they didn't look as good as I wanted, so I redid them. I ordered enough wire to do three carts (75 feet @ $1.34) and have extra.

[yawood]

Crimping and no, I haven't done it before. I would have thought that 25 feet was excessive but you did say that you had extra. I thought about 15 feet would have done it (without stuff-ups) but that's why I asked. Thanks for your input.

[Sergio]

I think it takes a total of about 17 feet of cable for the entire cart, I can lookup my exact lengths for each cable later.

Definitely crimp only and make sure there are no "ears" on the lug as most inexpensive hydraulic crimper dies are undersized meaning you will need to use a die one or two sizes larger than the cable gauge.

Use a sharp shear cut cable cutter for a clean cut.

Use good quality closed end lugs with corrosion protection and glue lined shrink tube.

[NoleFan4Ever]

I also used Walt's trick of the old A1/A2's over to F1/F2. Low current need for sure, but a heavier/stronger cable for longer duration and durability.

[wienerdog63]

What is this trick of A1/A2 to F1/F2 ?

[Wakko47]

Sergio, what’s wrong with soldering? I read a number of threads prior to doing it and didn’t see any negatives. In hindsight I’d rather have crimped, since the soldering was a small hassle and more expensive.

[Sergio]

Most crimp vs solder threads end up in heated arguments of opinions, but specific to large gauge cables, there are no industries that recommend solder, some of the reasons:

• The thermal mass of the large gauge copper cable requires a lot of heat to properly solder.
• Excessive heat on the cable has a tendency to separate the jacket from the copper strands and it allows for corrosive gasses to permeate up the cable.
• The solder tends to creep up the cable due to capillary effect and it creates several fulcrum points that can easily brake.
• It creates two metallic surface connections (copper-to-solder and solder-to-lug) instead of a single direct copper to lug connection.
• A proper crimp connection forms a gas tight connection that does not allow corrosive gasses.
• A proper crimp connection provides better physical connection independent of temperature.

By proper crimp crimp connection I mean using good quality closed end lugs matched with the proper die and crimper (not the hammer type) that makes the strands become a solid mass.

You should always use glue lined heat shrink tube to better protect the gap between the cable jacket and the lug.

Another factor in the industries that field terminate large cables is that it is very easy to verify a proper crimp connection since there are simple gauges that you can slide on the final product to make sure the crimp has achieved the proper compression.

There is no way to properly field test the solder connection and some of the possible damaged caused by heat is extremely dependent of the ability of the person soldering even if they done several times before it is difficult to guarantee the quality.

I think for DIYs it is much easier to get a good quality crimp even if you have no experience doing it which is not the case with solder and its required preparation and technique.


Some reference images for the proper die since a lot of inexpensive hydraulic crimpers have metric dies that do not translate well to SAE sizes.

The image below used the same 1/0 dies to crimp a 1/0, 2ga and 4ga cable.

You want the final crimp to look like the one on the 4ga cable that used the 1/0 crimp, no visible ears that indicate strands have been crushed:

When properly crimped the pressure turns the stranded cable into a virtually (for the sake of argument) solid mass that is gas tight:

[PingEye3]

Ditto to everything Sergio said (though a hammer crimp hit 3 times with a 2# sledge has worked for me for years)

Here is a link to those high quality lugs Sergio mentioned. These are for 5/16 studs. Good for everything except for when the 400MJZ solenoid is used, which requires 3/8"
https://www.mouser.com/ProductDetail/538-19221-0233

[ThreeCW]

Sergio, you make several valid points that make sense to me.

Interestingly though, Trojan is of the opinion based on their research that crimped and soldered connections are required.

A Readers Digest version of the attached Trojan Document:
"Connectors that are mechanically crimped to the cable’s end will create a high resistance area. At high discharge rates, this resistance can create enough heat to melt the terminal post on the battery and/or melt the adjacent insulation on the cable. ... It is therefore highly recommended that connectors not only be mechanically crimped but also soldered to the cable’s end. A properly crimped and soldered connector will provide a low resistance connection and reduce the amount of heat buildup at the connecting junction."

I can understand that a "poorly crimped connection" could be subject to higher resistance and heat build up ... but I would have thought that a highly compressed connection like shown in your cut away photo would be of negligible resistance. Is there any way to accurately determine the connection resistance other than statically using an ohm meter?