Re: [Amc-list] Battery good - no lights, no horn, no gauges, starter doesn't spin - completely dead electric

[Tom Jennings <tomj@xxxxxxx>]

Bruce Griffis wrote:
> I had already replaced the negative battery cable. I replaced the
> positive battery cable today, and it started right up. I popped it
> off, cleaned the contact area on the starter, put on a new cable - and
> it's good.

Good! It was smart to shotgun that battery cable. Yeah, cables rot away 
with time water and heat! Electronics can be complicated, but electrical 
connections are fairly straightforward. Gotta be non-corroded, tight 
metal to metal contact. I'd say halfor more of old car electrical 
problems are simple mechanical problems with wires.

Even when things like headlight switches fail, it's the same mechanism 
-- corrosion, from the little spark inside at on/off that slowly eats 
the metal, which makes a bad connection, which generates heat in the 
contacts, add humidity and 20 years and you have a problem. But inside 
there if you take it apart you'll see corroded pitted oxidized metal 
just like in the battery cable.

For those big connections, get 'em clean (wire brush, solvent or soap 
and water) and put ordinary chassis grease on them before you assemble. 
The tightening will pinch the film and you'll get metal to metal 
contact, but the remaining grease will keep out moisture etc. Most 
places recommend silicone grease for this, because it has a low film 
strength (eg. it's crappy lube) but it melts under the hood, and 
film-creeps all over the place, and causes problems with later painting.

There is a GOOD silicone grease, the only one I know of, its Dow Coring 
#4. Yup, that's all it's called, #4 silicone grease! Comes in a tube, 
doesn't melt til 400F. It's utterly inert. Some WWII invention.
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