Re: [AMC-list] Car Stereo Wiring Question

[tom jennings <tomj@xxxxxxx>]

My rule of thumb is, mission-critical or anything under the hood or near
weather, or more than a couple of amperes -- crimp, solder, heatshrink,
nothing is too good. Literally, because even that stuff fails.  The
connections from my Duraspark box to the distributor are crimped and
soldered ring terminals, with a 6-32 screw nut and washer each, with a piece
of slit fuel line over each. Ugly but drop-dead reliable. Those old klunky
OEM connectors all seem to be corroded.

Under the dash though, crimp seems fine, and if your stereo goes out on a
trip you get home OK. I use red terminals for nearly everything, tight is
good. I use one of those ratcheting crimpers, they crush a wide swath of
copper instead of just a dent. A good test is, wiggle and tug the wire; if
you can see it move at the working end it's not a good crimp. The key phrase
is "gas tight" -- can gases (eg. air) get into the metal-to-metal crimp?

Good crimpers are expensive though, $50 - $100, but you can switch in all
sorts of jaws. I used to do a lot more of this stuff (RJ11, RJ45, RF stuff,
etc) and still have from those days. Would be hard to justify for the
occasional radio crimp.


For speakers, strip and twist seems fine! Dumb, simple, reliable. Assuming
low power like radios and in-dash stereos. (I'm now putting in a
100W/channel RMS amp and a big subwoofer in my little American, the battery
is in the trunk and the amp is 3' from the battery, it gets #8 cable all
crimped and soldered, #14 soldered wire to two 2-ohm speakers per side in
series.)


On Sun, Nov 21, 2010 at 4:17 PM, Joe Fulton <piper_pa20@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

> OK, I installed a cheap car stereo in the 65 Rambler today to replace a
> defunct
> unit and basically just fill the dash and speaker holes.   I got power to
> the
> unit and determined that the speakers were good, then determined that my
> crimped
> connections were crappy although they looked good to me.  So power was not
> getting to the speaker on either side of the car.  So, Tom and others,
> should I
> go with crimped and soldered connections. In think I already know the
> answer.
>
> It will be a hassle to remove the wiring runs, but I can do that.  I hate
> soldering when I'm not working on the bench though.   Whine, whine.
>
>
> These are spade terminals to the speakers {male terminals on the speakers),
> and
> I have some quality crimp terminals but they are for 14 gauge wire. My
> actual
> wire gauge is smaller.  And I don't have the professional crimp tool, just
> a
> good parts store (Sears I think) crimper.  I'm thinking I could just use
> what I
> have and get a good solder joint at each connection.
>
> On a related subject (because I hooked up my new backup lights on the
> Rambler
> this weekend) I have some thoughts on bullet connectors.   Ramblers use
> large
> bullet connectors for disconnects in the wiring harness.  Parts stores
> usually
> carry smaller bullet terminals (blue for 14-16 gauge wire), but they don't
> have
> the large terminals (especially the male connectors) that you need if you
> are
> adding a disconnectable circuit where there's an exisitng AMC female bullet
> connector.   My local independent parts store has the large bullet
> connectors.
> If anyone needs them, I'll pick some up next weekend and send them if you
> send a
> postage paid self-addressed envelope.   Email me if interested.
>
>
>
> Joe
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