cgeorge

I have strange issue that I'm hoping to get some opinions on. A few months ago, I attempted to start my 1990 Pickup (22R - stock) and it turned over, almost started then I engaged the starter again and it just went silent. The radio and all accessories (dome light) were out. It was like the battery died all at once. I noticed some smoke from the right front side of the grill and opened the hood to find that the negative battery cable was melting. Luckily nothing caught fire. I tried to start the truck after a few minutes and it started without any issue.

Since that event, I have replaced all of the battery cables, cleaned the grounds and positive connection on the starter. All was well, until today, about 3 months from when I did the cables. I tried to start the truck it turned over and then stopped, the radio was out as was the dome light. I opened the truck and noticed the short lead off of the negative cable was melted a little. I waited a few minutes and the truck started without issue. I have since then had to start the truck 3 times and it was normal.

I've been doing some reading and some people point to a bad starter - pulling too much current. I don't have a meter to test this but was wondering how feasible this is?

The grounds and positive contacts are all spotless. The battery is also new.

Thanks for you time to you spent reading this.


** just an edit - the cables I used were OEM spec.

Odin

I had that happen to me years ago on a small block Chevy with a rebuilt heavy duty starter. I witnessed smoke rolling out of it when it failed to start one day and the battery cable was hot! I thought maybe I had wires touching or rubbing something but when I examined it that wasn't the case. Most people I talked to said the solenoid probably had a short in it. So yes on certain models there are rare cases of it happening.

When I returned the starter to the shop and explained what I witnessed they were VERY skeptical. I had to argue my case a few times but in the end since I purchased the starter and solenoid as one unit they reluctantly replaced them.
Over 25 years later I've never had that happen again and I can't count how many starters I've removed and installed.

wyoming9

iTrader: (1)

If it smoked your ground cable it is to small These things are tiny from the factory.

Then maybe you have a poor ground in the starter circuit .

This could happen just by weight shifting from the way it was parked

So what was happening is the starter is grounding through the body that is the ground to the inner fender your talking about .

Your ground to the engine block is fubared some how.

You might want to run a new 1/0 or even 2/0 AWG cable to the bottom starter bolt as a ground.When replacing battery cables always go larger .

You did replace the melted cable??

A starter can draw excess current when the bearings are tight putting more drag on the armature.

The armature also can short causing full battery current to run in a loop till something opens.

Odin

wyoming9 -is slinging some very good advice that is worth following.

Make sure your ground from the cylinder head is still there and not brittle or frayed.
Brittle or frayed wire means it's load carrying capacity is diminished, best to use a new wire in that case.

Battery cables are one of the things I replace on my cars when I first get them. Nothing worse than having problems because of something as easy as a battery cable or ground strap.
I don't purchase them though. Instead I prefer to purchase 00 welding cable and make my own soldering the connectors on and sealing with glue lined shrink tube.
On this little pickup I MIGHT go with 1 awg since the starting demands aren't as great as my V8 stuff.

From the racing scene I've also taken to replacing the battery terminals with marine terminals because of if something goes wrong or you need to take the battery out it's a lot easier. Some people tend to think the wing nuts come lose but I've never had that problem if you tighten them down good. I'm sure if you're the type of person who is never going to touch the battery again they could work their way loose, but you could always replace the wing nuts with regular nuts to solve that.
Something like this works quite well unless your hood or something else is super close to a tall battery.

RAD4Runner

Also remember that bad contacts mean high resistance. That means power is converted to heat at contacts and wire than converted to cranking power in the starter. This would cause overheating of battery positive or negative cable and connectors, depending on where the bad connection is.

I like that method. Soldering then sealing with heat shrink help prevent acid from getting in between terminal (crimped) and wire. Would be nice if one can also crimp while solder is still melted. Adds mechanical security.

Odin,
May we know what wattage soldering iron you use? I wonder if an 80-watt iron would be enough for 00 or 1 AWG wire.

wyoming9

iTrader: (1)

Any of those larger cables get crimped on lugs .

Even a 300 watt gun is not enough to solder them.

No way is a 100 watt gun even close I tried this in my misguided youth before I bought a good crimper of my own.

Odin

I've used crimper's on several occasions but never liked them. I learned to cheat by half***ing the soldering technique out of both curiosity and necessity.
I know my way isn't "technically" soldering the correct way but the connection is strong as hell. I've even put the connector in a vice and pulled pretty damn hard on the cable without it coming lose.
I've done the same with a few crimped cables and the ends come right off.
I figured well, it holds.. and it's metal to metal contact, can't be all bad lol

I've been doing it that way for about 20 years. Well I guess that's not entirely true because I only started to use the glue backed shrink tube last year when I first heard about it.
That has to help seal out some of the elements over regular shrink tube, but again, a little more expensive than the regular stuff.
This is not exactly what I use but the same principal.
I've never had to fix one of my cables because of contamination (the Optima battery helps) or because of it coming apart.
I've done a couple for my friends drag cars and even though I didn't charge them anything over the cost of the parts they didn't care for the price.
That much fat welding cable isn't cheap.

I'm sure wyoming9 and a few others know but in case anyone wants to know I do mean "00 Welding Cable", regular 2 AWG cable is a thin sick joke compared to it. Welding cable also has more actual metal in it (by means of thinner strands) and is able to carry higher amounts of current with less drop off at the other end. This cable and my Optima battery just kinda laugh when I hook it to someone's car or truck to give them a jump.
I don't claim to be an expert and I don't make a living off working on vehicles, quite the opposite lol

Here's a video of someone doing the same thing I do on youtube. I will say the way his came out with the cable sheathing that far away from the connector..
I wouldn't be happy and would give it another go, yes I sweat the small stuff.

RAD4Runner

Cool. That's how i wold do mine if I had the torch. However:
(1) I would have a helper crimp it while solder is still molten - to add mechanical integrity.
(2) I would make sure all strands are captured and soldered (no loose strands outside the terminal)
(3) I would NOT twist the connection to test it that soon after cooling.

chuckross1957

As a trained electronics tech, I can say that soldering is definitely an art. I soldered a 10 gauge wire using a soldering pencil. I tinned the wire first, then crimped the terminal on the soldered wire and then soldered them both together. I have to clean the tip of the soldering pencil with a wire wheel constantly to solder effectively. The original cables on my 86 22r truck look small, much smaller than a 4 AWG cable. I think 4 AWG cables are a big improvement over the factory cables. Unless you have some very high powered accessories, high quality 4 AWG cables should work very well. Beware all cables aren't high quality. I just installed a 2 gauge oem cable intended for use on a full size GM truck, I ran it to a remote starter solenoid. I ran a 4 gauge cable from the solenoid to the starter. Bigger is better, I am sure welding cable will work great.

millball

I solder large gauge wire and welding or battery cable ends by submerging the wire ends and lugs in a bath of solder that I have melted in a small electric lead pot.
I have tried, and never had any luck using a torch.
When there are a couple pounds of molten solder, there is plenty heat available to heat and wick the solder up into the wire.
I usually wick the solder up the wire before I crimp the lug on, then plunge the lug back into the solder bath so that the lug is soldered tight to the cable.
A small nugget of rosin onto the solder surface when I heat the pot, keeps the solder clean and helps the tinning of the wire and lugs.
The best joints that you can make.

wyoming9

iTrader: (1)

Then my crimper was a little over $300.00 I bought it new for work.

What solder do you buy in bulk for your Pot and how long does it take to go molten??

Odin

YES!
Though I consider the whole process a hack job he didn't do the process justice that's for sure. It can be done much neater once you work a couple common sense things out. Like most things the more times you do it the better you get because you find faults and correct them.
If you're going to do both I think crimping before soldering would be the way to go.

NOW THAT'S THE BUSINESS!

PLEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEASE make a video please please

Can you give me a parts list?
Give me an idea of what those parts cost. I just have the idea that it's gunna cost too much for my once and a while garage jobs.

Odin

"Resistance Soldering" This looks quite nice but I bet that machine isn't cheap

millball

I frequent yard sales and flea markets, and I pick up any 50-50 or 40-60 rosin core solder that I find for little money. I probably have 5 or 6 pounds laying around.
I have a heavy duty Thomas and Betts crimper that was surplussed from one of my old jobs. As you say, they are pricy if bought new, heck, even the lugs cost $$.

My old Esico solder pot will melt its solder in less than 10 minutes if I wrap it with a piece of old fiberglas welding blanket. I think that it draws 800 watts.
It was a yardsale find too.

cgeorge

Thank you all for your comments. I checked the cable from the block to the firewall and it is vintage 1990 and needs to be replaced. I'll do that as well as the suggestion for a cable from the bottom starter bolt.

Odin - you could probably sell those cables. Items made of that quality are hard to find. How much would you charge?

wyoming9

iTrader: (1)

Depends on how long you need them to be.

Plus the price of the lugs you want.

That is how I price mine out.

Plus a flat rate shipping box.

millball

You ought to be able to do it with any buzz box AC welder and appropriate clamps.
Looks like that guys clamps have graphite jaws.

Odin

I'd hit up wyoming9, I'm without a garage to work in at the moment so anything I do is pretty much between rain showers and a pain in the butt.
I'm sure he knows what he's doing and if he paid that much for his crimper it's most likely a pretty good one.

Like I mentioned above if you want to run fat 00 Welding cable for your power and ground the price is not going to be in the same ballpark as the 1 awg that you can get at a parts store. But the quality won't be close either.
I'm not entirely sure you need them that thick on a stock 4 cylinder if you're not running aftermarket lights or a massive stereo amp. 1 awg or 0 might work pretty dang good.

I mainly use the 00 wire to help the old style GM heavy duty starters spin over higher compression performance V8 stuff and it's probably a little overkill. Those starters tend to suffer from heat soak being down there getting a big dose from the headers. I find them more reliable than the newer gear reduction starters plus I have a couple and I can swap out and rebuild for fairly cheap. The GOOD gear reduction starters aren't cheap.
Adding those fat cables to the old starters easily got the job done. I could have run a Ford solenoid to help but... ugly and more clutter, no thanks.

One things for sure, that stock size on the Yota is pretty pathetic!

wyoming9

iTrader: (1)

I get lots of odd assorted lengths to short to use for much as stinger or work whips but plenty long for making battery cables.

I most often use 1/0 because it is what I get.

If your interested at all drop me a PM!!

chuckross1957

I just received one of these 2AWG Marine cables and it looks really nice, it has solid lugs. I don't know if any one else has any experience with these cables, but it looks to be very high quality. My original starter cable is about 32" long so a 3' section is going to be about 5" longer than the original cable. I don't know how this stacks up cost wise compared to having a welding cable custom made. I have some 1/2" wire loom from Harbor Freight to use with this new cable. http://custombatterycables.com/info_pages/wire_types.htm ...Interesting comments on custom battery cables.