Posted by Ben on January 02, 19100 at 10:37:45:
Had a couple of hours to kill between family parties yesterday and finally reworked my '96 Sub's positive battery terminal. Here's the details & my thoughts/opinions:
Cut the very pretty but stupid lug boots (covers) off of the lug flange area and NOT the wire barrel area. They only serve to trap any acid fumes against the copper lug flange & wire barrel. They also contributes to the "looseness" of the connection, in that it adds some spring to compressed joint.
Replace the lead slug between the two factory lugs with a copper or brass slug. I made mine from a brass pipe fitting (a threaded pipe reducer/expander...1/8" pipe internal thread to 1/4" pipe external thread made of solid brass hex stock). Drill out the hole with a 3/8" bit and cut it length (I added a lug which has 3 in-line fuses...50amp each...get the 3/8"x#4gauge lug from the welding section). You length will vary depending on how many extra lugs you have in the stack. Just make sure that the stack is *LESS* than the bolt's exposed shank after it has bottomed out in the battery terminal (this is so that the bolt can do it's job of supplying compression for the stack). File both end surfaces smooth, flat and square to the 3/8 hole.
Get a tube of battery terminal jelly/grease. This stuff has a base additive and seals off the stack from any acid fumes. I used almost 1/2 of the tube and really sealed all mating surfaces right down to the wires.
The factory lugs have been "split" on the ID to give a "bite" to the lead contact surface of the battery. Fine if you only break the connection for the next battery, but not so good if you do it a couple times. Make sure you rotate the lug and orientate the "splits" to a clean new surface of the battery terminal.
On the 1 hour drive to the party last nite, had "EVERYTHING" on and the voltmeter stayed 1/2 to a full needle with to the right of 14 volts. It used to drift down to 13.x and wonder between 13.x and 14. Rock solid above 14volts now. So, I'm positive that every Sub out there has a potential problem with their +battery terminal (though do remember someone posting that the newer models have only ONE lug, so that won't be a problem).
Now I'm ready to finish the design of the rewiring of my lights!
Happy New Years!
-Ben