that explains why they kept cracking,dammit i thought it was my crimpers. and twisted nuts sounds like a painful personal problem,.
Gotta say I've NEVER had a problem with **** connectors, even the cheapies from the parts stores. However I use the proper crimpers and tape over or shrink wrap them too. I've been doing them for 20 years and never had a problem. From house stereos to my daily drivers.
Put me down as another fan of the "western union **** splice". I used to do it the way described here, but have since converted - less fuss - less muss.
You are right, wire nuts are twisted, but crimp nuts, better known as 'wire joints' are crimped and look somewhat like a wire nut. I know this because a Jouneyman had me try to untwist a connector/crimp nut, he was thinking it was a wire nut too, DOH!! This was thirty-five years ago when I was an Apprentice Electrician.
Well ,shoot, I don't have anything unkind to say about the thread,which is quite unlike me. The wife says I complain about everything. I LIKED your article. It TAUGHT me a few tips I didn't already know, and I wanna thank you personally for it, By the time I know how to do everything, I'll be too freekin' old to do anything. But thanks just the same. Mikey
Hi Guys. This is my first post here so be kind. I have always thought that you need to add something like dielectric grease to any ****e, connection etc . to help avoid corrosion which is the main cause of joint failure? Great post, I'm learning already. Peter. 1956 Ford F100 Happy New Year!
Dielectric is used when dissimilar/different metals are connected, like copper and aluminum, for an example. It's also used for keeping contamination out after connections are made.
Having just done a full rewiring on my deuce, I jhave spliced quite a few wires and did it exactely the same way you do. It gets a bit harder with bigger guage wires, but still works. I have become quite handy with a pencil torch and soulder core ....
You forgot some 'important' tips - followed by a prior owner of a car of mine: 1. Put the solider on the iron tip and drip it onto the splice. It will almost work most of the time. 2. Use a butane lighter to shrink the heat-shrink tubing. It doesn't scorch the tubing too badly, and you only burn your fingers about half the time. 3. A couple-three linear feet of extra-cheap black electrical tape to hide the whole thing is a good idea. Hell, put some heat shrink over top of that too. It will impress people. 4. If you have a red wire coming into the splice, make sure it's black or green or yellow coming out. Bonus points for a different wire size too, preferably smaller. If it was hard for you to wire, it should be twice as hard for the next guy. 5. Romex, phone cord, cheap lamp cord, whatever you have is fine. Don't worry about the wire or the insulation being heat-, voltage- or automobile-rated. They only put the ratings on there to sell you the more expensive stuff you don't need. Hope this helps. (Be sure to keep the number of NAPA and the fire department on speed dial of course.)
Welcome RC! Glad to see you are over here too. Some great tech here. I used to have a good tool for tube amplifiers, sound board valves, ****og pedals and guitar pickups and I used it to test a solder or crimp joint. It was an occiliscope (sp?) that you would mentally (well I used to, now I have to use a calculator, test apiece of wire the same gauge and length without a joint) calibrate to the length and gauge of wire, and it would pulse and make a squawk and signature on a little round screen. It would give you an hz reading, and ohms of resistance on a sweep gauge and you could tell right then if the joint was any good. Try finding one of those nowadays. Mine got stolen, I bought it out of a pawn shop many moons ago. A piano tuner came to finish tune our old piano using a similar instrument, it just had a microphone clipped to the iron string board and you would wrap felt in to dampen the strings around the one you are tuning, that would read the hz but the signature was the same. He said he guards that thing with his life, but I have first dibs on it when he retires.
A lot of times I'll put a double layer of heat shrink tubing over a soldered inline joint. The first piece of shrink wrap just goes a little beyond the joint, then the second one is longer to over lap the first one. That makes sort of like a strain relief for the whole thing and takes a load off the area around the soldered joint. Before you do the heat shrink, make sure you don't have a sharp stray strand of wire sticking out sideways -- because that can poke a hole through your heat shrink. For stuff that's in the engine compartment or around the battery or exposed to the weather out near the back bumper or something, I like to use the heat shrink that has an adhesive inside that fuses to make a hermetically sealed waterproof joint.
- A good solder joint is less resistance and more reliable than your average 'aftermarket' automotive crimp connector is capable of. In most automotive applications, crimp connectors are fine, but that doesn't mean they are as good... - Current = Voltage / Resistance. Voltage and current are proportional to each other. i.e. double the voltage, double the current, half the voltage, half the current, ***uming resistance stays the same. Certain components of 6 volt systems are designed with higher resistance than their 12 volt counterparts, to increase the amperage running through them (such as lights). However, that does not meant he aperage is higher than the 12 volt system (because it isn't in most cases), just that it is higher amperage than a 12 volt spec circuit would see when run at 6 volts. Not trying to slam on you, but it sounds like the guy who explained it to you did not really have a good understanding of the subject, and the spread of mis-information is one of my pet peeves
Oh yeah - and I like your little tool for holding the wires. Gotta build one of those asap. My store-bought one is a little bulky for under the dash.
I like to double the heat-shrink tubing for added safety, considering how thin the heat shrink tubing really is & if even one stran of wire happens to poke it's way though the heat shrink tubing you're in trouble....joe
The Jalopy Journal
