On Sat, 02 Aug 2014 10:58:32 -0400, Jim Wilkins wrote:

This is relevant to the modern interchangeable parts and output
impedance discussions.

The other day my truck had a no-start problem that turned out to be a
poor cable connection at the battery clamp that I'd missed during an
otherwise thorough spring electrical cleanup. I found it -after- I had
removed, disassembled and thoroughly checked the starter.

The corrosion hidden inside the cable clamp still allowed about 30 - 40
Amps, not enough to spin the starter motor with the Bendix engaged but
the voltages were correct everywhere that was easily accessible, the
solenoid clicked and the battery dropped to 11.5V.

I bought Autozone's solid brass battery terminal to replace the previous
replacement and just found that it's too large for the negative post and
too small for the positive. It would have been a problem for someone
without my collection of blacksmith tools to swage open the tapered hole
and a milling machine to recut the square bolt head seat at the new
angle.

I'm not sure what your actual question is, but if I were in your shoes I
would certainly be pondering the wisdom of buying parts from the World's
Cheapest Source to equip a vehicle upon which I depend. Either the
Autozone parts are just crap, or someone didn't match up the battery part
# to the clamp part # correctly.

The cables in my '69 truck were bought as assemblies from (I think) NAPA
when we rebuilt it 22 years ago. They work great and are showing little
signs of wear other than the ugly white slime that batteries get.

--
Tim Wescott
Control system and signal processing consulting
www.wescottdesign.com