A bit of Wiring 101
Boy is this tedious on a phone. Oh well,, now let's use the ratcheting crimpers. I bought these at the L.A. Roadster Show from one of the electrical vendors, I don't remember who. It may have been Painless or American Autowire. They weren't that expensive, around $35 or $40.
These pliers don't release until you've squeezed them all the way, preventing (in theory) bad crimps. In the picture they are squeezed about 1/4 of the way.
See the little trigger just above the grip? That's the safety release. If you do screw something up, you push that and the pliers release, so you don't have to waste a terminal on a crimp you know will be bad.
These pliers make both crimps at once and also have the jaws labeled according to wire size:
Which speeds up the process and answers the question of which jaw to use. Although I will often start the crimp with the next size up and redo it with the proper size, especially if I'm in an awkward position.
As with the other pliers, I grab the terminal first:
These jaws do not open and close parallel, so take care to get the terminal in the jaws square:
It's extremely common to have the terminal twist as you close the jaws:
Which will give you a bad crimp. If the terminal twists, use the safety release and try again.
Once you have it right, insert the wire (make sure its in all the way) and squeeze.
You should end up with a proper crimp:
I'll talk about barrel type terminals tomorrow. It's late and my typing finger has gotten really tired.
Boy is this tedious on a phone. Oh well,, now let's use the ratcheting crimpers. I bought these at the L.A. Roadster Show from one of the electrical vendors, I don't remember who. It may have been Painless or American Autowire. They weren't that expensive, around $35 or $40.
These pliers don't release until you've squeezed them all the way, preventing (in theory) bad crimps. In the picture they are squeezed about 1/4 of the way.
See the little trigger just above the grip? That's the safety release. If you do screw something up, you push that and the pliers release, so you don't have to waste a terminal on a crimp you know will be bad.
These pliers make both crimps at once and also have the jaws labeled according to wire size:
Which speeds up the process and answers the question of which jaw to use. Although I will often start the crimp with the next size up and redo it with the proper size, especially if I'm in an awkward position.
As with the other pliers, I grab the terminal first:
These jaws do not open and close parallel, so take care to get the terminal in the jaws square:
It's extremely common to have the terminal twist as you close the jaws:
Which will give you a bad crimp. If the terminal twists, use the safety release and try again.
Once you have it right, insert the wire (make sure its in all the way) and squeeze.
You should end up with a proper crimp:
I'll talk about barrel type terminals tomorrow. It's late and my typing finger has gotten really tired.
