Poor Construction of Husky Booster Cables.

[George7941]

A friend of mine tried to boost his car with these cables and thought that something was wrong with them because his car, a Lexus SUV, would not crank over.
https://www.homedepot.ca/product/husky-12-ft-8-gauge-ul-listed-booster-cable/1000807592
He asked me to test them out. I used the cables to hook up a 225 amp load tester to a fully charged battery and the current measured at 130 amps, voltage dropped 5v across both pos and neg cables combined (2.5v across each cable). My conclusion - nothing wrong with the cables, they are working as designed. The cables are a thrifted product, made to a price point. The 8ga copper clad aluminium is equivalent to 10ga copper wire

What caught my eye was the plastic washers used when riveting the cable ends to the clamp jaws. Plastic washers are used when the jaws need to be isolated from the clamp body, as in Kelvin clamps. It is the wrong washer to use here because isolation is not needed, but, more inportantly, the plastic is going to compress over time and lead to a poor electrical bond between the cable end and the jaw. What a poor choice!

 

[Dave9]

Yeah, cheap/junk booster cables have their place but it is mainly hooking them up and waiting to see if you can get some charge back into the primary vehicle's own starter battery so both are supplying current in parallel.

Good jumper cables, buy once, cry once, then enjoy for decades. I just wouldn't bother getting copper clad aluminum. Old ways die hard.

 

[Danno]

I see the plastic rivet isolating the rivet from the current floe. The copper clamp to the jaws is the power flow.
Seems fine to me.

 

[FowVay]

Get a cable with some heft. Remember, the smaller the cable number the bigger the cable. A 8 gauge or 10 gauge cable is for lawn mowers. Get a 4 gauge and you can arc weld with them if need be.

 

[Dave9]

I would have guessed that the plastic rivet is to stop dissimilar metal corrosion between the copper clad (whatever) jaws and the steel clamp body.

 

[Lubener]

You can't expect much from a cheap Chinese produced jumper cable.

I always made my jumper cables with welding cable and the clamps.

 

[George7941]

I see the plastic rivet isolating the rivet from the current floe. The copper clamp to the jaws is the power flow.
Seems fine to me.

The main power flow is from the cable eye to the jaw where they are in direct contact with one another and a very small flow will be through the rivet. Absolutely no need to isolate the rivet.

 

[George7941]

I would have guessed that the plastic rivet is to stop dissimilar metal corrosion between the copper clad (whatever) jaws and the steel clamp body.

The plastic washer is not preventing contact between the jaw and clamp body here.

 

[oil pan 4]

Plastic is cheaper than metal

 

[SaberOne]

I’ve been using these for more than 30-years, and they have held up very well.
Of course, they were a lot less pricey back then, but oh well .