Tesco jump leads - any good?

Well, I've got some where each wire (i.e. where each wire consists of multiple small wires) is about 7.5mm under the insulation and I've had them for years and they are excellent. Most of the ones you buy are a lot thinner than that. Are you talking about 10mm including insulation, maybe?

Rob Graham

Usually refers to cross sectional area of the conductor - like with mains cables. So is actually 10mm²

To allow an instantaneous jump start with a totally flat battery you need cable of at least the same diameter as the starter cable in the vehicle - and larger won't do any harm. Mine are actually 16mm - that's a common cable size as it's used to feed the electricity from meter to CU in some houses.

Good alligator clips are also needed as obviously a poor connection here will prevent maximum current flow.

Tri-rated or not can make a difference to current capacity too...

The message from "Dave Plowman (News)" contains these words:

As is good technique. There's an art to getting a good contact - using the engine lifting lugs where appropriate helps, for a start.

Avoid like the plague leads with clamps made of plastic with metal inserts for the contacts. The slightest mispositioning and they get hot and melt the plastic.

Not for a cable used a free air it won't!

Tri-rated cables were introduced to attempt to provide a degree of harmonisation for cables used in industrial situations. There primary application is for wiring control panels. They have an insulation thickness and temperature rating of whatever country's standard is the highest.

As others have said, in the context of jump leads, size matters!

Chris

Yes, in which case ours are about the same.

Rob

For a decent set of jump leads the copper itself would cost more then £8.

Not quite - £8 would buy just over 3kg of copper, and I suspect that your average set of jump leads weigh much less than 3kg

Mick ( snipped-for-privacy@newsgroup.please) gurgled happily, sounding much like they were saying :

Would that be "crock clips" as in "crock-of-s**te", or as in "crockodile"?

I remember buying some nice thick cables. Saw a chap at ASDA trying to get his car started and an ASDA chap brought out the thin ones they sell. Didn't work. Tried with mine - worked first time.

Definately agree that thick cables do the business! ;0)

AMO

It strikes me that looking for a battery bargain would be a better long term option?

I used to work overlooking a large carpark of a factory, the night shift would all rush out and at winter perhaps 20 people could not get their cars to start. Eventually one would get a jump start, he would find his mate, jump start him, that chap would go to the next 'non starter'. We named them the 'Jumper Club'.

MH

The message from DeeBee contains these words:

Mine must weigh about that - they're 3 metres long and as thick as my little finger.

The message from snipped-for-privacy@hotmail.com contains these words:

I used to have a trolley with an old strimmer motor driving an alternator on it. Fire it up and connect to the dead vehicle[1] - about five minutes and you could drive away.

[1] Didn't work the other way round - no matter how hard you pulled there was too much resistance to let the little 2-stroke engine get started.

16mm 'meter tails' cost 1.16 per metre from TLC - plus VAT of course. Bought in large drums the cost per metre would be much lower.

Sorry, I meant the copper cable. While I'm sure you could buy a lump of copper for that, it wouldn't help you start a car!

I normally pay about &0.80 per m for 16mm2 flexible cable.

I have a mental vision of that mounted under-bonnet. Would make a great start up procedure in a busy supermarket car park ;-)

-- Stuart

AOL

The message from Conor contains these words:

Getting the two connected wasn't easy 'cos I was in a hurry and didn't have time to arrange for perfect alignment or cunning universal joints - so I cut two inches of heater hose out of one of the LDVs and use that with a couple of Jubileee clips.