I get what you are saying and you did what you had to do at the time. My theory is that those sides have no tight contact to the wire and the wire there is not physically bonded to the terminal. There's a gap. Likely ok not using the full capacity of the wire anyway so I'm not saying "man, did you really screw up, it's gonna FAIL!" - just that the ideal crimp puts even pressure around the wire for a sealed connection.
Oh for sure. It is mostly just to get the second battery in place so it's not sitting in my basement un-used on a maintainer. I realized yesterday evening I will be redoing my entire electrical - again, and hopefully for the last time. So there will be ample opportunity to get the right connectors here in the next few months or so. I will be shortening the wire as well doing that so I dont need to worry about weak copper at the ends of the line either. Also just for sake of discussion I did still put shrink wrap on that, so nothing is exposed. I just wanted to share how well the hydraulic too crimped. I wasn't sure what to expect as not having access to a hydraulic crimp in the past, and my personal experience with the 'hammer' type crimp tools have not been very positive. I'm very pleased at the pressure this tool provides and in the future will definitely do all of my own wiring unless for some reason I need something larger than 0 ga. Based on how hard this thing compressed, I have no doubt it can handle 0 ga easily. In fact, I actually over-crimped the 4 ga Anderson connectors. I'm sure I broke several strands with how much it tightened down. the wire I am using is nice, flexible - at the cost of having lots of super thin copper. I'll try and remember to post up a picture for reference. But that is something needing to be considered as well. I have seen plenty of crimped wires crimped too tight.
Oh man I remember way back during school dealing with a, mmmm I think it was a Lincoln that had a intermittent 'stall' as explained by the customer, only on hard acceleration and only half the time. Long story short, it was because a wire going to, I can't remember what specific component anymore, had half the strands broken internally, causing just enough of a lack of connection for things to go wonky causing drivability issues. The only way it was found was through some destructive testing - as there was enough good strands that your standard voltage and resistance tests turned out ok. The issue was the wire, as the engine rotated by forces applied, caused the wire to bend/move, which was just enough movement to cause said strands that were broken to not touch, thus causing too much voltage drop/resistance which then put it into limp mode, throwing codes, until the wires reconnected. That being said, I know I definitely have some wires that have too much movement in them - but they are non-critical systems and won't be an issue for at least 10 years. Usually these days I only solder connections that are mid-wire. Most connectors I use do a good job of holding the wire so it does not bend right at the crimp point - which is the worst place for constant bending.
I was going to ask, and forgot - how that tool worked out, and how you think it might work with proper connectors matched well to wire sizes.
My first impressions, it is a quality tool. There are several like it - Amazon has knockoffs, for about the same price. I have had Pitsburgh tools in the past, more industral level, and they never failed. I'm sure this and all the lookalikes are made in the same factory. Anyway, I think it is great. It has an internal spring or something that even pulls back the lugs when you open the relief valve - so it's the little things. And it does not take much effort at all to crimp even these overly large walled Chinese junk Anderson connectors. The wall thickness is darn near 1/8 thick which is much thicker than others I have seen. It's so thick that with the old Chinese crap crimpers I literally broke through the metal while crimping it, so sealing it with shrink tube was an absolute must!
The majority of the connectors have a strain relief as part of the connector. That solves the problem of the crimp connections work hardening and failing. There are several clamps securing the wire or harness along the way. Engines have clamps even closer than on the airframe. Most aviation connectors are moisture resistant. Some how corrosion still happens and kept me busy for 32 years.
inside the distributor, the wires going to what Ford/Motorcraft called the magnetic pickup assembly. There was a toothed armature that passed by a coil mounted in place of the points. As the vacuum advance turned that plate, it flexed the wires.
