Just about every person that owns an automobile has had the misfortune of needing a jump start. Knowing how to set-up the cables to perform a jump start can be daunting. One misplaced cable can destroy the battery on both cars and destroy the electrical system on one or both!
A jump-start must cause a vehicles battery to produce enough amperage to initiate the starter to crank over an engine. Turning an engine is not an easy task. To manually crank an engine over is next to impossible. I have witnessed heavy duty tools bend and break when someone tries to manually turn the engine over just one crank! Yet a small starter motor and a good battery can do it several times a day with apparent ease.
Here I will walk you through the steps of a jump start from another vehicle or jump-start your vehicle using a powerful charger.
Like I always say, in my vehicle repair hubs, I want my lady friends (and the guys the enjoy wearing their hair long) to pull their hair back in a band of some kind to keep it out of the moving engine parts. The battery may be dead right now, but it won't be in a minute and you don't want to be pulled into the engine by your hair!
You know your battery is dead by two basic signs:
1. The interior lights don't come on when you open the car door.
2. The tell-tale "click, click, click" of the starter when you turn the key in the ignition.
No need to worry, you have options!
Let's Do This
If you find yourself at the market or some other public place when your battery dies there are plenty of people willing to help. I have found men to be the best option. They will have jumper cables with them, most of the time, and they are always happy to give a person a hand with a jump. In all my 45 years I have never had a guy turn me down for a jump unless he didn't have jumper cables and even then, he would hail someone else to help me.
1. Pull the "jumper vehicle" up to the dead vehicle on the side that the battery is located or pull it up "grill to grill", but don't let the vehicles touch each other!
2. Starting with the "jumper vehicle" shut it off and place the positive cable on the positive terminal and the negative cable on the negative terminal making sure to keep the other end of the the cables separated. A good way to do this is clip the negative cable onto the cord of the positive cable while your hooking them up. (refer to photo)
3. Now take the other end and put the positive on the dead batteries positive terminal and the negative either on the negative, or preferably, on a source of ground other than the negative terminal. Remember positive first, negative second.
4. Restart the "jumper vehicle".
5. At this point you can try starting the dead vehicle. On occasion, especially if your trying to jump a large engine, you will need to wait a few minutes for the "jumper vehicle" to charge the dead battery a little bit. Otherwise you can rev-up the engine on the "jumper vehicle" to generate enough amperage to allow the dead battery to start the car.
Once the dead vehicle is started:
1. Starting at the battery that was dead, carefully remove the clip on the negative cable from its ground source.
2. Remove the clip from the positive cable from the terminal, again making sure to keep the negative and positive from touching each other.
3. Now remove the clip the negative from the "jumper vehicle" and then the negative.
4. Stow the jumper cables back where they belong or return them to the proper owner and your back in business!!
Drive the vehicle that was dead for about twenty minutes. This will allow the vehicle to recharge the battery to starting capacity.
Jump Starting From a Charger
If you have a battery charger with "jump start" ability (Very handy device! A garage isn't complete without one!)its even easier to start your car with a dead battery than with another vehicle.
1. Place the charger near the battery in the vehicle.
2. Attach the positive cable on the positive terminal.
3. Attach the negative cable to a convenient ground source (see picture).
4. Now plug the charger.
5. Set the charger to 200 amp "jump start".
6. Wait a few minutes to let the starter put some energy into the battery.
7. Now start your engine!!
After the engine is started is started:
1. Unplug the charger.
2. Using caution remove the negative terminal from the ground source.
3. Remove the positive cable from the terminal.
4. Stow the charger out of the weather to encourage a long usable life.
And your on your way!! As I mentioned before, run the engine for about twenty minutes to get a good charge on the battery before shutting it off.
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