Jumper cable opinions

Just bought 4 gauge, to step up from my, I think, 8. Now I'm thinking 2 or even 1 is the right way to go. Opinions?

I have some very nice cables, but I jump from a little battery pack.

The portable jump boxes are the way to go. Smaller, easier, less hassle, etc. 

I've always used cheap parts store cables, and they've always worked fine for me.

"It depends"

0) Carry both a jump box and cables? "Belt-and-suspenders" or "two is one, one is none".  Also, jumper cables won't recharge your phone while you are walking around, and a jump box won't work as an improvised tow strap or tie-down.

1) What are you jumping from, and what are you likely to jump to, and how long do you expect the cables will be carrying power?  There's math and/or lookup tables out there for voltage drop and current rating vs. length.  If you have a dinky battery it matters less, if you expect to start a large diesel it matters more, if you want to run a winch it matters quite a lot.

The cheap parts store cables are really, really inadequate. 4 gauge is about the smallest I'd go. Even those will heat up if you've got to crank for more than a second or two.

Jump packs are really handy for a car that is in good running order that just needs a quick light off. Most of the ones I've used seem to time out quickly. (for reference I currently have this one). If the battery has been dead awhile or it's one of my old junkers I prefer some 0 or 2 gauge cables.

Larger gauge wire is better, but it becomes a balance against added cost.  If you have a choice, get some welder cable - it has finer individual strands, so it's more flexible and easier to handle.

Steve_Jones said:

The portable jump boxes are the way to go. Smaller, easier, less hassle, etc. 

Yes, I keep a Halo box in my daily and cables in my bigger truck

Jumper cables charge a battery but may not start a car with a completely dead or shorted battery, a booster pack will be able to substitute for a completely dead battery but it needs to be kept charged in storage.

Every tool has its strengths and weaknesses, which is why we have so many of 'em...

In reply to Pete. (l33t FS) :

I think a lot of the lithium jump packs get very upset if you try to use them as a complete battery replacement. I know my boss destroyed one when he used it to get a motorcycle running and rode home with it. I generally find them more trouble than they're worth because they always seem to be dead when I need them, so I stopped spending money on them. I'll take a jump from another vehicle instead or I grab my spare Optima if the onboard battery is damaged. 

I have a jump box and some nice cables. I don't know what they are but they are heavy gauge and easy to manipulate and probably 20' long. On top of that they have really nice clamps. I bought them at 2:00 in the morning while walking into my apartment 20 years ago (in hindsight I bought them from a drug addict but was naive enough to believe the story he spun). 
I prefer the cables because there is almost always a charged and running car to get a jump from and the battery box always needs to be charged. 

The lithium jumper boxes can't handle sustained loads and discharges, and aren't happy with serious temperature changes; I think a 5 year lifespan out of them is really good.

Boxmart jumper cables are much better than nothing, but look at charts to see what they can manage; they're typically the bare minimum to get something fired off and get warm pretty fast. I've melted a walmart set right in their parking lot with a friend's minivan, so know how far you can trust them.

If you want to MAKE a good set, here's an idea: find a hybrid car in your local junkyard and pull the battery harness. The Hybrid Ford Fusions in the 2010s has 15 feet of 2 high-voltage cables rated for 400v, a single positive lead at 4g thickness for the 12v, and a 10 foot negative chassis ground lead at the same thickness. I bought that has a "half harness" for $15 from my local yard and it's all high-quality stuff, to the point where welders regularly make new cables using the same stuff! 

In reply to Keith Tanner :

Oh yeah, the Lithium ones are no good as a battery substitute, they can be thought of as jumper cables.

The mongo packs that are basically a motorcycle or Group 51 battery in a carrying case are the only way to fly when you really need it.

In reply to Pete. (l33t FS) :

Given how good some of the LiFePo batteries are, if I were into carrying around a jump pack, I think I'd just buy one of these instead.   They stay charged forever and are super lightweight.  I use the AG-1601 in my Formula Vee and it works great.  I'd probably avoid one of the ones with a super fancy BMS (like AG's "restart" technology) because they expect a working alternator which limits your options for their use. 

Lithium jump packs are great when they work.  Small, light, no need to depend on anyone else, no need to carefully position cars with battery terminals next to each other, just clip it on and bam you've got a ton of extra amps.

My problem with them is that they aren't just a straight battery.  There's a microcontroller in there that's monitoring things for safety reasons, and if it sees something it doesn't like then it disconnects the battery from you.  I've owned two, one of them had no indication at all for why it was unhappy, the other has a single LED that it flashes red sometimes, which is a color not mentioned in the manual.

So I have both.  Jump pack is great when it works, but a good set of jumper cables is there as a backup.

Mainly this is stuff I keep in my truck for when the race car wouldn't start because it had a teeny tiny AGM battery and it did not like cold weather (or at least as close to it as we get here in California).  Of course I replaced that with an anti-gravity battery like Berck mentioned a few months ago.. :)

I have both.  I will say that jumper cables are a personal taste thing.  I did buy a set of 16' 2ga with a coupon from HF last year and I like them aside from being pretty stiff with their cheap insulation.  I think they were $42 regular price and I got them for $34 with a 20% off coupon.

A jump box is also only as good as its cables, and only as good as its capacity.  It also won't hold a charge forever and needs periodic topping up.  This is why I lean toward cables.  For the most part, any cable will get the job done, it's just a matter of how many amps need replacing in the dead battery.  If you hook up some 0-gauge cables to a vehicle with a 250A alternator, it might take a few seconds to jump start.  If you hook up some 8-gauge cables to an old Buick with a 40A alternator, it might take 20 minutes to get enough juice into the dead battery.

I also have a jump pack.  It's nice for camping.  I have used it once as an actual jump pack and it didn't do the job.  There was just too much missing from the dead battery that the jump pack exhausted its electrons before it made an adequate charge.

Jump pack pros:  works in multiple situations like camping and jumping a low battery.  It can also jump start YOU if no one is around.
JP cons:  limited capacity, needs top-up charges, limited lifespan

Jumper cable pros:  almost always gets the job done based on the wire size and number of electrons needed, no maintenance, compact, nearly infinite supply of electrons as long as the donor vehicle has gas
JC cons:  can't jump yourself, limited functionality.

I keep the cables in the van 24/7.  If I'm headed into the boonies for a camping trip I'll also take the jump box since I may not encounter anyone to make use of the cables.  Having larger gauge cables is lovely, but it also isn't always necessary.  Hence why I got bigger cables on sale because I know there might be that one day when I really need a fast jump to make a deadline, but in all honesty I could have done smaller cables and done the Buick/20 minute thing.  The real difference is that small cables means you are leaning toward a kind of fast-charging of the battery to get enough juice to start on its own.  Big cables will move enough electrons that you can start by just dragging enough electrons through the cable from the donor regardless of how many electrons are actually in the dead battery.

I like the proper jump pack with motorcycle battery inside, but I own a shop and use it daily.  Its likely to be dead if it just sits around.  Any booster cables will work as long as you understand how long you need to hook them to a running car to charge the dead battery.  I've seen all sorts of cheap cables with maybe 12ga wire inside a centimeter of plastic.   Those need to be hooked up for a loooong time, and wont start a car with a ruined battery.

It really doesn't matter for many people, though, since I get about one phone call a week from someone who used booster cables and the car wouldn't start...until the tow truck got there and hooked them up properly.  Or it gets towed and I go out with my jump box.  Lotta people have no clue.

I have also witnessed, back in the day of steel bumpers, a jump done with touching bumpers and two lug wrenches held together from positive to positive.

In reply to Streetwiseguy :

I've seen a guy weld a repair on a Land Rover using jumper cables, doesn't mean I want to do it :) That's a brave move with the bumper jump.

I do not know the specs of the cables that were used. 

I have a home made set in all our cars. 1gauge wire, 10ft long and nice ends. All the wire is either old welding cable or hybrid car harness. 

For around the house have the "supercharger" 

In reply to Professor_Brap (Forum Supporter) :

You're my hero.  That's fkn awesome.  I thought about doing something like that and adding Anderson SB175 connectors to keep the sparks away.

Curtis73 (Forum Supporter) said:

In reply to Professor_Brap (Forum Supporter) :

You're my hero.  That's fkn awesome.  I thought about doing something like that and adding Anderson SB175 connectors to keep the sparks away.

I have a set of Anderson sb175 connectors setting here for v3 of it. I auctally used it last night on a Detroit dt466 we have at the house and it charged both almost flat batteries up in around 45min. Nice thing is, since V2 got the battery on it, it takes some of the load with super dead batteries and doesn't bog the motor out.