75ZT Community

every so often and randomly the car will loose all electrics after it's been used.if i wiggle the battery cables they will come back, i have a new battery and the alternator is charging ok , plus both the cables are attached to the terminals tightly, any idea's as to where to start looking.

I'd say that if you wiggle the battery cables and the car comes back to life I'd start there. Disconnect the battery and using some fine sandpaper give the terminals a good rubbing over to remove any corrosion. Do the same with the connectors for the positive and negative - although the negative usually picks up more corrosion on it. Lube up the connectors and terminals with some good-quality conductive lube and you'll be good for ever

A few places to check:

check the other end of the earth cable, where it bolts to the body.

check the main connection from the battery, to the fusebox (hex screw at the top) and the alternator fuse fixings (same place).

Also worth checking the cable itself hasn't come loose inside the battery terminal (either of them). It has been known.

Final thought. When you say the battery terminal is tight, do you mean the nut is tightened up? I have seen a few where the clamp has been tightened up and doesn't grip the battery terminal post properly. Usually you can see this because the clamp sits very high on the post. If it's right, the post should stick through the top of the clapm, not be below it. If it is below it, slacken the clamp nut right off, and wiggle / push the clamp down the post which will open it up. Hold it down on the terminal and nip the nut back up.

A note to everyone: remember always disconnect the negative terminal first, and reconnect last. This is because if you do the positive first, when your spanner touches earth (when, not if, believe me) it shorts out the battery. That's bad. Couple of thousand amps through yer spanner?