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Posted by D. Sherman on Thursday, February 14, 2008 at 13:29:02 :
In Reply to: ground straps and ammeter question posted by Galen on Thursday, February 14, 2008 at 08:00:11 :
Ideally, the ground straps should be the special flat braided ground strap material since they're subject to a lot of vibration and flexing. Short of that, something flexible and yet as heavy gage as the battery cables, such as a scrap of welding cable, would be good. Building-type wiring (THHN) doesn't have enough strands and is liable to break, strand by strand, over time. You can also get more flex by bending it in a U shape rather than going in a straight line. A good industrial battery shop should be able to make you some excellent ground straps if you can't scrounge them off of something.
The ammeter will be fine. Keep in mind that for the same power output, a 12 volt generator will put out half the current of a 6 volt one, so don't expect the ammeter to read as high. As somebody pointed out, if it reads backwards, simply reverse the connections.