When a jumpstart goes wrong? Safety Question

Neighbor tried jumping my wife’s ‘06 Nissan Altima, we left it for 10 minutes and came back and the cables had melted through the headlight of both cars and some of the bumper. I wasn’t there but thankfully they stopped their car and were able to disconnect the cables without incident. We noticed after there had been mice living in around her engine from the mouse poop, minimum the last two weeks. What causes jumper cables to do this? Something a rodent may have chewed? Definitely an issue with my wife’s car. Our poor neighbors have a newish midsized suv. My wife has also had constant issues starting her car, even with a new battery I got a year or two ago. Anyone seen this before?

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u/Dorkamundo Dec 31 '23

I mean, sometimes when a battery is discharged fully it can take some time to build up enough amps to start it.

Especially if the cables are low-quality.

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u/Doenicke Dec 31 '23

I don't know...i have jumoed cars a number of times and never wated longer than it takes to connect the cables.

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u/Automatic-Alarm-6340 Dec 31 '23

Most small engines have no issues with this because of how little power the starter needs, but I've had to wait a few minutes when working with larger diesels or tractors before. Depends how dead the battery is.

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u/Anxious__Engineer Dec 31 '23

It's taking the amps from the other car that's the point

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u/Dorkamundo Dec 31 '23

Yes, and if the cable is low quality, as in thinner cables, it can't provide enough amperage to do across that thin cable.

This also causes the wire to get hot from the large amount of current, which may explain the burn marks we're seeing.

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u/n80sire Jan 01 '24

correct me if I'm wrong, but if you've hooked up the cables correctly, the donor battery is now corrected directly into the receiver's circuit? so it doesn't need to "charge" the battery, the receiver's starter motor can pull current directly from the donor's battery?