I love wiring, and here's a tip

[davepl]

I'm one of the 0.01% of car guys for whom wiring is one of my favorite parts. As I'm wiring my truck from scratch and testing as I go, I have a battery in it and the cables sometimes connected.

Rather than have the positive go right to the battery, though, I took some heavyish gauge wire and put a 30A auto-reset breaker in between the + post and the + cable. You couldn't crank the engine like that but its enough capacity for anything else.

That way when the inevitable short happens it just trips the breaker. For me it was the not-yet-connected starter cable touched something. Could have been ugly, as anyone who's accidentally set a wrench across the terminals can attest to!