@Tin_Foil i thought surely with all that orange in the picture they had hidden some in there. Plus w the write-up talking about giving the nephew something useless too, they missed such an opportunity!
@tartanknickers wishing I had bought one of those too since my car had to be jumped 3 times yesterday before I could get somewhere to buy a new battery
@stardate820926 At least you can console yourself that the battery jumper thing would have only saved you one or two of those jump starts - they are really use-once-and-then-recharge gizmos.
@cinoclav Kids today are lucky, in my day we only had one jumper cable. You had to move it really fast to catch the electrons coming out the other side.
@awk Didn’t they teach you young whippersnappers anything? The single cable connected the hot leads; you’d then complete the circuit by nudging the donor car forward till the chrome bumpers touched. No need for the added weight (and complexity!) of the two cable system. For obvious reasons, this technique is no longer viable.
As an added benefit, any sparking (when the bumpers touched) was well away from the batteries, which - at the time - spewed so much excess hydrogen that the better designs had built-in exhaust fans which would blow the gas over the terminals in order to block corrosion.
Some questioned this design, and it faded away at about the same time as onions began vanishing from belt loops.
@davechait Never tried it, but it should have - back in the heavy chrome bumper days.
I always went directly to the posts, as I could rarely get a good ground otherwise. You’re generally (and rightfully) warned against this practice, but if you understand the nature of the danger then you can at least take steps to mitigate it. ‘Sealed’ batteries were becoming the norm, and I was content to just blow away any standing vapors before I fastened the last cable - and I looked away before I made the connection. No problems in over 40 years ('though I’m now more likely to pull my AAA card instead of jumpers).
@bigjonroberts well if you don’t want to buy anything anymore move to a state they don’t ship to (or out of country) and/or have your mommy take your credit card away from you (grin).
I would pass on this one, at least until someone figures out how long the jumper cables are. Cables that are not long enough to jump two cars parked side to side can be a serious hassle, and I would advise against buying such too-short cables.
So other than the jumper cables (8 gauge, so about $6 worth), are any of the other items worth more than a buck each? Much of this looks to be stuff found at a dollar store … except you’d get more than 10 zip ties or 10 tissues or 16 bandages there.
In my part of the world a big metal coffee can with some cat litter in it and a large candle with matches is a good idea. Stuck at -20 degrees and you light the candle IN THE CAN to produce a bit of warmth.
In addition to my un-asked-for-advice above (which is to not buy this unless the jumper cables are a lot longer than I think), I would add this advice:
It can be very helpful to know how to jump your own car. Perhaps an even better gift than these cables would be an offer to teach the recipient how to use jumper cables.
If you are teaching someone, or asking someone to teach you, I would suggest practicing on four cars - that should give you a good sense of the variety of how the attachment needs to be made.
After that, I would buy a cheap pair of safety glasses and a piece of string, and a box of nitrile gloves. Take the glasses and the string and put them in a glove. Put about six more gloves over the glasses. Toss it into some spot that you never need to use for anything productive in your car. (For me, this is behind my spare tire, or under the rear seat.)
If you are the forgetful sort, put a note on your owner’s manual about where you put your stash.
Then when you need to jump your car, you have nitrile gloves to keep your hands clean, a pair of glasses to protect your eyes, and a piece of string to tie up your hair. You really don’t want to get your hair caught in a car’s fan belt.
And while I’m giving advice, I don’t carry jumper cables. They are expensive and take up a lot of space. I’ve never had to ask more than four strangers in a parking lot (or along a street) if they had cables before finding some (total times I have done this is, I think, six[1]). Most gas stations will also loan a pair.
What is much more rare (based on my limited sample size) is finding someone who knows how to use cables.
[1] I tend to repair my own car, and put off things like replacing an alternator for too long.
@mydrivec The most recent time I used cables, it was to help a couple in my dentist’s parking lot. They had the hood open and were peering at the engine. I asked if they needed help.
Turns out they were clueless about mechanical things, and did not have AAA. But they had jumper cables! I had never jumped a car with a start button before, but following the long instructions in the owner’s manual, which included a secret panel in the storage cubby, was easy enough.
So, my car, plus their jumper cables, resulted in them having a running car. Hopefully, by anti-leeching a bit that day, I evened out my jumper cable karma a bit.
@username If you don’t need or want a car, it certainly makes more sense to not own one. My car is a hobby, going for a drive is something I really enjoy. So I own a car.
@jqubed I have a push button start in my prius. It’s easy to jump. The 12v battery is in the trunk, but under the hood is a set of jump points. You connect and jump like normal.
I just can’t jump start another car. I can only trickle charge. If I’m trying to trickle charge someone’s car and they try to start it, they can fry the hybrid battery. I would be very hesitant to trickle start someone’s car for the fear that they wouldn’t listen and still try to start it while connected. I would gladly loan my jumper cables though.
@RiotDemon if I owned a Prius and felt the pull to assist others in jumping cars (I do), I’d carry one of those portable battery booster-jumpers like sold here at meh a not long ago.
No F-ing way is the risk of frying the Prius inverter worth jumping from it.
In fact, with the risk to all the expensive electronics in today’s cars, once the portable lithium ion battery booster market matures just a bit more I’ll carry one of those in our ICE cars.
It’s a nice kit but those jumper cables are weak sauce. They look very short and 8-gauge is “adequate” for cars but you should really have 4-gauge or better if you should need to jump a truck or SUV.
I have a similar kit in the back of my car. When I needed the jumper cables, the insulation was completely rotten so the cables were useless.
This list gave me a good idea of what to refill the bag with though. Already have a good set of cables, so no need for this. I already own most of the other stuff.
‘course, that Wal Mart kit looks sketchy too, now that you mention it. I should probably read up on what 4 gauges are, like in the reply up above. I’ll just open Wikipedia here, which is how I begin all informed purchase-making processes… oops, time for work. Gotta run!
@InnocuousFarmer basically the smaller the gauge, the fatter the wires - carries the voltage better. This case - or any like it is really an emergency kit built to minimum (read cheap) specs.
and my son used the bandaids in the case to hold the plastic bumper on my car in place till he got home from a small fender-bender in the school parking lot…but duct tape would have been better
Does anyone really expect their nephew or niece to know how to jump start their car? Their Dad will be the one to appreciate the jumper cables after they call him at 2 in the morning to come out in the pouring rain because they left the lights on while they were in the party/club/whorehouse/white house (redundant?).
@bmihalovits No, Dad will be so unimpressed with the inadequacy of the included jumper cables, this kit would end up in the trash after one use.
Trust me, I’m a person who constantly saves parking lot leeches from certain doom, often with nothing more than common sense and simple tools. I have used cheap roadside emergency kits many times before. This one is ultra cheap. My advice to folks would be to either (1) continue to be leeches, or (2) buy real tools if you’re even slightly concerned about your safety.
@MauriceMoss I would suggest just getting good jumper cables if that is what people are getting the kit for, the tools that come with all these are complete crap. Get some good cables and a recovery-strap and a cheap headlamp. Everything else can be purchased at the dollar store and will be the same quality as in these kits.
@lichen do you think the quality of jumper cables matter? I just bought two packs at northern hardware for 6 bucks each. will they work or will they fry me up
@davechait Northern Tool? If they are the 10G ones, they will work… they will just take longer to get the electricity into your battery and are only rated for 150A of current so they might not work great to actually “jump” the car. They will charge the battery when hooked to another car after a while though. I personally like at least 4 Gauge jumpers for full cranking current and less voltage drop. But I am not really an expert on the matter.
With some half-assed online research, this seems like just the price of this kit. The $60 claim is the exaggerated retail price Amazon always compares to so that the regular price looks like savings. You can easily get this kit for $40 so the savings isn’t great.
I built my own kit using a Craftsman bag you can get for $5 or less pretty regularly. Jumper cables (good ones from an actual parts store), basic tools, flares, duct tape, rope, wire clothes hanger for the people who lock their keys in their vehicle. I also keep a flashlight, whistle, a Leatherman, and a few other little tools in my main cabin.
I’ve jumped more vehicles than I care to remember. Only needed it once myself.
@goldnectar it could be a weapon to hit someone with, or threaten a misbehaving kid with (only threaten since DHS takes a dim view of actually hitting a kid - but of course the kid doesn’t know that - grin)
Specs
What’s in the Box?
2x Gloves
1x Tire pressure gauge
1x Safety vest
1x Poncho
2x Glow sticks
1x Emergency blanket
2x Jumper cables
1x Roll duct tape
10x Zip ties
1x Pliers
16x Misc. size bandaids
4x Alcohol swabs
4x Cotton swabs
1x Length of thin rope
1x Rag
10x Tissues
1x multi-tool pocket knife
1x Compass/LED Flashlight/Whistle
1x Hand-crank flashlight
1x “Help” sign
1x Carrying case
Pictures
Stuff
Case
Reverse
Hanging up
This
that
and the other
plus some more
Price Comparison
$59.99 at Amazon
Warranty
90 Day Mediocre
Estimated Delivery
Monday, July 13th - Friday, July 17th
Is this car safety week?
If only it had 11 tissues.
How can it be an emergency kit without life saving candy corn?
@Tin_Foil This plus candy corn will be this Saturday’s bundle.
@Tin_Foil *Candy Corn sold separately.
@Tin_Foil … nor LIFE SAVERS, especially Cherry flavor.
@Tin_Foil i thought surely with all that orange in the picture they had hidden some in there. Plus w the write-up talking about giving the nephew something useless too, they missed such an opportunity!
@Tin_Foil you mean you didn’t buy the 50 bags of candy corn?
Kid learning to drive. Buying it. Wish I’d bought the battery jumper thing a few days ago too.
@tartanknickers wishing I had bought one of those too since my car had to be jumped 3 times yesterday before I could get somewhere to buy a new battery
@stardate820926 At least you can console yourself that the battery jumper thing would have only saved you one or two of those jump starts - they are really use-once-and-then-recharge gizmos.
@tartanknickers See my two long responses below for more details, but I would suggest teaching the kid how to jump start and get longer cables.
@bdb He could have charged it while driving in between jumps! …like a battery.
They really count the jumper cables as two separate pieces?
/giphy smh
@cinoclav Kids today are lucky, in my day we only had one jumper cable. You had to move it really fast to catch the electrons coming out the other side.
@cinoclav beats 6
@awk Didn’t they teach you young whippersnappers anything? The single cable connected the hot leads; you’d then complete the circuit by nudging the donor car forward till the chrome bumpers touched. No need for the added weight (and complexity!) of the two cable system. For obvious reasons, this technique is no longer viable.
As an added benefit, any sparking (when the bumpers touched) was well away from the batteries, which - at the time - spewed so much excess hydrogen that the better designs had built-in exhaust fans which would blow the gas over the terminals in order to block corrosion.
Some questioned this design, and it faded away at about the same time as onions began vanishing from belt loops.
Now get off my driveway.
@rpstrong There is no need for the added weight and complexity of your one cable system either; just roll the car down a hill and pop the clutch.
@rpstrong You shouldn’t be connecting the second cable anywhere near the battery anyway, so sparking doesn’t matter.
@rpstrong did that actually work?
@davechait Never tried it, but it should have - back in the heavy chrome bumper days.
I always went directly to the posts, as I could rarely get a good ground otherwise. You’re generally (and rightfully) warned against this practice, but if you understand the nature of the danger then you can at least take steps to mitigate it. ‘Sealed’ batteries were becoming the norm, and I was content to just blow away any standing vapors before I fastened the last cable - and I looked away before I made the connection. No problems in over 40 years ('though I’m now more likely to pull my AAA card instead of jumpers).
/buy
@rileyper It worked! Your order number is: woolen-witchy-oil
/image woolen witchy oil
@mediocrebot was not disappointed
/DoNotBuy
@Stallion Does this really work?
Because I’m sick of auto-buying every damn thing that pops up on this site.
@bigjonroberts well if you don’t want to buy anything anymore move to a state they don’t ship to (or out of country) and/or have your mommy take your credit card away from you (grin).
Pliers are a pair, too… Might as well count that as two pieces.
@djslack The best is that tissues is 10 things, but a multi-tool is only counted as one thing.
No road flares? I’m out
@jjohns71 If you short out the jumper cables it serves as a flare. For a moment, anyway.
@jjohns71 burn a tire
@mehcuda67 And if you gather something flammable, you could use the sparks for lighting a fire to stay warm.
I would pass on this one, at least until someone figures out how long the jumper cables are. Cables that are not long enough to jump two cars parked side to side can be a serious hassle, and I would advise against buying such too-short cables.
@bdb If you dip your big toe and the middle finger of the opposite hand in salt water, you can appreciably extend the reach of any cable.
But you also need old fashioned metal bumpers on both cars so you can ground them together with a bumper to bumper kiss.
@RedOak Good points.
@bdb Below I have a post about teaching/learning to use jumper cables sometime when it is warm and sunny.
And another post with what I feel are better choices for cables ($20)
@RedOak This is also a good way to weld two cars together.
@toddnet
So other than the jumper cables (8 gauge, so about $6 worth), are any of the other items worth more than a buck each? Much of this looks to be stuff found at a dollar store … except you’d get more than 10 zip ties or 10 tissues or 16 bandages there.
@narfcake They’re really expensive tissues.
@narfcake and that’s a rather nice case.
Here’s the manufacturer’s link. Looks like they get to 60 by counting each tissue:
Relief Pod Roadside Emergency Kit
In my part of the world a big metal coffee can with some cat litter in it and a large candle with matches is a good idea. Stuck at -20 degrees and you light the candle IN THE CAN to produce a bit of warmth.
@radi0j0hn and the litter is for pooping in
@medz Which is how you get crunch logs to eat three days later when your candle is gone and nobody has found you yet.
@yakkoTDI @medz you guys are disgusting LOL
“HELP”
/giphy weedy-unwritten-holiday
*pic unrelated
How many times can you use the relief pod before it’s full?
@mehcuda67 depends on how many gigabytes you get with it. Wait, you mean that’s not an option? No SD slot??
Nice job @Moose!
If only it had a MacGuyver in the bottom pocket.
/giphy macguyver
I have an AAA membership that sends someone who knows how to use this stuff.
I like but too many monies
In addition to my un-asked-for-advice above (which is to not buy this unless the jumper cables are a lot longer than I think), I would add this advice:
It can be very helpful to know how to jump your own car. Perhaps an even better gift than these cables would be an offer to teach the recipient how to use jumper cables.
If you are teaching someone, or asking someone to teach you, I would suggest practicing on four cars - that should give you a good sense of the variety of how the attachment needs to be made.
After that, I would buy a cheap pair of safety glasses and a piece of string, and a box of nitrile gloves. Take the glasses and the string and put them in a glove. Put about six more gloves over the glasses. Toss it into some spot that you never need to use for anything productive in your car. (For me, this is behind my spare tire, or under the rear seat.)
If you are the forgetful sort, put a note on your owner’s manual about where you put your stash.
Then when you need to jump your car, you have nitrile gloves to keep your hands clean, a pair of glasses to protect your eyes, and a piece of string to tie up your hair. You really don’t want to get your hair caught in a car’s fan belt.
And while I’m giving advice, I don’t carry jumper cables. They are expensive and take up a lot of space. I’ve never had to ask more than four strangers in a parking lot (or along a street) if they had cables before finding some (total times I have done this is, I think, six[1]). Most gas stations will also loan a pair.
What is much more rare (based on my limited sample size) is finding someone who knows how to use cables.
[1] I tend to repair my own car, and put off things like replacing an alternator for too long.
Pro tip : don’t own a car
@bdb I’m one of those guys that carries cables even in my new car…sigh…you are a leech
@mydrivec The most recent time I used cables, it was to help a couple in my dentist’s parking lot. They had the hood open and were peering at the engine. I asked if they needed help.
Turns out they were clueless about mechanical things, and did not have AAA. But they had jumper cables! I had never jumped a car with a start button before, but following the long instructions in the owner’s manual, which included a secret panel in the storage cubby, was easy enough.
So, my car, plus their jumper cables, resulted in them having a running car. Hopefully, by anti-leeching a bit that day, I evened out my jumper cable karma a bit.
@bdb Wow, I hadn’t even thought about how a push button would impact jump-starting a car!
@username If you don’t need or want a car, it certainly makes more sense to not own one. My car is a hobby, going for a drive is something I really enjoy. So I own a car.
@jqubed I have a push button start in my prius. It’s easy to jump. The 12v battery is in the trunk, but under the hood is a set of jump points. You connect and jump like normal.
I just can’t jump start another car. I can only trickle charge. If I’m trying to trickle charge someone’s car and they try to start it, they can fry the hybrid battery. I would be very hesitant to trickle start someone’s car for the fear that they wouldn’t listen and still try to start it while connected. I would gladly loan my jumper cables though.
@RiotDemon if I owned a Prius and felt the pull to assist others in jumping cars (I do), I’d carry one of those portable battery booster-jumpers like sold here at meh a not long ago.
No F-ing way is the risk of frying the Prius inverter worth jumping from it.
In fact, with the risk to all the expensive electronics in today’s cars, once the portable lithium ion battery booster market matures just a bit more I’ll carry one of those in our ICE cars.
@mydrivec like wise cept imma gal!
The most impressive thing here is that you reused the Amazon photos shamelessly!
This Orange costs big green…no relief here…pass…
Better options, if you need cables, in my opinion:
https://www.northerntool.com/shop/tools/product_200670399_200670399
$20, 20 foot, 2 gauge
https://www.walmart.com/ip/Everstart-Booster-Cable/182918724
$20, 20 foot, 4 gauge
2 gauge is better, but availability may not be as good as at walmart.
I don’t know if I need this. But isn’t that the point?
It’s a nice kit but those jumper cables are weak sauce. They look very short and 8-gauge is “adequate” for cars but you should really have 4-gauge or better if you should need to jump a truck or SUV.
I have a similar kit in the back of my car. When I needed the jumper cables, the insulation was completely rotten so the cables were useless.
This list gave me a good idea of what to refill the bag with though. Already have a good set of cables, so no need for this. I already own most of the other stuff.
So, thanks.
@RiotDemon don’t forget the tissues
Walmart - JustinCase
Justas Good
@richmondhokie good work. You talked me out of it.
‘course, that Wal Mart kit looks sketchy too, now that you mention it. I should probably read up on what 4 gauges are, like in the reply up above. I’ll just open Wikipedia here, which is how I begin all informed purchase-making processes… oops, time for work. Gotta run!
@InnocuousFarmer basically the smaller the gauge, the fatter the wires - carries the voltage better. This case - or any like it is really an emergency kit built to minimum (read cheap) specs.
@richmondhokie yeah, I gathered. I was joking, describing the manner in which I was going to never purchase jumper cables.
@richmondhokie *carries the current better.
@richmondhokie They have lots of confidence in that jumper set since they included a tow strap LOL
I don’t value preparedness this much. Half price or out!
Add duct tape to the kit.
@caffeine_dude we have a JustinCase
and my son used the bandaids in the case to hold the plastic bumper on my car in place till he got home from a small fender-bender in the school parking lot…but duct tape would have been better
@caffeine_dude The “What’s in the Box” list includes a roll of duct tape.
@caffeine_dude or chewing gum… just sayin’
@caffeine_dude
/buy quantity - 2
@vin314 It worked! Your order number is: jiggly-minute-leather
/image jiggly minute leather
Does anyone really expect their nephew or niece to know how to jump start their car? Their Dad will be the one to appreciate the jumper cables after they call him at 2 in the morning to come out in the pouring rain because they left the lights on while they were in the party/club/whorehouse/white house (redundant?).
@bmihalovits No, Dad will be so unimpressed with the inadequacy of the included jumper cables, this kit would end up in the trash after one use.
Trust me, I’m a person who constantly saves parking lot leeches from certain doom, often with nothing more than common sense and simple tools. I have used cheap roadside emergency kits many times before. This one is ultra cheap. My advice to folks would be to either (1) continue to be leeches, or (2) buy real tools if you’re even slightly concerned about your safety.
Better to compare with AAA (4390AAA) 66-Piece Severe Weather Road Kit or AAA 42 Piece Emergency Road Assistance; both for around the same $29 price.
@MauriceMoss I would suggest just getting good jumper cables if that is what people are getting the kit for, the tools that come with all these are complete crap. Get some good cables and a recovery-strap and a cheap headlamp. Everything else can be purchased at the dollar store and will be the same quality as in these kits.
@lichen do you think the quality of jumper cables matter? I just bought two packs at northern hardware for 6 bucks each. will they work or will they fry me up
@davechait Northern Tool? If they are the 10G ones, they will work… they will just take longer to get the electricity into your battery and are only rated for 150A of current so they might not work great to actually “jump” the car. They will charge the battery when hooked to another car after a while though. I personally like at least 4 Gauge jumpers for full cranking current and less voltage drop. But I am not really an expert on the matter.
@lichen yes they are. thanks for the reassurance that they will not be a complete dud.
I’d probably buy this if it came with 2 bags of candy corn.
@Jmays253 meh can probably arrange that @thumperchick
With some half-assed online research, this seems like just the price of this kit. The $60 claim is the exaggerated retail price Amazon always compares to so that the regular price looks like savings. You can easily get this kit for $40 so the savings isn’t great.
I built my own kit using a Craftsman bag you can get for $5 or less pretty regularly. Jumper cables (good ones from an actual parts store), basic tools, flares, duct tape, rope, wire clothes hanger for the people who lock their keys in their vehicle. I also keep a flashlight, whistle, a Leatherman, and a few other little tools in my main cabin.
I’ve jumped more vehicles than I care to remember. Only needed it once myself.
@ScottN umm but what if you locked your keys in the car - then the hanger won’t do you any good…
@Kidsandliz you’re right. I’ll play. umm but what if you don’t have a dead battery - then the cables won’t do you any good.
@Kidsandliz I got another! umm but what if it is day time - then your flashlight won’t do you any good…
@goldnectar you can use your cables to tie a kid into his car seat when he tries to escape
@goldnectar it could be a weapon to hit someone with, or threaten a misbehaving kid with (only threaten since DHS takes a dim view of actually hitting a kid - but of course the kid doesn’t know that - grin)
How long are the jumper cables?
@vjsatyal
Found on Ebays for $20.00 with free ship from a few different sellers, some even offered it in black or grey.
Waiting for the new deal is like:
@Brasssong I know…Brasssong abides…
Does this work with electric cars???