Battery connections, and why do people dismiss them as a cause?

often when people have a situation where their car won t turn over, I have found that the problem lies in the battery circuit connections being poor in some way. either at the battery itself, at the starter connection, the relay connection (in situations where the relay is on the side wall of the engine compartment), or at the ground connection to the block.

sometimes its not obvious when the connection is simply oxidized not corroded, or when the corrosion is under the plastic cable insulation and not visible without stripping the sheathing back.
sometimes people say that the lights or radio work, and dismiss this as a cause.
sometimes people say the battery has been tested and dismiss this.
sometimes a mechanic or friend tells them that this is not the prob., and they dismiss it.

but often it seems that they or their mechanic or friend won t even remove and clean the connections as we advise.

my question is why? its free! its easy! the repair, if this is the cause, at most requires a new cable or connector.

but they won t even try it many times.
I have fixed or advised this fix for many people over the years. it is a common problem. every ford product that I have ever owned had this problem at one time or another over the years.

I can see where an unscrupulous mechanic might want to make easy money by fixing other things unnecessarily, but the unwillingness of some to believe it could be so simple just baffles me.

I see some posters that are very active here when trying to figure out their problem, and they dismiss the connection theory the whole time,
then after trying every thing under the sun, and posting numerous times with results and questions and after many mechanic visits, they disappear.

then I think to myself, aha! they finally checked those connections…

It’s the same reason they won’t shift an automatic transmission into neutral to see if the car will start if the neutral safety switch is bad. Some people are simply not proactive when their vehicle fails to start. I used to drive a wrecker in my younger days. I can’t tell you how many times that I went on service calls and the vehicle was left in drive when the driver shut off the vehicle. I simply shifted to park and the vehicle started. I still had to charge them the the $25 because that was what the boss insisted on. I didn’t understand his reasoning then but I do now.

I hate to admit it, but I have been baffled for a few minutes once or twice when my car has been left in drive…