Need some electrical help for my 72 please.

[kentucky_smith]

Driving along and hear loud pop, I thought it was a backfire, but everything dead. Get it safely off the road and find a wire coming off the battery has burnt up. It's the red wire going into wiring harness off the battery, not the one going to the starter.

Put a jumper wire in there, radio and accessories come on, but no start. Also, red wire gets really hot. All fuses in fuse box are good and everything seems to work. Red wire going to left side fender looks great, it splits off to voltage regulator(?) or back to fuse panel. Don't see any frays or anywhere it could be shorting. Black wire that comes off the same block on the inner fender next to battery seemed to have an inline fuse that may have been burnt or I may have broken it trying to get the rubber boot off. Jumpered it too. Still no start.


Back of fuse box panel does seemed gacked up. Ideas?

The green jumper wire is a temp just now. It was all nice and sealed up. At first, I thought it was the battery sliding into it, but now not so sure.






Took the wife and sun around to our family cemetaries today, then to his baseball game. Were having an awesome Memorial Day weekend before it broke down about 2 miles from home. Towed it home with my 04 F150.

Here's good pics of the truck. Help me figure this out quick and I'll post pics of the wife.