General Motors introduced the side-post battery in the 70s with the idea that this type of battery terminal connection would result in less corrosion than conventional top post batteries. Ultimately this turned out to not be the case. Another reason for the design was that General Motors, at the time, had a proprietary battery produced by AC Delco, which just happened to be a subsidiary of GM. Therefore, if you needed to replace your battery you had no choice but to buy it from General Motors. Jump-starting a side-post battery is difficult but possible with the right steps.
Place your automatic transmission in Park or manual transmission in Neutral. Set the parking brake. Make sure your headlights and all accessories are turned off. Unplug anything that's plugged into a power socket such as a cell phone. The engine on the jumping vehicle should also be off. If the jump does not work like this, start the vehicle.
Connect the jumper cables to the starting with the red clip on the positive battery terminal of the starting vehicle.
Connect the other red clip to the side-post bolt on the vehicle to be jumped. You do this by grabbing the head of the bolt with the side of the clip. It may take a few tries to get a good bite.
Connect the black clip to the negative battery terminal on the jumping vehicle.
Connect the black clip to an unpainted part on the engine of the vehicle to be jumped. Usually one of the brackets on the engine will work. You will get a small spark when you connect this clip. It's supposed to do that.
Attempt to jump the vehicle.
