I'm planning to cut the negative terminal off with a dremel, crimp on a lug ring -- something like then bolt down the ring to a terminal like and put that on the terminal.

I did some looking around in the forums and it seems like people have done similar things. My biggest concern would be I'm not sure the cable will still be able to reach the terminal after I cut it and swap it out. Am I on the right track?

NB I'm considering doing this because my current negative terminal is a bit beat-up and isn't tight enough even when fully tightened. I'm planning to try to fix this either by shimming, inserting a screw in there, or hacksawing off the end of one of the crimping wings so it can compress more, but I want to have a backup in place in case these things don't work.

 

Can you post a pic of what your existing negative clamp and post look like? I'd try a lot of things before cutting off the original terminal.