Trick for improving connectivity is petroleum jelly between the battery terminals and the leads. Make sure it's clean first, coat the stuff on and away you go. Sounds like you've resolved the issue though.
for now, i have some battery jelly stuff that came with my old battery to put on the terminals but will do it when i got a proper lug. also bought some rapid fix for afew cracks in my fairing and holy s**t does it work well.