Relocating battery to hatch.., wiring? Options

[mark_426]

Hey guys

those of you who have relocated the battery to the hatch - how did you do it?

Did you run two leads back to the hatch, basically extending the old leads? Or did you just ground it in the back somewhere?

What gauge wire did you use?

Any suggestions on where/how to hide wires, or run them through the firewall?

thanks

[95ST]

deffinatly ground it in the trunk, make sure you have a good ground.

Ive seen it done with 4 gauge wire without any problems, but I would consider possibly bigger but I like overkill.

[Dr_Tweak]

Yeah what he said, ground it good in the trunk, and use a VERY heavy guage wire for the positive because it's a long way to travel and you want as little resistance as possible.

-Doc

[mark_426]

When you say VERY heavy, and overkill, are you thinking, like 2, 1, 1/0, etc?

any suggestions of where to hide these wires?

thanks

[Clipsetuner]

0g-4g should be fine I have seen it done all the time with 4g.

I have 4g ran underneath my carpet for my system and soon enough my battery relocate and I have no bludges of any sort, 0g might tho.

In the engine bay you can just Distro block your positives together or just hook them all to the starter.

As far as running it through the firewall I would buy a sealing lock nut grommet like such Grommet.

Make sure you have good grounds between your engine bay and chasis, and you should be set.

DTE

This post has been edited by Clipsetuner: Sep 28, 2005 - 11:36 AM

[Hanyo]

i remember someone using jumper cables as a cheap alternative to buying wires.

If i where to ever do this. I would run jumper cables under the car and zip ties the wires along the underside of the frame.

[Coomer]

I've had my battery relocated for a long time and I used four gauge wire and everything works fine.

[Batman722]

When Manny and I relocated his battery I think they were 4 gauge wires. He had used this to secure the battery to the trunk


He had run the pos and neg to the front of the car and I had also grounded the battery to a secure location behind the back seat bracket (the U bracket in the pic)

also there is an inline fuse block comming off the battery for safety (between the blue wires).

I ran the wires behind of the hatch plastics, the driver's side rear speaker plastics (pictured before I hid/snaked them better),


and under the door sill/carpet to behind the fuse box and through the firewall to the bay.

you can see the "power" box I hooked them to here, top of the pic with the blue and silver wires going to it.


the stock + battery terminal was fitted to the box and the - was grounded to the same spot it was before with new clean 4 gauge wire.

vroom vroom, no probs

[Batman722]

I added to the sticky for a knowledge base

[BonzaiCelica]

i was recently in a toyota basic electronic class at college and the professor who has been working for toyota for over 20 years, had said that small amounts of fumes evaporate from the battery. is that true??

what is the lightest car battery out there??

This post has been edited by BonzaiCelica: Nov 24, 2009 - 9:04 PM

[richee3]

^^ I believe small amounts of fumes do evaporate from the battery, but you still open your doors and hatch, don't you? That should vent the cabin well enough, considering how miniscule the fumes are.

[JustinCapps]

how would you connect the wire from under the hood to the 4g wire running to the back?
just solder them together?

[hurley97]

i was recently in a toyota basic electronic class at college and the professor who has been working for toyota for over 20 years, had said that small amounts of fumes evaporate from the battery. is that true??

what is the lightest car battery out there??

That's why you use a sealed battery like an Optima.

[BonzaiCelica]

well optima doesnt make lightweight batteries, right?........

hmm well how about braille battery usa. they make a battery that weighs in at 6.6 pounds and a carbon fiber batteries as well. dont see the point in carbon fiber batteries

looks like the 6.6 lb battery can only withstand 60-120 degree weather. But if you move to the 9.5 pound battery i guess it can withstand weather from 32-120 degrees???? anybody know the answer.

so from stock battery that weighs 35 to the leightweight battery that weighs 9.5 pounds you have a 25 pound weight reduction. thats pretty darn good

This post has been edited by BonzaiCelica: Nov 28, 2009 - 12:59 AM

[lagos]

well optima doesnt make lightweight batteries, right?........

hmm well how about braille battery usa. they make a battery that weighs in at 6.6 pounds and a carbon fiber batteries as well. dont see the point in carbon fiber batteries

looks like the 6.6 lb battery can only withstand 60-120 degree weather. But if you move to the 9.5 pound battery i guess it can withstand weather from 32-120 degrees???? anybody know the answer.

so from stock battery that weighs 35 to the leightweight battery that weighs 9.5 pounds you have a 25 pound weight reduction. thats pretty darn good

Go look on the Evo forums. Those guys are obsessed with mini batteries.
Personally I don't think you will notice much of a difference, and it will put a bigger strain on your electrical system to always have to recharge that tiny battery. Not to mention those batteries cost close to 200$.

[Hanyo]

i was recently in a toyota basic electronic class at college and the professor who has been working for toyota for over 20 years, had said that small amounts of fumes evaporate from the battery. is that true??

what is the lightest car battery out there??

All batteries emit fumes, gel cells batteries like optimas emit less or have a chamber to capture fumes. This also the reason why on any battery that mounted inside the living space has a self contained ventilation system that vents outside the car. The smallest battery that i know which can be safely mounted inside the cabin would be the mazda miata battery. part number: U1RT; with 370 cold cranking amps rating. To put that into perspective the average toyota 35 series battery has around 550CCA and the tiny honda civic battery has around 470. This gives you an idea how much your sacrificing to save weight.

You may ask, Why do i need so much Cold Cranking Amps or power?

Well the more cranking amps your car has the easier it is to start, the more forgiving the car will be to to electrical leaks (leaving your headlights on), and the more stable the power from the alternator will be. As batteries age they produce have less power. So a small battery might be able to start your car when it was new, but as it ages it will slowly produce less and less power and you will notice a dragging starter. The temperature also affects the power of the battery.
Majority of batteries fail are during cold starts, where the age and the cold temperatures pushing batteries past the threshold leaving there owners stranded. The average life of a battery is around 3-4 years. But if you take good care of your battery I had one last up to 7 years before it would go out. This is assuming you are using the properly size battery; A smaller and less powerfull battery will expire sooner because it has to take a deeper discharges everytime you start your car.

[dabazied]

I'll look to see what battery I have, I got a cheapo, but it's a little lighter than the stock and it's about 3/4 of the size, same amount of CCA as well. I'll get back to you on it. Got it from Advanced or Autozone.

[JustinCapps]

nobody answered my question?
what is the best way to connect the 4g wire to the wire that is alrighty there for the positive

[dabazied]

Best way and safest way to hook it up is to get one of those junction boxes that have fuses in it. That way it is bolted down to one section of the engine bay and not dangling, and also you have fuses and stuff for protection. You can usually find them with extra ports too to wire up some other stuff.

[JustinCapps]

sweet! i didnt think of that, but that would work perfect

[presure2]

i solder in some 0 gauge, high quality ring end terminals to the positive cable and the cable that i run to the trunk, and bolt them together, then cover that assembely with good shrink wrap and electrical tape.

[BonzaiCelica]

well i just went to autozone today to buy lift supports for the trunk. and I asked the guy if he knew anything about smaller batteries. even though he knew i had a 94 hatch he said "your not going to be drifing on the streets are you?" ha i told him i had a ff drivetrain. anyways, he said to locate the battery to the trunk of the car and to the front of left rear tire, just like manny has his battery located. He said that people corner balance their car and make all sort of adjustments to their coilovers so the weight of the battery wont throw off the balance of the car. He also said that those battery are strictly for racing only.

But doesnt the alternator take care of the car once the engine starts?? I only have an alarm and manual opening doors along with manual windows, i also dont plan on putting any sound system in my car. Can someone plz fill me in on the cons about smaller batteries.

This post has been edited by BonzaiCelica: Nov 30, 2009 - 2:30 AM

[dabazied]

Size isnt really the issue, its the power. Its like this, throw on a turbo and max out boost to the extreme of the internals, A, you throw reliability out the window because its always gonna be harsh conditions, B, its always gonna be maxed out. See what im saying? Its best to have more juice(battery wise) than you need, than to be at bare minimum. I was working on the car all day and forgot to get the specs, type and all that, I will get it tomorrow. My battery was cheaper than our stock batteries and im almost positive I got it at advanced. Ill get specs tomorrow. Its not super smaller, but it is decently smaller and a lil lighter but has the same cca and stuff as the big bulky ones.

[Jaws4God]

yeah i ran 6ga at first, and that didn't cut it... switched it out to 4 and starts almost the same time as with the battery in the front.

I did run an extra ground to the front because i was having grounding issues.. but my 6ga ground wire runs to the trunk well.

[BonzaiCelica]

actually, the lightest battery that you can use for daily driving and audio would be the 15 lb braille battery

[dabazied]

But doesnt the alternator take care of the car once the engine starts??

A battery is what powers the vehicle and what the vehicles needs for the engine to start. A alternator is what keeps the battery charged......basically a battery charger built into the car

http://autorepair.about.com/od/glossary/a/..._alternator.htm

[richee3]

Just finished up my battery relocation today. The hardest part is definitely just finding a way to get the wire past the firewall. Otherwise this was one of the easier things I've done to my car. Seems to be well worth it. I'll be picking up an Optima battery soon and that'll be it. Not counting the cost of the battery, my total cost was $46. Not bad at all.

[TEAMFaint]

I have a question here for everyone in regards to battery relocation; why not just do a simplistic relocate to the right side of the engine bay?





As seen here on the left side of the picture (right side of the car) since my car is the non-wrc version, why not just relocate
the battery to this side of the car to free up space for such things as a straight intake/cold air box etc?

Only arguement I have heard from when I have asked around is simply "if you are going to relocate it might as well be in the back
to free up all the space."

Thoughts?

[richee3]

It's not so much to free up space for me. It's for better balance of the car. 60/40 is profoundly bad, especially in a severely underpowered USDM Celica. Cornering is all these cars have over here, so we do what we can to make the best of it. If moving a 35 lb. battery from the engine bay to the trunk is what it takes for my car to.. well, not really feel any different at all, that's what I'll do. In your GT4, you might be able to use the extra space for your intake and such a lot more than I could with my 5S-FE.

[TEAMFaint]

Hmm I hear ya..
I think that just sold me on just locating it to the right side of my engine bay since I dont have the anti-lag system,
since its just going to be a small Oddessy battery anyways weight is really not that big of a deal to me.
Will post pics when finished! =]

[richee3]

Might as well post pictures of my battery relocation just for future reference for anybody who is interested. I used 4 gauge power wire to go from under the hood back to the trunk. I ran mine the same way as presure2 did, under the carpet on the driver's side of the car, behind the plastic in the back seat, and then I ran the wire between the rear seat and up through the carpet there and into my custom built box. Presure2 and Batman chose to ground to a U shaped bracket that the rear seat latches to, whereas I chose to ground mine to the bracket that the rear seats bolt to in the center of the car. I will edit this post with pics of that as soon as I get my real camera going again. For the box, I built it myself using materials I already had sitting around. It's simply a piece of plywood and some black denim. I could have bought a plastic box that would serve the same purpose, but I chose to save my money and build my own.

Although this battery relocation is currently fully functional and cost me less than $50, I will be adding some things to clean it up later, and I will post more pictures when I do. I will buy a junction box to go under the hood like presure2 used, as well as a grommet to run the power wire through my firewall. This will happen when I swap though, so that I've got an empty engine bay to work with.

[delusionz]

TeamFaint: for some reason you don't have ABS, most Celicas after 95 including my GT4 do have ABS, which sits in that location you point out.

Even if you don't have it, that location doesn't look very practical.

As for grounding, I ground to boot & to the stock engine ground.

Used to have starting troubles with just a boot ground after alarm install.

[96stgreendemon]

thought i would share this, if you want to do this for a cheaper price you can use the cable for welders, works just as well and is way cheaper

[BonzaiCelica]

I believe I remember a member who located it inside the center console (of course a small light weight battery that is)

can anyone recall

This post has been edited by BonzaiCelica: Sep 23, 2012 - 11:28 PM

[yellowchinaman]

TEAMFaint> You mean something like this?


I'm using a caterham banner battery which is tiny and light weight.
Made my own battery tray out of aluminium.
My build was always about balancing weight and trying to keep it performing like or better than stock.
This is actually an old pic. Since my battery is properly strapped down and my intake has changed and I saved more weight removing the original battery tray by drilling out the welding points.

What I found with many DIY relocations in the boot is that many people suffered weak start up and poor earthing.
Doesn't matter if you earth 5-10 points in the boot you should really earth it close to the front, to the alternator and even onto the engine.
DO NOT USE JUMP CABLES! Unless you want it burning up as I have personally experienced when the cables melted and end burnt off.

IF you want it in the boot, go to the salvage yard and find a BMW. They tend to have the batteries in the boot so salvage the cabling from them and wire it in the same way. Cheap and effective.

This post has been edited by yellowchinaman: Sep 25, 2012 - 2:24 PM

[BonzaiCelica]

this is how my battery terminal turnd out after the connection kept on sparking cause of wear and tear. i feel like this is not a solid connection what do i do??

[rave2n]

Sand and file it clean.

Put it all back together. Get a torch, heat the area. Spin up a bunch of solder, and make sure its heated realllly hot, and the solder will just melt into the joint.

Or, just tin the shiz out of the wire.

This post has been edited by rave2n: May 13, 2013 - 2:07 PM