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How To: Battery Relocation

17K views 40 replies 25 participants last post by  kleedus 
#1 ·
Battery Relocation
Written by RedIntake (Kenny)
www.angelfire.com/ultra/scort/index.html

(suggest reading entire instructions before starting)
Remove the battery terminals, J-bolts, and the battery from under the hood. Remove the battery tray that the battery sits on by unscrewing the four 10mm bolts. Clean the battery with degreaser or terminal cleaner. Remove the ground terminal and attach the ground wire running to the vehicle to the chassis. Be sure to scrape up the chassis a little, so you get a good ground. Use Rustoleum or rubberizer to coat the connection so that it doesn't rust. Buy a sealed (marine) battery box from AutoZone (about $15), and some big, copper, multi-wire from Home Depot. The stuff that I bought carried 900 amps, I bought 15ft at like $.29/ft. Mount the sealed batterybox in the trunk to put the battery in. You can run a tube from the box
outside of the car through a hole in the trunk floor to give the deadly, explosive Hydrogen fumes a way to escape outside. Put new terminals on the battery inside of the battery box. Run the wires through a hole in the box, sealing it afterward with RTV gasket sealant. Ground the negative wire to the chassis in the trunk with some of the wire that you bought. Coat this connection with paint or rubberizer also. Run the positive wire through the vehicle, through the firewall in the passenger's side footboard under the dash. There is a huge rubber seal surrounding the main wire cluster running from the engine bay and interior of car. Slice a slit in this rubber grommet and run the wire through it. It will seal up nicely afterward around the
wire. Run the wire inside of the engine bay, against the firewall to avoid melting it from hot engine parts. Attach the positive wire from the battery to the original positive vehicle wire. Don't just twist them and put a little tape. This will require a big crimp to avoid too much resistance. You can buy 8 or 10 guage wire crimp connectors from Home Depot in the electrical section (about $2.50 a piece). If you have all of the wires connected good, you should be able to start up the vehicle just like normal. A few things to check if you have problems:
*Will not start at all: Check the terminals, make sure they are tight, check
the wire grounds, they have to have good, clean metal connections for
pushing 650 amps required to crank your Escort. Check your fuses, interior
and engine bay. If you connected something while it was shorting, you
probably blew a fuse.
*Wires get warm: This is bad, soon the wires will melt, that is if your
battery power lasts long enough to keep running. This can be caused by two
things. If the wire only heats up while the car is running , then you bought
wire that is too small for carrying high amperage. Replace the wire with
bigger, higher amperage wire. If you are using wire with a smaller guage
number than 8 (the bigger the wire, the smaller the number), and still
having problems, then you are probably using the wrong TYPE of wire. I used
8 guage 900 amp low-resistance multi-strand copper wire. On the other hand,
if the wire heats up while the car is not running also, then you have a
short. Check all the way along the positive wire, looking for a place where
is rubs with the chassis.
*Battery drains: There are many reasons that this could happen, but it's
likely that it's caused by small wire, high resistance wire, or shorting.
Check if the wire gets hot or melts, this indicates that it is probably a
problem with power moving through the wire, because it is not big enough, or
too restrictive, to carry that much power.
 
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#2 ·
^^UPDATE^^

I didn't mention that if you spend the extra $5 for more wire to run from the neg terminal on the battery all the way to the engine bay and ground it to your main ground points under the hood (The engine/tranny ground, EEC bracket ground, and upper radiator mount ground), you will get alot better results. You will give a better ground to all of your components and it's been said that you will increase horsepower too. I'll include some picks of these ground points when my dig cam gets fixed. Have fun! It really makes it alot easier to find an intake for the 2gen.
 
#5 ·
No, i'm sorry, my dig cam is broken. If autozone doesnt carry them where you are, any marine store should have them. They look like a rectangle with a gasket and a strap. :)

Also, a sealed deep-cell marine battery would take care of the whole box problem. They run about $45 at a good battery or marine shop. I think that the 2gens require 650+ cold crank amps, 580+ running amps. From what I've been told, running up to 900 cold crank (850 running) amps will be fine. Most marine deep-cell marine batteries are around 850 cold crank, which I've told is fine to hook up to the 2gen scort.
The deep-cell batteries are also some of the longest lasting ones on the market. They are made to be completely drained and then recharged, or drained partially and be recharged, or be recharged while being used, and have no memory loss. They last alot longer than a regular one. They are good batteries.
 
#6 ·
pfssssshhhh

my setup is this, took all the mounts clamps and battery stand, and mounted it where the stock jack goes, cut the panel to half cover the battery, then i used my 4 guage audio wire for my amp which was pre run from engine (battery) to the trunk , so i just spliced the engine side to my starter wires and accessory wires, then pluged the amp end into the battery and ran another foot piece to my amp

VOILLA DONE

no battery case, ya thats right lots of people say it should be vented but meh screw it

and yes i know the complications, but no i dont think it will ever happen
 
#8 ·
Whitie_Bear said:
pfssssshhhh

my setup is this, took all the mounts clamps and battery stand, and mounted it where the stock jack goes, cut the panel to half cover the battery, then i used my 4 guage audio wire for my amp which was pre run from engine (battery) to the trunk , so i just spliced the engine side to my starter wires and accessory wires, then pluged the amp end into the battery and ran another foot piece to my amp

VOILLA DONE

no battery case, ya thats right lots of people say it should be vented but meh screw it

and yes i know the complications, but no i dont think it will ever happen
There is two vents in the trunk of the escort.They are hidden behind the left and right plastic panels.One is close to where the spare tire jack goes.
 
#11 ·
ya i knew about the vents thats why i wasnt to worried, but thanks for pointing it out for those who didnt know

um the benefits are these

better weight distribution
harder to steal the car
room for my civic intake

the reason i did this was because i used a intake i bought for 7 dollars yes seven dollars and thats canadian funds, anyways the battery was in the way so i moved it to the back

but also if a crook smashes your window bam alarm is going off, he pops the hood and runs to snip battery cables but wait, WTF no battery cables, hes not going to wait around while its going off so he beats it,

if he comes back he knows its prolly in the trunk but i have the terminals hidden behind the panels, so its basically a bitch for him to cut any wires and disable my horns (yes i have to sirens) 1 siren is in the engine bay, and one is hooked up inside the car inside a panel and that wire is virtually impossible to cut, unless you remove the right panels and snip it

tada

oh and its easy as crap all you need is wire, a new battery terminal and a drill, and some snips to mod your trunks panels if you put it where i did

oh and the factory jack i cram it in kinda half under the battery stand, and it stays, so boooyaacka
 
#12 ·
wanna post some pics of how to do this?? I want to get my CAI and I want to relocate my battery. Also, what would be the benefits of possibly a 2nd battery???? I will also be running 3 caps @ 1 Farad each
 
#15 ·
Slammed94Wagon said:
nor is mine... i figure if it gives off enough to fill up the interior of my wagon then y don't they come up with a better/safer battery... :D

Jeremy

lowered '94 tracer wagon

http://www.cardomain.com/id/hiney
well I'm sure the interior of an escort isn't exactly air-tight

as another guy up there said... there are two vents in the hatch somewhere so I think I'll be fine :)
 
#16 ·
Thanks for all the info on the battery relocation, as far as the jack and spare tire I bought a box at wal-mart that fits into the trunk It holds my jack and space saver spare also any other repair junk that may have to sit back there. if I go racing I just remove the box and all the weight of the spare and jack stuff is gone
 
#18 ·
RedIntake said:
I have never had problems with hydrogen, even when I had no box. Someone told me last year that I should use a box. It's not that bad of an idea.
well I suppose if you had any serious problems with hydrogen, you probably wouldn't be here :)
 
#19 ·
GTScort said:
RedIntake said:
I have never had problems with hydrogen, even when I had no box. Someone told me last year that I should use a box. It's not that bad of an idea.
well I suppose if you had any serious problems with hydrogen, you probably wouldn't be here :)
This is true. When I did most of the reductions, i took out the box and put it away for the summer, since I ride windows down anyways. I honestly haven't actually used the box very much at all.
 
#21 ·
relocating the battery is really really easy, just try it youll see, its not hard to take a battery mount out of the engine bay and put it over the jack hole, of course half of the battery plate is suspended in air but hell its easy, then cut a huge rectangle out of the panel and your done (of course run wires, and a couple drill holes are needed)

i dont have a digi so i cant take pics, all i can say is its amazingly easy
 
#25 ·
hate to bump an old thread but what did you guys do with the little black "box" that hooks up to your battery? Did you run all new wires for that?I went to home depot couldnt find any multi wire that has 900 amps so im gonna be using the audio wire that i also had in my car for my amp.

Thanks George
 
#26 ·
^ That thing can just get grounded to the chassis in the engine bay. It's just a collection of harness grounds.
 
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