[Driftin_AW]

Seems like the season for it, so I thought I'd post pics of what I've done. I did this when I converted to 3SGTE, but today I redid the fuses and tidied it up a bit

Bracket:

Welded in to place. That small strip of metal sheet at the back holds the clamp on one side

Underside of the battery clamp, with the top on it (fuses will be mounted to it). The sides of the cover have foam around them to prevent the terminals shorting in the event that something moves

and finally, everything installed, fuses in and mostly wired. The big fuse runs to the starter, and the 4 way block will be connected to 2 amplifiers, fuel pump, and water/air intercooler pump

The earth and the wire running to the starter is 1 gauge (50mm^2 cross section), and they're double sheathed for extra protection against insulation damage. The short red cables running to the fuses are 4 gauge

 

[Driftin_AW]

oh and finally here's an old shot showing how the spare tyre still fits quite easily (even with the front end airflow mods there's still room for soft luggage )

 

[casualsax3]

Wow that looks great, and tiny! What kind of battery is that, and do you have any more pics?

 

[bentheswift]

Yeah, that's a great idea. I'm still getting ideas for how I will built mine later this year. But I have to second the "more pics"! (especially the hood system)

 

[Driftin_AW]

The battery is an Exide Orbital Gel Cell. It's basically the same as an Optima Red Top, and I assure you it's not at all tiny! Same size as a redtop/standard full sized battery, weighs a ton too! It's possible that the rather large fuses throw the scale off a little.

Don't really have many other pics of it, there's a couple on my website here:
http://www.fasterthanjesus.net/sw11/D20.html and
http://www.fasterthanjesus.net/sw11/battery.html

And for more pictures of the radiator/bonnet work, there's a brief thread about it here:
http://www.mr2oc.com/showthread.php?t=157255 and much more info on my website here:
http://www.fasterthanjesus.net/sw11/rad.html

 

[Myk]

Not to hijack thread, but I put my batt in the front as well. I bolted down a marine battery box with two bolts and put the battery inside. Do you think that will hold up to hard cornering and braking?

Myk

 

[85MK1]

Yeah i will agree that looks nice great job on the install.

 

[bentheswift]

Now since the hood is vented, water won't be coming in direct contact with the battery of course, but won't it be a generally lot moister in the frunk during the wet season? Have you made any provision for that or do you think it's a big deal at all? Does it even rain in new zealand?

 

[Driftin_AW]

no it doesn't rain in New Zealand. For water we send expeditions to Antarctica where they cut of massive pieces of ice which are then melted and put in giant buckets when they arrive back here

:lol:

Actually I've designed the whole thing so there should be very little chance of water getting in. The stock seal in the frunk is still in place, and all the other parts are going to be well sealed with silicone on the permanently mounted parts, and waterproof foam between removable parts.

To be fair though, you could probably submerge the battery and it wouldn't cause any major problems. There would be a small leakage current between the terminals, but nothing major. I would be more worried about the amps that will eventually be mounted on top of the battery getting moisture damage, as there are often much higher voltages present in amps, sometimes with the poles quite close together. I wont be doing that until the setup has proven to be waterproof though

 

[07734]

hm.... right hand drive??
i wonder if it can be done in a left hand drive... since the master cylinder is on the other side

 

[Driftin_AW]

don't see why you couldn't just do a mirror image of the same thing?

 

[aaron7]

Looks good, but why did you get rid of the stock fuse setup?

 

[Driftin_AW]

I'm not sure what stock fuse set up you're talking about? I didn't get rid of any

 

[SeanBlader]

That's brilliant with the tray. I've been trying to find a way to put the spare back up front with my battery. Now I have to find someone to weld up a tray for me, hehe.

Wanna weld up a bolt in version for the opposite side of the car? :smile:

 

[Chrys007]

thats a sweet install, I'm in the process of fabbing the mount for my relocation, except I plan to put mine infront of the M/C so that I can fit a fullsize spare

 

[Ottobon]

why are you guys speading the weight out all over the chassi? i understand the idea behind it but you probably are only hurting the "moment of inertia" rotational ease

anyways its not like 44.5/55.5 weight distribution is horribly rear heavy or anything

*thats still a nice fab job there

 

[Chrys007]

its not the point that it helps any weight dist. In my particular case, the air cleaner is now sitting where the battery used to be. and I'd rather have it up front than in the trunk. its as close to the middle of the car as it can get w.o being in the cab

 

[Driftin_AW]

Ottobon, do you go into everyone's battery relocation threads and throw around the term "moment of inertia" to make it sound like you know what you're talking about?

From a very superficial viewpoint you might think moving weight further away from the centre of mass like this was going to hurt the handling of the car, however the motion of a car around a corner is governed by a lot more than simply the mass moment of inertia. Other aspects are important, like the % of weight over the front wheels, especially in a car that often understeers due to a lack of weight in the front, infact a lot of people have put heavier objects into the front of aw11s and commented that it improved the handling. Also I don't know how much you think moving ~10kg less than 0.5m from the center of mass is going to effect the mass moment of inertia of a 1000kg+ car, but I can tell you it would be SFA.

Sean, I think my fabrication skills are just good enough for my car, not for anyone elses Have a look in the mk1.5 section, somewhere on the first page is someone else's battery relocation where he has it mounted behind/under the spare(similar to a mk1), looks like it should be a very tidy and effective way to do it

 

[SeanBlader]

Driftin, I think your fab skills are the shiz, and I'm jealous hehe. I actually have 2 problems with my spare/battery, I have a full size spare tire to go in there. They had a triangle at the junkyard once and I picked it up. Then went to the trouble of fitting a $20 piece of rubber around it too. I'm sure eventually I'll get it worked out.

 

[Ottobon]

im not trying to impress anybody with big words, i just wanted to make it clear what i was trying to say, maybe it does work in the mr2, but i know when porsche tried similar measures in their 911s it actually hurt performance even though it seemed like the right idea, the mki is not a exceptionally rear heavy car it already has a nice amount of weight on the front. i however can not argue with the fact that the battery is much much lower to the ground, that by all means is a very good thing