Relocated battery

[Matthew]

Get something larger than 2awg if your winching with it., I think its borderline too small for cranking. The specs on the cable Steve mentioned are a bit confusing, the data sheet on the Jaycar site doesn't match the the blurb.

Jaycar lists 0awg, but not in stock. It is rated at 200amp, they don't list the duty cycle, but at 200amp it may be 100%.
http://www.12volt.com.au/ have 0awg, 315amp @ 60%

I would look for 00 or 000awg if you can find it cheap enough, 00 should be around $20 a metre. Dedicated car audio suppliers should have it, caravan outfitters and welding suppliers should all have it in stock.

A quick check of ebay shows a few suppliers of 00, search for b&s and awg, they're the same.

[jono165]

Last time I needed a bit of battery cable I did the tight arse option. It can be quite expensive if you need a bit of it. Most BMW 3/5/7 series have the battery in the boot. I have previously bought a length of battery cable from the wreckers for $4 from the back of a 7 series. This was very thick cable, much thicker than the cable that came with the winch I have. Wrecker pricing can be quite interesting as they have to apply the 'battery cable' price to every car.

I dont know the guage of wire it is but it looked like this:
http://www.ebay.com/itm/BMW-E38-740iL-7 ... 1069401241

[lbzook]

I got a length of battery cable (15mm od) today out of a 3 series BMW, and i noticed that the stock earth cable just goes from the negative terminal straight to the body. My question is to you guys that have already done this, what have you done with the earth? Should I be running a solid line back to the starter? Or can I earth it nearby to the body or chassis then back to the engine closer I the motor?

Thanks for the help
Leigh

[Greg]

Run a second heavy gauge cable up to the firewall and just use a big bolt through the firewall (no isolation required).

If you have both your firewall holes where the stock battery was, all your stock wiring under the hood can be used.

[lbzook]

Thanks Greg! So if I do it like that, and then run the starter earth off that, that single cable will act as both my body and engine earths yeah?

[Greg]

Surely will leigh.

Your stock battery earth is taken off the body at about the same location too - so the earth 'performance' should be on par with stock too.

[lbzook]

Perfect! Thanks for the help!

[Matthew]

BMW battery cable ftw!

$4.00 out of an M5 at imlachs, and somebody had already stripped most of the interior for me

[dank]

yeah they are a PITA to get to those battery cables! we got one for the jeep about two years ago. Spent over an hour ripping shit out plus the rear drivers door wouldn't open which made it harder!

[lbzook]

But so worth it though! I went from looking at about $30 per metre to about $2 per metre!