The Stovebolt Site Forums The Shop Area The Electrical Bay Battery location

Time to start putting the old 51 back together and have the option of putting the battery back to its original location under the floor boards or putting in the engine compartment on a tray that was welded to the firewall. What are the pros and cons of each location? This will not be a show truck but more of a daily driver. Thanks for you coments. Elmer

i kinda like under the hood ,it's a pain i know on my old mans 1940 maintaining it there ,they catch a lot of junk and spray down there .

my 52 has it under the passenger floor mounted to the frame just as your 51, and my plan is to remove the mount from the frame and bolt it to the passenger firewall. My truck will be a driver as well and for ease, I believe having it in the engine compartment would be best.

Im doing a bit of custom work to the 52 (ie door poppers, no handles on the outside, etc) so having it under the floor mounted to the frame would make it a bit more harder to get to if I had to recharge/jump the battery in case of emergency, though I am adding an emergency locked out latch to be safe. Either way it going in the engine compartment.

Mine is still under the floor on the passenger side.
Pros:
1-it is out of site
2-I sealed up my box pretty well with live rubber and put in a drain sytem nothing gets to the battery
3-space is at a premium under the hood and not having a battery in there is nice
Cons:
1-when i first got on the road my battery was old and let me setting at the local Hardware, luckily i have a long set of jumper cables or where i was parked it wasnt happening had to run the cables through from the drivers side window
2-roling up the carpet to get to the battery is a pain
3-you have to be very careful tightening up the positive cable or ya end up touching your wrench to the steel and ya get a nice spark..i keep a 1/2" wrench covered in black tape just for the battery in my tool box

So there are some good an bad points to either set-up it is all up to you it is YOUR TRUCK.
Tim

Two things I don't want hanging on my firewall, the master cyl and booster and the battery. My old 51 I had 40 years ago had the battery on the firewall by the PO. It was ok there, but I want this truck to be a semi show truck and keeping the firewall clean is a good start.
If I were planing on using my truck as a driver I would probably hang it on the firewall.

I'm thinking about a drop down battery box for my '54 GMC.

http://www.classicperform.com/Store/1947_59_Trucks/BDBS24.htm

I haven't had the urge to move mine from where the factory put them and I have 4 pre 55. One of them is a 350 with a 270 from the factory and the group 1 spins it just fine. The other 3 are pickups.

I ran out of room on my truck after conversion so I put it in a battery box in the bed. One holds the battery and one is a cooler/toolbox/luggage.

http://www.leahstockwell.com/truck/truck%20002.jpg

if you enlarge the box you have more choices for batteries under the floorboards, but that's really not needed unless you have LOTS of electrical stuff.
if you put the batt in the engine compartment you limit what you could have put there that may serve your needs in the cab better like windshield washer bucket or A/C plumbing or??
http://s67.photobucket.com/albums/h298/1951otter/?action=view&current=6.jpg
my .02

If you do get the Optima size. It's a little bigger than the standard box.

I am planning on relocating the battery to the frame on my 64 to un clutter the engine compartment. I had thought about the connection issues and didnt want to end up welding my wrench to the frame taking the cables off , so i am going to use these http://www.hgmliftparts.com/default.asp?ID=30 they handle the load of electric forklifts that are driven all day with no problems. I got a couple from a mechanic at work along with enough welding cable to run my power / ground. I was even thinking of putting a connector on one end of a set of jumper cables so i could just plug them into my battery and have the clamps on the other end.

Cletis,

Will you be using a 6v or a 12v Optima?

Tim

12V

Regarding the Pros and Cons from SW Radial. Con item 3. I am of the impression that if you tighten the positive side first and hit the metal frame you will not get a spark. If you do the negative side first you will get a spark when the wrench on the positive side hits metal.
I could be very wrong on this as its been a while.

Connect the negative last, remove the negative first...no lightshow/suprises....

Well I am a creature of habit ...ya see Ive been working with Industrial Electricity for over 20yrs. and it is beat into you to ALWAYS CONNECT GROUND FIRST ...HOT second ..that way YOU are not the ground when 480 hits you!
Tim

i agree w/ SW, for your personal safety ...
the path to ground should NOT go through YOU.
so the ground is always connected first before power, and last after power is disconncted.
that's my 36 yrs in working w/ power

good to see you 2 straightening them out, but you forgot the most basic safety rules .... when working with electricity keep one hand in your pocket and always wear rubber soled shoes

also note that if you connect the ground first, then when you touch the cable to the pos battery post, if there's a spark you know right off there's a problem .... if you didn't forget to turn the key off

Bill

When dealing with automotive electrical systems, gorund is disconnected first, connected last. You really have to be carefull with that when dealing with any modern cars and any alternator using the Delco style solid state regulator (almost all aftermaket alternators are running that type). If you hook up the positive last, you will fry the regulator. If you hook the ground up first, when you hook up the hot side, you will be the ground when dealing with a automotive style electrical system.

Longbox is correct on this. In all automotive electrical work the ground is connected last. In days of old it was done so that you could not fry your wrench and today it is done so that you cannot fry the electronics and your wrench.

The loads produced by grounding a battery are not the same as with line voltage for commercial or residential. I have never heard of anyone being elecrocuted by grounding a battery, but it is possible to be burned very bad. The battery can explode as well, but this would take more than just a momentary grounding with a wrench.

I am installing a stainless drop-down box in my 5700. I don't want to remove the seat bottom and floor panel everytime I need to get to the battery. I intend to install it just behind the cab just inside the frame rail. It will still be close enough to the starter so I don't have to worry about excessive voltage drop.

If you haven't yet bought the box I would suggest you choose the larger one that accommodates the funny looking battery. I can't remember what it is called but most of you guys know what I'm talking about. I am out of town and can't check on this. I chose the standard box and then decided on the better battery. It will fit but you will need to do some modifications with the hold-down. I would think the larger box would accommodate either battery so later if you decide on upgrading you battery you could do so without any problems.