The Stovebolt Site Forums The Shop Area The Electrical Bay Battery grounding?

From what I've been reading,it's better to ground your battery to the starter and not the frame as original.Why? jimmy

You have to supply a ground between the starter and frame anyway so I can't see the advantage.

Hi, jimmy, the reason for that is the starter takes the most AMPS from the battery. also run a good ground to the frame from the battery.

Grounding to the starter or anywhere on the engine block is better than the frame. Reason: the frame usually does not have a metal to metal hook up to the engine, because of the rubber engine mounts. Thus, a ground on the frame does not necassarily mean a good ground for the engine. Your engine needs a good spark, hence a good ground to get that spark. Generally, its good to have the engine and the frame gounded together with seperate ground wires back to the battery so a good ground loop is made.

As long as you have a good engine to frame ground and a frame to battery connection, as the factory built it, you won't have any problems. no need to run separate ground cables to the battery for frame and ground.

i agree 100% w/longbox55

As long as you have a good, clean, solid engine to frame ground and a frame to battery connection, you won't have any problems

I have a heavy braided strap - frame to engine and frame to battery. a 2.0ga battery to starter, now you take the grounding thing all the way and ground the cab to bed, gas tank to cab or bed depending on where your tank's location is, I have the tank grounded in two places [but that's me], I also have my radiator frame grounded [fan] to the inner fender and because I have 5 relays mounted in the drivers inner fender that is grounded to the frame.

Every ground is scraped, w/ serrarted washers and covered w/ red anti-corrosive paste.

I will respectfully disagree. Well yeah, when these vehicles were somewhat younger, the mechanical ground worked just fine. But 50 plus years of moving around plus dirt and grime, I not so sure. A couple of bucks for wire and a little work...to me that's cheap insurance.

The early-50's straight-8 Pontiacs were notorious for developing noisy pinion bearings in the rear end. The problem was caused by the lack of a ground strap from the frame to the engine, and starter current finding its way back to the battery by going down the driveshaft and springs to the braided ground strap from the body to the battery. Simply adding a heavy frame-to-engine ground strap solved the problem, but it could have been avoided by attaching the battery ground to the engine in the first place. Most body-grounded items like headlights, etc., do not draw enough current to require a battery cable sized ground wire.
Jerry

I'll agree with what Jerry said. Some later model cars are even grounded that way, usually with the ground cable going to or near the alternator bracket. Either wya, you want to make sure you have a soid clean ground. But there's really no need to run 2 cables from the battery. You could simply just run the ground to the engine, then run the chassis to engine strap to take car of the body electrics.
As far the trucks are concerned, if the contacts are clean, and the bolts tight, the factory system works fine. I will admit to running secondary ground wires from the radio/amp, as well as the aftermarket ignition system, but the are all run to the mounting for the common ground, which is also the connection point for the engine ground.