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Hello,
I have a 55.2 Chevy truck with a late model wiring harness. I'm new to electrical wiring. I have a question about grounding. Is there any benefit to routing ground wires from various components through the firewall and making one connection that has a strap to the negative battery terminal? Another words a direct connection rather than using the body to ground. Even though I have the cab, frame and engine directly grounded via straps. You can see how I have it with the diagram link below.
Electrical diagram

Technically what you are doing is bonding from battery to ground ie starter frame firewall. Looks good to me drawing wise. I would use at minimum 2/0 in either 12 or 6 VDC for starter ground - go there first then you can have a bond from starter ground point to cab or you can run this bond separate from battery bond to the frame on the way to the cab. This one I would do in # 8 or so maybe # 6 if you have lots of load ie 130 dBA sound system

Dan Bentler

Dan Bentler

there is no advantage [beyond redundancy] to adding any more ground wires than the factory had, neg post to firewall right behind battery and starter mount bolt to toeboard boss - electricity travels thru any conductor instantly and having more paths doesn't improve anything .... just make sure the connections are tight to start with and keep them that way

Bill

Dan,
You lost me on the "2/0 in either 12 or 6 VDC" thing.

I guess I wasn't thinking "redundancy" but "reliability" on this. It seems like if you get some rust on a grounding point over time it shorts out. If it were all in one place (right behind the batter on the firewall) it would be easier to maintain.

I'm over thinking this aren't I? I do that a lot. That's how I drift off to sleep at night...how can I make this more difficult? Ha, ha!

yes, overthinking - use good star type lock washers to insure contact thru the paint on the cab and you'll have the reliability the factory engineers provided .... I'm kinda skeptical you'd waste all the effort you've been putting into that truck for any problematic corrosion to happen in your lifetime also, adding more connections doesn't make anything easier to maintain, the simplicity of this retro-tech allows for ease of trouble shooting

Bill

Thanks for setting me straight Bill!

Please allow me to set you straight on another matter. A corroded ground point does not "short out", it looses ground. "Short" is a term meaning a short circuit. When power finds it's way to ground before reaching it's destination, that is called a "short". When power does not find it's way to it's destination or when an intended ground does not find it's way to ground, that is called an "open", for open circuit.

Like when I hooked up my volt meter, forgot to scrape off the paint where the ground wire was hooked up to, turned the ignition key and fried the ground wire?

I knew it was a four letter word, but I didn't think was "open" for open circuit!

Thanks for all the info.!

The point that Cletis mentioned seems to be the most commonly misunderstood fact of life in the wiring world.