Battery relocation?

Hoping for some help, I thought this would be an easy topic to research but it seems there are just as many opinions as people giving them on this issue on-line.

I have a 2003 Toyota Matrix XRS and I want to move the battery from it's present location (under the hood, ahead of the front axle, on the drivers side), to the floor behind the front passenger seat.

What is the proper way to accomplish this?

 - What gage wire is ideal; 0, 00, ?

 - What is the best way to ground it in that location? Am I able to ground the chassis (from the battery) to the OEM seat belt anchor bolt and then ground the engine to the chassis (using a braided ground cable?), or is there a better way.

I want it done right and safe.

Help and thanks

I wish there had been some updates on this thread. I would love to relocate the battery in my car as it is effectively the same thing with the same issues (Corolla XRS clone).

 Did you ever end up moving the battery?  

We've done it on a few cars. The wire gauge depends on the length of the run, I don't know offhand what we used. You can ground to the chassis. The engine should already be grounded to the chassis. 

Use a sealed box. I like the moroso box. 3/8 minimum hold down hardware through the floorpan with spreader plates on the underside.  0 or 00 high strand count to starter. I prefer to use bmw cable as its cheap and good quality from the junkyard. 

Ground: i would make either a dedicated bolt for ground through the body near the battery, or run a cable up to the block in addition to the seatbelt bolt ground point. Additional braided strap from engine to frame be perfectly fine. 

Hope that helps. Ive done well over a dozen this way with no complaints on any of them. 

My '09 Pontiac G5 had a battery in the trunk, and I believe it shares a lot of underpinnings with you because of the Pontiac Vibe. I'd look into that further and see how much of the factory approach you can pirate over. Not only would that save you from a lot of overthinking, it would look clean and have easily replaced parts. 

We went with the Jegs battery relocation kit w/ some extra terminals. So far has worked great and the price was reasonable.

In reply to kevinh333 :

Why do you want to move the battery?

If you're relocating to inside the vehicle, as noted above make sure you use a sealed box. Ground can go to the closest chassis point, just make sure it has really good contact. DO use a circuit breaker somewhere close to the battery - something like this. Copper is pretty spendy nowadays, but don't scrimp on gauge for the positive lead, you'll probably need 0ga but depending on the run length you *might* be able to use 1ga. If in doubt, go bigger. Sometimes you can find good deals on stranded heavy-duty welder cable (I used this when I relocated the battery in my FC RX-7 got like 25' of it pretty cheap off a guy on Craigslist).

When I remote located my battery decades ago, I used heavy welder wire to run up to the engine (can't remember what size). Since then, I have read to also run a same size ground wire up there. Also, to run the B+ wire to a starter solenoid in the trunk, hooked up to the battery positive wire so that it is de-energized except when turning over the starter. http://madelectrical.com

NOT A TA said:

In reply to kevinh333 :

Why do you want to move the battery?

Usually for more favorable weight distribution. 

Back when I autocrossed and drag raced my 5.0 Mustang, I relocated the battery from the front of the engine compartment to the spare tire well - at the rear, and several inches lower. The battery weighed a little over 30 lbs, the car weighed a little under 3000 lbs, so it was an easy and effective way to relocate about 1% of the overall weight to the rear tires, rather than the front.

Did it make a huge difference? Probably not, but every little bit helps.  

earlybroncoguy1 said:

NOT A TA said:

In reply to kevinh333 :

Why do you want to move the battery?

Usually for more favorable weight distribution. 

Back when I autocrossed and drag raced my 5.0 Mustang, I relocated the battery from the front of the engine compartment to the spare tire well - at the rear, and several inches lower. The battery weighed a little over 30 lbs, the car weighed a little under 3000 lbs, so it was an easy and effective way to relocate about 1% of the overall weight to the rear tires, rather than the front.

Did it make a huge difference? Probably not, but every little bit helps.  

 

I (and many others) did this for decades before modern light weight batteries were invented.

Consider a light weight battery in the stock position? By using a light battery and not having to add extra lengths of heavy wiring, a cut off mechanism, and a box to hold said battery you might be better off. The difference would be how high the weight is in the car and the polar moment difference by being forward of the front wheels.