I'm doing a relocate for space reason. Picked up a Moroso kit on eBay for fairly cheap. After ever thing is hooked up....nothing. The voltage on the battery is ok, but at the engine bay, it doesn't even read anything. I switched the 2g Moroso wire out with an 8g wire I had, and it barely reads 1v.
So is my stock Civic battery just not pushing enough amps to get the voltage through that much wire?

Search a few battery relocate threads and did not see this issue.

 

The thickness of the wire is to carry more amps not volts. Volts doesn't care about wire size.

I think you have a grounding problem.

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by mrlegoman &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">So is my stock Civic battery just not pushing enough amps to get the voltage through that much wire? </TD></TR></TABLE>

Like Grumpy said, the size of the wire isn't important until you actually start drawing real current through it. You could hook up a 9V battery to some 2 gauge wire a mile long, and very likely you'd see 9 volts on the other end.

Check the ground, check the wiring, it should be really straightforward. You need the probes on your voltmeter to "see" both ends of the battery to read a voltage.

 

That makes more sense. I keep forgetting the difference between amps and volts. I will work on the ground. I cleaned the contact area, but did not sand it to bare metal. I now have a pretty good feeling that's my issue. Thanks guys!

 

The easiest way to relate to electricity is using the old comparison to water running through a hose.

Volts is comparable to the water pressure in the hose, amps is comparable to the volume of water that the hose is carrying and resistance would come from the friction the water experiences in the hose.

 

This is exactly why I ran the ground all the way back to the block. It's more weight but I've had the odessey battery for 1.5 years with no problems. My daughter even left the interior light on two times. the car started right up both of the following mornings.

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by dvp &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">This is exactly why I ran the ground all the way back to the block. It's more weight but I've had the odessey battery for 1.5 years with no problems. My daughter even left the interior light on two times. the car started right up both of the following mornings.</TD></TR></TABLE>

isnt it best to have the shortest ground possible???

 

If you ground to the chassis, make sure you ground the engine to the chassis in several places.

 

i have had an odyssey 680 in my trunk now for 2 years. i ran 4 gauge positive and ground from the trunk all the way to the engine and fuse block. i beefed up all the grounds to 4 gauge also. tranny mount, valve cover ground
haven't had any problems at all doing it that way. even with full stereo.

 

You have to sand it to bare metal because the bolt holes is also painted so now the only ground you have is whatever the both threads have scraped off in the hole.

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by hybridmoments &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">i have had an odyssey 680 in my trunk now for 2 years. i ran 4 gauge positive and ground from the trunk all the way to the engine and fuse block. i beefed up all the grounds to 4 gauge also. tranny mount, valve cover ground
haven't had any problems at all doing it that way. even with full stereo. </TD></TR></TABLE>

is their a fuse by the battery or only in the engine bay?

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by dohcdelsol &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">isnt it best to have the shortest ground possible???</TD></TR></TABLE>

Yes, but grounding to the chassis doesn't make it a short ground either.

 

It's not the distance that determines resistance. If you could measure the resistance from the front of the chassis to the back, you probably wouldn't even see .01ohms. The chassis has more "cross-sectional area" than any automotive wire you can buy. That is assuming you're grounding into the actual chassis and not like a fender or something.

 

Sanded down the negative contact to the bare metal. Full 12v seen now.
Thanks to all.