Small Battery, Anyone tried this ?

[Kavs]

I am wanting to out a gell Battery inside the car against the fire wall.  Autosport have VELO batteries which they say will work fine.  Seems everyone has a different opinion.

[PZG302]

To ask a silly question, why???

 

In my old race car the battery was mounted in the standard location in the engine bay.

 

Yes I knew that there was a small effect on the weight, and it was weight that was up relatively high, but the safety aspect was more important to me.

 

I wrote a sports 1300 off at Amaroo park in the early 90's and the battery was mounted in the passenger footwell. The battery was split open in the crash, I was using a bike lead acid battery, smallest and most cost effective at the time and would turn over the 3K Corolla motor. I ended up very nearly getting an acid bath along with the bruising and sore neck and bruised ribs.

 

Even with being a gel battery, I wouldn't want the possibility of something that could come loose in the cabin. I have also seen what happens to someone wearing an open face helmet when a fire extinguisher breaks out of it's metal mount in a sports sedan, and it wasn't pretty.

 

Even with the new race car build, the battery will go in the boot to make sure the cabin only has the bare minimum in it to function so there is less potential to be hit by stuff if the worse happens.

[nizm0zed]

Why not?

Dedicated race cars will often have many things done in certain ways because they are a lot more likely to be crashed at high speeds, Build and design accordingly.

You wouldn't have a full cage, harness and stripped interior in a street car would you?

 

I have one in my car, its a Pulse brand AGM battery (made by Odyssey)

I made up a mount for it to tuck up under the dash, behind the glovebox on the passenger kick panel.

When I bought it, it was the smallest I could get with enough crank power to start the engine, without spending a bazillion $$$

Its shagged now and there is better ones around, so that'll be replaced.

 

I did it because I wanted to tidy up the engine bay and wiring loom.

I think it looks a lot neater not having the battery in the bay.

 

Edit, I did have some pics in my build thread, but I notice that image shack has decided nobody wants to look at them.

I will have a look at home and see if I still have all the old pics saved, i'll have to repair my build thread too... 

[JDSM]

I used a lithium battery for my hill climb car:

 

http://www.superstart.com.au/Products/ProductList/tabid/108/mode/details/bid/15/Default.aspx

 

It weights a few hundred grams and they are very cheap these days. Also, you don't have to jump the car all the time as the CCA are massive for the size. Also, modern lithium batteries are quite safe compared to their predecessors.

[Kavs]

My battery bracket was rusty, surprise surprise. and on removing it now appreciate the space. I pulled out the factory aircon and have space to hide a battery if small enough and would still go the extra mile and make some sort of case or barrier.

is there a minimum for cold cranking amps/cranking amps ?