I have been reading numerous posts lately about grounding and how important the electrical system is on the second gen cars. Well, I went out to Pep Boys last night and bought (2) 4 guage battery cables (The ones that don't have the terminal connectors...just the flat loop connectors).

I remembered reading a few posts that stress 3 general areas of grounding and I proceeded to run one wire from the negative battery terminal to the shock tower and one from the alternator bolt to the shock tower.

This morning's drive to work was absolutely WONDERFUL!

The condition of my previous electrical system was such that when I came to a stop that my car would bog down to 400-500 rpm and die or get real close to it. When I had the AC on it was about a 50/50 chance of dieing every time I came to a light and when I had my power steering in still I would die out practically every time I hit a light. My idle was pretty constant and sat around 750 rpm and my tps was adjusted perfectly and my bac valve was functioning perfectly.

Now my idle is absolutely rock solid at 760 rpm and when I come to any stoplight or any stop it jumps right back to idle without a hiccup. I also feel a touch more throttle response and may have grabbed an hp or two.

If you haven't reinforced your grounding situation yet on your 7 I strongly encourage you to do so and the replies after this post will tell you the same I am sure!

-Lee

PS- I love my RX-7.

 

Glad you have finally seen the light! Congrats John

 

Wasn't that the best $10 you ever spent?

 

Whaty lengths of wire did you use? I just want a rough number so I can determine where I want to run my cables.

Thanks,
Kris

 

awesome man! just curious though as to where you added extra grounds (or replaced old ones)

personally i was going to get a 4 gauge ground right from the battery to the lead coil mount... i thought that would help a bit.. and then one over to the trailing and one to the engine.. ? im a little unfamiliar with the 13B still (in regards to stock ground locations)..

where else did you throw em?

 

Yup... doing that tomorrow morning when i wake up...

I hear it's very worth while. I already have a grounding strap going from the front housing (aluminum) to the side of the shock tower. it really didnt change much. But that's because my battery prolly isnt grounded very well. But like i said i am going to change that tomorrow morning. Later guys

Markus

 

just thought id like to add... i did the switch. i used 24" 4 guage wire from bat post to spot on strut tower where old - wire grounded. then i used a 36" 6 guage i think it was, from that same point to the starter. then i ran some 6 guage from the other side of the engine to the other strut tower, and trough the fire wall to where the cpu grounds.

the pert ill add is, dremmel with wire wheel or grinder the area where the ground connects. then buy dielectric grease. q-tip swab the grease all around the part you wire wheeled and then buy some battery terminal spray, its like a grease/paint you spray over the posts of your battery terminals to prevent corrosion, and spray that over the boletd on and greased assemnbly. that will give you an even better ground that wont corrode.

 

I bought (2) 4 guage wires @ 24" long and ran one from the negative battery terminal to the strut tower and the other went from the alternator tension bolt (The bolt that you can adjust on the bracket to make the belt tighter or looser) to the strut tower as well. I am going to go and buy one more 4 guage wire to run from the engine block to the body later today.

Make sure that you take some sand paper and scrape through the paint around the strut tower bolts so that you have good contact to metal (The rubber caps will cover over anything that you scrape away so it doesn't affect your nice clean engine bay.) And while you are attending to these grounding points you might want to check all of the stock grounding points while you are at it. The stock ground that runs from the tranny stud at the top of the engine to the firewall (Just to the passenger side of the engine) had melted the plastic connector on my 88GTU. I unbolted it and sanded away all the paint underneath the connector to the firewall and it has not melted on me again since then.

-Lee

 

new connections work wonders man.. replace the connector for the ground wire to the battery, and while your at it add another wire and attach it somewhere..

maybe it wont seem like it makes a difference NOW, but ill betcha it will save you a few headaches down the road..

cant get enough grounds man.. more grounds = more solid

 

It seems that the forum has trends. The current trend is the importance of gorunding wires and a healthy charging system. Nice to hear something besides "I'm removing my air pump, will my auxiliary ports still function properly?"

And if anyone saw my post a day or two ago, I'm about to do the same thing, rewire the charging system along with battery relocation to the passenger side storage bin.

 

yep I have always ben a big advocate of re-grounding. Most Japanese cars were poorly grounded when they left the factory, well alone what happens 15 years down the road.

Even my 99 Tacoma, fresh from the factory when I bought it. The first thing I did within a week of buying it was to upgrade the grounds to 4 AWG throught the engine compartment.

 

Wow, great post. I will do the same, maybe it will chase the Gremlins away!

 

Hey Icemark....since we seem to be on a trend of new sticky mod right ups how about an Engine Grounding Write UP with all the points you reccomend grounding, size of wires to use and if we should use any sprays or anything for corrosion.......please?!!!

 

here here i second that

 

WOAH YOU GUYS!!!

i added a 12" ground wire from the battery right to the lead coil

THE SMOOTH IDLE and ALL THE POWER is BACK!!!!!!

man i couldnt believe it.. im not even kidding you guys.. serious.. runs sooo smooth now..

 

Can you detail how to connect to shock tower? Is is the big bolt on top? How about alt. bracket? Is it the adjusting bolt? Thanks.

 

Hmm, This is embarassing, I need to recheck & beef up mine also.

 

(crowd chanting) WRITE UP! WRITE UP! WRITE UP!

seriously though....there are enough posts here where you can pick out parts of each and make a write up.....maybe ill get on that......or maybe ill do some home work lol

 

myself i added a ground connection right to the bolt of the mount where the lead goes..

so.. theres the bolt, and then instead of coilmount + nut, it goes coilmount + ground wire terminal + nut

tightened up the nut, made a WORLD of difference

gonna run a few more ground wires later.. but right now im gonna drive... zzZZZZOOOOOOOOOMmmmmmm..

 

hey...BLACK13B
u said from the battery to the l-coil...... where on the battery? neg? pos?
jack

 

umm.. DO NOT run a wire from the POS of batt to the mount.. THATS VERY BADD!!!!!

a ground is another word for a NEG or negative terminal..

you can put pretty much grounds wherever, cause no one EVER puts power to the fender or anything.. it doesnt happen..

so.. NEG terminal to mount bolt.. in the order of... coilbracket + new ground wire terminal + nut

tighten the nut and wham pow

 

seriously if anyone is skeptical about spending the 10 bucks just DO it.. it will either make a difference or it wont.. and even if it doesnt, then you KNOW you have solid grounds, and a car will NOT function right without solid grounds, so.. you will just be saving yourself a headache in the future if you do it now

 

I HAVE alot more grounds that arent stock but the one i felt the most power was alt. power to the neg batt term. niiiice
jack

 

WOOHOO!!! *does corny victory dance in endzone with Black13b* Rotory power baby.

There are 4 smaller nuts on the top of the strut tower that you can connect any ground wires to... I believe they were 14 mm. And scrape the paint off underneath them when you put the ground wire on and use some dielectric grease if you have some.

Yes it is the adjustment bolt on the alternator that I used.

-Lee

 

Well I'm pretty borde today and I still need to add acoupla grounds to my electrical system so maybe I'll make a write up with pictures, write ups with pictures O\/\/N!!!