Ok, well I searched first and can't find what I am trying to find, but I did notice most battery relocation threads were in here... Alright so here's the deal. Last night me and my buddy relocated the battery to the driver wheel well. Thought this was going to be an easy hour job. No. What I have and how its ran. I got 2 ga. battery cable and ran it directly from the battery to the original positive cable at the front. I grounded it at the back at the seat belt bolt with 2 gauge as well. So I crawl up front to start and click click click clickty click click. Yea so. I clean up the ground really good and check all my connections and test every thing with a volt meter. Found out my ground in the back wasn't very good. So I fixed it. Crawled up front and a really fast clickty click and then it drags a little but starts up. With a volt meter it drops to like 8.5volts when I start it. So I figured I needed a battery with more cajones. So I grab an new optima we got laying here in the shop. Same thing. So I start thinking about the wires at the front. I get back under the hood and well I have the positive from the rear attached to the old positive cable up front. So I decide to scratch that idea and just attach it directly to the starter. So I do that. Clickety click. But still starts. SO WTF. Well I decide I need to do something with the ground. So I actually take the old ground up front and take the battery bolt out of it and ground it to the strut bolts. Clickety click. Can't figure it out. Then I put a 2ga ground from the block to the sub frame. Like a 8-10 inch piece of cable and thats it. 13.8 volts when running, 12.4 when off but still drops to 7.5-10 when I crank it over and most of the time I get that clicking ( dead battery noise when all your relays and solenoid click open and close ) It doesn't go down so low that I lose my memory. But its pissing me off. Plus I haven't driven it far enough and got it hot enough to know if its going to start when I want it to, or if its even charging the battery good enough. Someone please help me!!!!!!!

 

Most of us are using 0 cable. I also have two extra 0 grounds from the engine to frame.

I also had to replace my starter with a new one. The old one(delco reman) just could not get the job done with the energy available after moving the battery to the rear

 

I have zero issue with #2 wire.


are the connectors you are putting on the wire in good contact with the wire? (I alway use crimp type connectors and I found this sweet hammer-type crimper thats inexpensive to crimp them.



are you sanding the paint off where you are grounding?

 

I'm having similar issues with mine and never got a solid answer. So I've been trying some different stuff

I relocated mine to the trunk recently for my single turbo install (turbo sits where battery normally is up front so I had no choice).

I have a 2ga hot lead running directly from the batt up front along the pass side, thru the firewall and down directly to the starter. From there I have a 4ga wire running over to the aux batt + spot on the fusebox under the hood. PREVIOUSLY I had a new lead running from the aux batt + down to the starter. I was having the clicking issues you're talking about - it would click twice then fire fine - and my battery wasn't charging like it should be. I have a 4 ga ground in the back off the neg batt that connects to a bolt on my rollbar, and a 4 ga ground up front off the block to the subframe, as well as the dinky little strap on the driver side of the block.

So I thought maybe if I run a straight lead up to the alternator directly from the + off the battery that would solve the insufficient charging issues. I removed the one from the aux batt + spot and ran the new lead. Well that didn't help much. Its up normal while running, but drops while cranking. I put the car on the charger last night and just sitting right when I hooked it up the gauge showed like 80% power (on a 0-100% gauge). I'm also going to pull both grounds loose and scrape the crap outta the surface underneath and clean the bolts to make sure they're good, as well as running an extra 4ga ground cable off the battery to another ground spot. I'm thinking the battery just isn't getting sufficient recharge and I hope this fixes it. If not I'm going to try ANOTHER ground directly off the lower starter bolt to a spot on the frame there and see if that helps any. I'm thinking its either the 2ga hot lead to the starter isn't flowing enough current, or the grounds aren't sufficient. The 4ga directly to the alt. should be enough to flow current out of it for sufficient recharging of the battery.

In your situation, your leads up front may not be large enough since you are running your source hot lead quite a bit farther up to the batt + up front. You may need to step up to a 1ga or a neg. gauge welding cable (for flexibility, and the fact that you can get them in huge sizes). Might also check your grounds as well and possibly add more/replace with larger ones.