Beast Battery Relocation

PCD · 11-20-2009, 10:43 PM

The story so far:
I have a winch to put on.
The stock battery is 9AH and rather small.

Purchased a 19AH battery, but it is considerably larger than stock, approx. 4" x 7", give or take.

I had already fabricated a new battery box, cut out the old one, and fit it in the same location. So far, so good.

Enter The UNI FILTER. The Unifilter is a dual element sponge type filter with good build quality and a price under $30.00 all in.

I was clued in to this excellent filter by our fellow memeber WELDANGRIND. He already performed the legwork to figure out which model would fit.

The Problem I had only 1" of free space between the Mikuni performance carb and the front of my new battery box. I had already cut a large relief in the face of the battery box just to be able to use a 90 degree inlet and a 125cc dirt bike filter. The rubber inlet tube only came out from the back of the Mikuni 1" and then took a 90 degree nosedive downwards. Needless to say, this was not optimal.

To install the 4" Unifilter I would have to move the battery, but where? My first thought was between the frame rails at the tail end of the bike, but this is what I was faced with. Way too much clutter to deal with.
Note: You can see the back of my earlier modified battery box in this picture. Hint: Its red

Then while I was thinking about things, I noticed this. A whole bunch of open space on the drivers side rear AND 2 10mm (fairly long) bolts that threaded in to welded on boss's on the frame.

So I was in Princess Auto (Harbor freight for you Yanks) and saw this. It was WAY too large but it was a good starting point and it was $12.99 before tax.

To make a long story short, I cut it into about 10 pieces. I didnt quite know how it was going to fit yet, but I chopped it up anyway. I ended up with this after everything was said and done.

Once I started taking tape off the wires on the bike to prep it for installation, this is what I found. Nice.

After seeing that garbage I added a little better wire for now, but intend on doing the entire bike over. I have a spare wiring harness and I intend to make a new one using it as a template, but with superior plugs, connectors, and wiring. Maybe I'll make 20 and sell them

Oh, here is the Unifilter in all its glory. I now have room to install it nicely with no insane bends or elbows requied.

So here are a few shots of the initial install. Nothing is tight yet, and although it may not look it, the new battery cage is parallel to the ground. The bike is up on my stand and leaning backwards slightly.

I also left room in the cage for rubber dampening material, so if the battery looks tilted in the pics, it really is

Now, the battery is centered between the wheel and sprocket, so if the rear shock were to suddenly disintigrate, the battery would have clearance all the way down to the axle.

The stock battery is MUCH smaller and would look a lot neater if moved to the same location instead of that jumbo thing of mine hanging there, but I'm happy with it and I have over double the amp hours with this jumbo battery.

I will be installing a splash shield under the UNI, but I've been thinking that the stock battery could be squeezed in there as well

I have a couple of of battery cut-off switchs laying around so I think I may do it.
I know they are different capacity batts, etc, but I run dual batts in my truck so I'm familiar with the details.

The whole shebang probably took me 10 hours to be honest. There was a lot of fiddling around that had to be done, but now the UNI is on properly and the battery is squared away, so I can install and wire the winch.

Cheers!

waynev · 11-20-2009, 11:14 PM

Very nice PCD, looks great, that is a great spot for it, my T1 Rebel has it mounted in the same spot, other than the mud and crud that the rear tire throws up at it, it still seems to be fine in this location.
I like the looks of your filter, mine is all crushed into the stock battery box.

MICRider · 11-20-2009, 11:17 PM

Wow! Looks good Pete! Soon there will be no original Beast left, it'll be a Peterbuilt

. (Sorry, I couldn't resist!)

Regards,
Stew

PCD · 11-20-2009, 11:24 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by waynev

Very nice PCD, looks great, that is a great spot for it, my T1 Rebel has it mounted in the same spot, other than the mud and crud that the rear tire throws up at it, it still seems to be fine in this location.
I like the looks of your filter, mine is all crushed into the stock battery box.

I just realized I never cleaned up the the cuts after chopping out the stock battery box (hangs head in shame).

Now I feel really dumb. I just came off the GIO site. The pics show it clearly man. Damn.

PCD · 11-20-2009, 11:25 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by MICRider

Wow! Looks good Pete! Soon there will be no original Beast left, it'll be a Peterbuilt

. (Sorry, I couldn't resist!)

Regards,
Stew

You owe me a new keyboard dude

That. Was. Funny.

Weldangrind · 11-21-2009, 01:39 AM

Good call Pete. Beats putting such a large battery up front, although it would be a short distance to the winch. Who do you recommend as a source for good quality battery terminals? I don't want to use the typical soft yellow connectors from my kit.

Get out and ride your quad Pete. It's far too clean.

BTW, love how you cut out the factory battery box with a steak knife.

TurboT · 11-21-2009, 03:13 AM

Excellent work Pete!

Not that I should have to say anything, but make sure you cinch that big battery down so it don't fly out of there on ya!

Stew, top quality line on the Peterbilt. Its going down as a classic already.

-TT

PCD · 11-21-2009, 03:57 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Weldangrind

Good call Pete. Beats putting such a large battery up front, although it would be a short distance to the winch. Who do you recommend as a source for good quality battery terminals? I don't want to use the typical soft yellow connectors from my kit.

Get out and ride your quad Pete. It's far too clean.

BTW, love how you cut out the factory battery box with a steak knife.

And a DULL steaknife to boot!

Ride it?

Whats this "ride" you speak of?? How do you do that?

Battery terminals, or battery lugs? just pm me. I have a bucnh of copper lugs like you see in the pics, except I have 4 or 5 different ID's for different bolt sizes.

These ones are really meant for 4AWG. I have 20 or 30 feet of 4AWG wire left over from my last car install and will be using it for the bike. Its that very flexible hi power amp wire that bends real nicely as opposed to say welding cable.

Overkill? Yeah, for sure, but I will only use it for the major runs.

Turbo: I have a couple of nice bungies laying around. The big flat rubber ones, not the stretchy cord things.

Oh, Turbo: GIO included that case thing with the missing exhaust parts. Looks to me like it was meant to hold memory cards and Sony memory sticks. Way out of date though because the smallest cut out it has would fit a SD card and now we have MINI SD cards and MICRO SD cards, like what fits in our BlackBerrys.

Pete

TurboT · 11-21-2009, 08:14 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by PCD

Oh, Turbo: GIO included that case thing with the missing exhaust parts. Looks to me like it was meant to hold memory cards and Sony memory sticks. Way out of date though because the smallest cut out it has would fit a SD card and now we have MINI SD cards and MICRO SD cards, like what fits in our BlackBerrys.

Pete

Yes I went hunting on the Mezzi case site and found them. John told me he's including one in every parts order now. I thought I got it by mistake. We only have SD of CF cards around here so it's probably destined to be a kids toy. I'm sure my girls will enjoy it until its lost under the couch.

-TT

waynec · 11-22-2009, 10:31 AM

Hi PCD......great write up on your upgrade. I am so grateful to everyone on this site for the time spent sharing advice. The web at its best.

Not sure where I saw it, but, you posted a little while ago about your oil and how you figured there was more capacity that recommended. Do you find that simply adding more oil has smoothed out your gearbox? If I am understanding correctly, how much do you add now?...thx...waynec

PCD · 11-22-2009, 10:44 AM

Hey Waynec, yes this is a great forum here.
The bike shifts better with heavier oil, say 10W-40. I currently have 15W-40 in there but that's like maple syrup in colder weather, no good.

The last 2" of my dipstick was chewed up and barely hanging on so I cut it off and have been going by the sightglass since day 1.
1.5 litres barely hits the low mark on the glass and 2 liters takes it just barely above the "H" for hi mark on the glass.

I think you can safely go 2 liters without blowing any seals or whatever out of the engine.
I was using Honda oil but noticed it was 10W-30 and besides, even buying it by the case it aint cheap so I'll save it for the.R's.

Cheers

waynec · 11-22-2009, 04:37 PM

I have an ancient Kawasaki 440 motorcycle. It calls for 20-40. Recently it seems both Honda and Yamaha say 20-50 is the new 20-40, which they don't even keep in stock now.

I really like what you did with your battery better than my choice. Not sure if etiquette allows me to put a couple of pics here......I wll take any appropriate flaming like the punk that I am if its too out of line. This is what I did....
I took the battery box out all together.

The old box just screws to the body panel so if I mucked things up I could just screw it back on. Then I rotated the battery 90 degrees so it would sit lower in the frame.

The uni clears the battery with the little help from the offset in the connector. I used some galvanised plumbers strap to make a carriage for the battery and then 1 wrap of strap around the battery to secure it.

A bigger battery could be tucked but the uni would then be a little more cramped. I wrapped the frame in some adhesive backed foam with a pretty agressive tack to it so there is some cushion effect......waynec

Weldangrind · 11-22-2009, 08:29 PM

waynec, can you provide a rear view? I'd be interested to see how much clearance there is to the swingarm.

TurboT · 11-22-2009, 09:00 PM

Hey waynec,

I wouldn't worry about being 'flamed' here, you're posting battery relocating pics in a battery relocation thread...besides, all of our members here are good folk and enjoy the contributions anywhere you plug them in.

I'm always impressed by anyone who grabs the wrench and tries to make something better! ... looking at your setup, I would be a bit concerned about the location of the UNI on top of the battery like that. As W&G will tell you, I'm a bit battery sensitive, and I wonder if any off gasing will get sucked into your engine that way.

Not to mention if you have any sort of a fart of hiccup/backfire out the carb you could ignite said offgasses and blow your battery up.

Now I'm just theorizing, and someone here may have better theory to counter my points, and I'm all ears and eyes to that, but my instinct is to share my thoughts on my concerns.

waynec · 11-22-2009, 09:32 PM

Thx Turbo.......a shield in between the battery and the filter might be an idea...maybe a cap from the old good battery box would work.

W&G...I wondered who would consider the swing arm clearance. I bounced my big fat personage on the bike and could not get with-in 2 inches.....its right at the pivot point. If a bigger battery were desired it might get dicey as it would extend further into the field of movement but could still be accomodated imo.....waynec

11-20-2009, 10:43 PM	#1
PCD Join Date: Oct 2009 Location: Newmarket On Canada Posts: 382	Beast Battery Relocation The story so far: I have a winch to put on. The stock battery is 9AH and rather small. Purchased a 19AH battery, but it is considerably larger than stock, approx. 4" x 7", give or take. I had already fabricated a new battery box, cut out the old one, and fit it in the same location. So far, so good. Enter The UNI FILTER. The Unifilter is a dual element sponge type filter with good build quality and a price under $30.00 all in. I was clued in to this excellent filter by our fellow memeber WELDANGRIND. He already performed the legwork to figure out which model would fit. The Problem I had only 1" of free space between the Mikuni performance carb and the front of my new battery box. I had already cut a large relief in the face of the battery box just to be able to use a 90 degree inlet and a 125cc dirt bike filter. The rubber inlet tube only came out from the back of the Mikuni 1" and then took a 90 degree nosedive downwards. Needless to say, this was not optimal. To install the 4" Unifilter I would have to move the battery, but where? My first thought was between the frame rails at the tail end of the bike, but this is what I was faced with. Way too much clutter to deal with. Note: You can see the back of my earlier modified battery box in this picture. Hint: Its red Then while I was thinking about things, I noticed this. A whole bunch of open space on the drivers side rear AND 2 10mm (fairly long) bolts that threaded in to welded on boss's on the frame. So I was in Princess Auto (Harbor freight for you Yanks) and saw this. It was WAY too large but it was a good starting point and it was $12.99 before tax. To make a long story short, I cut it into about 10 pieces. I didnt quite know how it was going to fit yet, but I chopped it up anyway. I ended up with this after everything was said and done. Once I started taking tape off the wires on the bike to prep it for installation, this is what I found. Nice. After seeing that garbage I added a little better wire for now, but intend on doing the entire bike over. I have a spare wiring harness and I intend to make a new one using it as a template, but with superior plugs, connectors, and wiring. Maybe I'll make 20 and sell them Oh, here is the Unifilter in all its glory. I now have room to install it nicely with no insane bends or elbows requied. So here are a few shots of the initial install. Nothing is tight yet, and although it may not look it, the new battery cage is parallel to the ground. The bike is up on my stand and leaning backwards slightly. I also left room in the cage for rubber dampening material, so if the battery looks tilted in the pics, it really is Now, the battery is centered between the wheel and sprocket, so if the rear shock were to suddenly disintigrate, the battery would have clearance all the way down to the axle. The stock battery is MUCH smaller and would look a lot neater if moved to the same location instead of that jumbo thing of mine hanging there, but I'm happy with it and I have over double the amp hours with this jumbo battery. I will be installing a splash shield under the UNI, but I've been thinking that the stock battery could be squeezed in there as well I have a couple of of battery cut-off switchs laying around so I think I may do it. I know they are different capacity batts, etc, but I run dual batts in my truck so I'm familiar with the details. The whole shebang probably took me 10 hours to be honest. There was a lot of fiddling around that had to be done, but now the UNI is on properly and the battery is squared away, so I can install and wire the winch. Cheers! __________________ Good, Fast, or Cheap....Pick Two.
	0

11-21-2009, 01:39 AM	#6
Weldangrind Join Date: Mar 2009 Location: Sardis, BC, Canada Posts: 25,977	Good call Pete. Beats putting such a large battery up front, although it would be a short distance to the winch. Who do you recommend as a source for good quality battery terminals? I don't want to use the typical soft yellow connectors from my kit. Get out and ride your quad Pete. It's far too clean. BTW, love how you cut out the factory battery box with a steak knife. __________________ Weldangrind "I figure I'm well-prepared for coping with a bike that comes from the factory with unresolved issues and that rewards the self-reliant owner." - Buccaneer
	0

11-22-2009, 10:44 AM	#11
PCD Join Date: Oct 2009 Location: Newmarket On Canada Posts: 382	Hey Waynec, yes this is a great forum here. The bike shifts better with heavier oil, say 10W-40. I currently have 15W-40 in there but that's like maple syrup in colder weather, no good. The last 2" of my dipstick was chewed up and barely hanging on so I cut it off and have been going by the sightglass since day 1. 1.5 litres barely hits the low mark on the glass and 2 liters takes it just barely above the "H" for hi mark on the glass. I think you can safely go 2 liters without blowing any seals or whatever out of the engine. I was using Honda oil but noticed it was 10W-30 and besides, even buying it by the case it aint cheap so I'll save it for the.R's. Cheers __________________ Good, Fast, or Cheap....Pick Two.
	0

11-22-2009, 08:29 PM	#13
Weldangrind Join Date: Mar 2009 Location: Sardis, BC, Canada Posts: 25,977	waynec, can you provide a rear view? I'd be interested to see how much clearance there is to the swingarm. __________________ Weldangrind "I figure I'm well-prepared for coping with a bike that comes from the factory with unresolved issues and that rewards the self-reliant owner." - Buccaneer
	0

11-20-2009, 11:14 PM	#2
waynev Join Date: Aug 2009 Location: London, Ontario Posts: 1,097	Very nice PCD, looks great, that is a great spot for it, my T1 Rebel has it mounted in the same spot, other than the mud and crud that the rear tire throws up at it, it still seems to be fine in this location. I like the looks of your filter, mine is all crushed into the stock battery box.
	0

11-20-2009, 11:17 PM	#3
MICRider Join Date: Oct 2009 Location: Alberta, Canada Posts: 3,274	Wow! Looks good Pete! Soon there will be no original Beast left, it'll be a Peterbuilt . (Sorry, I couldn't resist!) Regards, Stew
	0

11-21-2009, 03:13 AM	#7
TurboT Join Date: Sep 2008 Location: Surrey, B.C., Canada Posts: 2,185	Excellent work Pete! Not that I should have to say anything, but make sure you cinch that big battery down so it don't fly out of there on ya! Stew, top quality line on the Peterbilt. Its going down as a classic already. -TT
	0

11-22-2009, 10:31 AM	#10
waynec Join Date: Oct 2009 Location: Ottawa Posts: 119	Hi PCD......great write up on your upgrade. I am so grateful to everyone on this site for the time spent sharing advice. The web at its best. Not sure where I saw it, but, you posted a little while ago about your oil and how you figured there was more capacity that recommended. Do you find that simply adding more oil has smoothed out your gearbox? If I am understanding correctly, how much do you add now?...thx...waynec
	0

11-22-2009, 04:37 PM	#12
waynec Join Date: Oct 2009 Location: Ottawa Posts: 119	I have an ancient Kawasaki 440 motorcycle. It calls for 20-40. Recently it seems both Honda and Yamaha say 20-50 is the new 20-40, which they don't even keep in stock now. I really like what you did with your battery better than my choice. Not sure if etiquette allows me to put a couple of pics here......I wll take any appropriate flaming like the punk that I am if its too out of line. This is what I did.... I took the battery box out all together. The old box just screws to the body panel so if I mucked things up I could just screw it back on. Then I rotated the battery 90 degrees so it would sit lower in the frame. The uni clears the battery with the little help from the offset in the connector. I used some galvanised plumbers strap to make a carriage for the battery and then 1 wrap of strap around the battery to secure it. A bigger battery could be tucked but the uni would then be a little more cramped. I wrapped the frame in some adhesive backed foam with a pretty agressive tack to it so there is some cushion effect......waynec
	0

11-22-2009, 09:00 PM	#14
TurboT Join Date: Sep 2008 Location: Surrey, B.C., Canada Posts: 2,185	Hey waynec, I wouldn't worry about being 'flamed' here, you're posting battery relocating pics in a battery relocation thread...besides, all of our members here are good folk and enjoy the contributions anywhere you plug them in. I'm always impressed by anyone who grabs the wrench and tries to make something better! ... looking at your setup, I would be a bit concerned about the location of the UNI on top of the battery like that. As W&G will tell you, I'm a bit battery sensitive, and I wonder if any off gasing will get sucked into your engine that way. Not to mention if you have any sort of a fart of hiccup/backfire out the carb you could ignite said offgasses and blow your battery up. Now I'm just theorizing, and someone here may have better theory to counter my points, and I'm all ears and eyes to that, but my instinct is to share my thoughts on my concerns.
	0

11-22-2009, 09:32 PM	#15
waynec Join Date: Oct 2009 Location: Ottawa Posts: 119	Thx Turbo.......a shield in between the battery and the filter might be an idea...maybe a cap from the old good battery box would work. W&G...I wondered who would consider the swing arm clearance. I bounced my big fat personage on the bike and could not get with-in 2 inches.....its right at the pivot point. If a bigger battery were desired it might get dicey as it would extend further into the field of movement but could still be accomodated imo.....waynec
	0