I relocated the battery to the hatch while I was doing my T5 swap. So basically the battery has been in freezing weather not getting any charge for about two weeks.

Today I finished wiring the battery and all that. The seatbelt light/noise, the wipers, and the flasher worked. I went to crank it over and the starter clicked, then everything went dead. I figured the battery was dead so I busted the battery tender out. Sure enough, the battery needed charging. I checked on it about 45 minutes to an hour later, and the battery was over 85% charged. I figured that would be enough to get the starter to turn a few times. This time, however, nothing worked. No power to anything. No lights, no wipers, no starter, nothing.

This is how I have everything wired:
Battery to cutoff switch. Cutoff switch to distribution block in engine compartment. One side of distro block goes to 4awg alternator wire and the inline fuse (from old alternator wire). The other side of distro block is 4awg wire to starter and the wiring for my electric fans. The negative battery cable goes to the frame rail under the hatch. There's a ground wire from passenger side head to the frame by the front sway bar.

Unless I'm crazy, that setup should work wiring wise. I haven't checked any fuses yet, but that's next on my list.

Any ideas what's going on here?

 

sounds like your fusible links by the starter might have fried.

 

Ok, so I finally got the last problem figured out. The car starts the first time every time now, but I've got another problem. The choke light and the volt dummy light come on and stay on while the car is running, and it idles at 2000rpm unless I manually move the choke cam back. So thinking I had an alternator problem, I went and bought an alternator. Installed it tonight, and the lights are still on. I cut off the fusible link on the orange wire that used to go to the battery. That's not causing this problem is it? If that's not it, what is causing this problem?

 

Ever figure it out man?