has anybody ever forgotten to attach the ground strap from the back of the head to the firewall and if so, what happened when you tried to start the car?

 

if you also don't have a ground from the battery to the body you get a bad voltage drop & that can cause all kinds of problems

 

I forgot mine. A shower of sparks flew out at me when I hooked up the battery. A subtle reminder to check all the major grounds.

 

It's always a good idea to have a direct ground to the engine.

Otherwise: Snap, crackle, pop, **** crispies.

 

dayum...was not aware of this. i have been having voltage problems for a while now.

how do i go about grounding from battery to body?

 

White91GTA, just a small wire, about 10 gage or so from the negative side of the battery to the fender.
i have seen a ring & pinion get eaten up from not having a battery to body or a motor to body ground. why the guy wasn't having other problems i don't know.

 

DENN_SHAH...thanks for that info. I will have to look at my car and see if I have the ground there or not and if not I will definately be putting one on there.

 

Make sure you have a ground directly from the block to the battery, that the bet adivce i can give.

 

no problem
grounds are 1 of the first things i check on electrical problems.
like ME Leigh said, the big cable from the battery to the motor, it needs to be able carry at least 500 amps, a good ground from the motor to the body & a good ground from the battery to the body, all 3 are needed.
i have 2 grounds straps from the motor to the body on my car. with the motor running, everything electrical is powered by the alternator, so a single small wire motor to body ground won't last long with a 100+ amp alternator.

 

There's no need for a direct battery to block cable. Put a 4-gauge ground from the battery to the frame, and another from the back of the block to the firewall.

While you're doing this, another good idea is to upgrade the alternator-to-battery positive wire to 4-gauge, as well. Try to keep the wires as short as possible, but well-routed.

 

Absolutely, you want the shortest distance to ground for the ignition and starter circuits.

 

I honestly don't see a point in running a cable directly from the engine block to the battery, unless you have no good grounding point on the frame because of excessive rust, or you have some ridiculously powerful ignition. You're not going to route a wire through the belts, so you have to run the wire to the back of the engine block anyway. A ground wire to the firewall from the block and a ground wire from the frame to the battery would do the same job.

Feel free to correct me if I'm wrong. I've just never seen it done that way.

 

Because steel is not a good conductor of electricity.

 

Good point

 

The factory does it that way, at least on my car it did.
I'd post a picture If I could get the Attach file option to work.

 

Its best to have the large gauge cable go right to teh block/head as the starter is the single largest load. Dont want it pulling current through the smaller ground wires hooked up to the engine.

 

agreed