I replaced my battery cables today and I took some pictures. It's a very simple operation, 7 screws/nuts/bolts to undo and some heavy duty soldering.

The Rx is up:


First the old cables:
The old cables on the battery:


The positive lead has a small cable that runs to the fusible links and the negative cable grounds to the chassis on the strut tower. The small positive cable is the black one with the phillips screw holding it on. The ground is the black one with the yellow stripe below it. The ground is accomplished by using an eyelet spliced onto the cable.:


Both the positive and negative cables run together to the back of the engine. This is the first cable tie. It's a plistic ring that attaches to the chassis through a hole in the wheel well:


With the car raised, you can see the tail of the cable tie (and others):


After the chassis ground, the cables run through another tie, this time it's a zip-tie style that's again, attached by a hole through the wheel well. They then run to the back of the engine, parallel to the oil cooler line:


At the back of the engine is a metal double bridge style tie-down held to a bracket on the engine with a bolt. There should be grommets on the cables as they pass under the bridges. One of mine was completely missing and the other was saturated with grease to the point that it was squishy:


From here the cables split off, the ground get bolted to the engine.:


The positive cable goes to the starter.:


Taking the cables out consists of:
1: Remove the cables at the battery.
2: Remove the cables from the loop-style cable tie
3: Remove the chassis grounding screw and the fusible link screw
4: Unzip the zip-tie style second cable tie
5: Remove the double-bridge tie-down by removing the one bolt
6: Remove the positive cable from the starter
7: Remove the negative cable from the engine block
8: Pull out the cables gentely without snagging them on anything

Once out, I straightened out the cables on the floor. The jacket on the negative cable near the rear of the engine was so hard it cracked open when I tried to straigten it.:


Now the new cables. 1 ga wires from Summitracing.com. Stock is 4 ga but I've got a lot of electronics in the car that weren't there when it started life, plus I like the idea of upgrading when I replace anything.:


The only real trick to making the new cables was the chassis grounding splice. The part that Mazda uses can't be found in an auto parts or hardware store. I took the old one off, opened it up, and crimped it onto the new cable. I then soldered it and eyelets to the cables and applied some heat shrink tubing.:





The ground cable from summit is actually about 3 inches shorter than the stock cable. This can be overcome by routing the cable a little more directly to the back of the engine.

Notice that the positive cable doesn't include the smaller cable that runs to the fusible links. Instead, I bought a 6 ga cable from Autozone that's typically meant for a lawnmower battery (the old cable was 10 ga). I soldered eyelets to both ends. One end will attach to the battery terminal screw, the other to the fusible link.

I cut the positive cable a little longer than stock so that it could reach around the front of the battery to help with routing the fusible link cable.

Putting the new cables in is a simple matter of reversing the removal process.

The new cables on the battery:


Here's the positive battery terminal, notice how it and the smaller cable share a terminal bolt.:


The new fusible link cable:


The new chassis ground and you can see the zip-tie down:


The new cable routing along the engine. At the back, you can see the grommet tie-down attached to the engine.:


Then they run through the bracket at the back of the engine but using new grommets. The ground to the engine ground and the positive to the starter.

That's it. Like I said, it's a very easy installation. It only took me about 3 hours and I spent one of those looking for cables and eyelets at auto parts and hardware stores. Just a couple things to know:
1) The positive cable to the fusible link attached to the main positive cable is available at auto parts stores and at victoria british, but they're 4 guage wires and I wanted something beefier.
2) Soldering a 1 ga wire takes a torch, you can't get enough heat into the cable using an iron.
3) Getting that grounding splice off the old cable is a major pain. It's crimped on very well and it's a very thick piece of metal. It takes alot of determination to get it off.

Enjoy.

 

This is one of the things that I need to do eventually. My starter doesn't always kick on when I turn the key, and I have to hit it a few times.

Good writeup!

 

may i say u did a great write up and was wondering do u plan on changing the alternator too. and have u seen a diff between the old gauge n new. man that is nice

 

its a must for the archives

thanks dude iv been pondering to do this thanks for some motivation

allround great job

 

I upgraded to an S4 alternator when I went to fuel injection. Between FI and the MSD, the 1st gen alternator was totally overstressed.

I'll update if I see any electrical improvements when I get a chance to drive the car. It's been snowing since I finished. Honestly, I don't expect that I'll notice anything but we'll see.