Has anyone installed the Helix braille battery on their MC (non-s!!!)?

It drops 25 lbs off the front of the car, where it needs some lightening.

I spoke with Helix and they said I may need to fashion a braket for it to work. They will include some generic braille brackets for free to try it with, but I just want to see if anyone has done this, first!

Thanks,
-Steve

 

That's one of the many questions I was asking in my earlier posts. Keep me posted if you find out any info. I'll do the same.

 

I have it,if you like i will take pics to show you brackets.

 

Byron,
I'd love to see those pic's, too. Have you had any issues at all with starting, battery letting you down, etc?

 

I want to do the same. I also have a 05 Cooper. However I dont think that Byron's MCS battery install will work the same as for a MC. I think some custom fabrication will be needed.

 

Did you relocate the battery? Either way, let's see some pics.

 

NON-S!!!! AAAAAAAhhhhhhhhh!!!!

I'm no master fabricator so if someone can give dimensions for a bracket to cut out or secure in with points to drill or something, this may be a mod I can pull off!

 

bump. has anyone else done this? I've searched around and haven't seen any Braille battery installs in the nonS MC battery compartment.

I just bought a 17lb Braille battery so any ideas to mount would be helpful. Otherwise I'll head to the hardware store and fashion something up and take pics.

 

A friend of mine mounted one in an S and just used a hard styrofoam block which he custom cut/sanded to fill the extra void left by using this battery. I suppose you could use the same stuff in your case as well.

 

Pics would be great! Keep us posted

 

I thought about doing that but a friend of mine mentioned heat from the engine being a danger. Would the stryofoam be ok in the engine bay? I dont have any idea how hot it would get in that battery compartment. There was a noticable temp different from the engine to the compartment when i looked yesterday, but the car had been sitting for 30 minutes after i got home from work.

Battery is waiting for me on my porch, so i'll do some brainstorming tonight and put it in either this weekend or next.

Will be sure to post pics of whatever i end up doing.

 

Preliminary test fit done last night.

Height of the battery is perfect and I'm not going to have to raise it up. The non-stock battery i had to drop in there in a emergency situation wasn't tall enough and I had to put some cardboard and such to lift it up so I could make a good connection. It also looks like the braille is going to be comfortably centered in the compartment.

Going to check out a few hardware stores this weekend and see if i can find some flame retardent high density foam. Also thinking of maybe some bar stock running length and width wise of the battery to secure it.

more to come.

 

I eagerly await pictures and feedback. I'm thinking about trading to a braille but I want to know if it will be reliable enough to have in my daily driver.

 

I talked to chad at detroit tuned for a while on it and ultimatly went with the 17lb for daily driving per his recommendation. 15lb was an option but the weight saving was negligible when you compared the stats on them. I was really tempted by a 11lb one, but winters are pretty harsh here and I didn't want to have to keep switching it out. The 17lb should have just enough cold cranking amps to see me through.

Braille has a pretty easy to read chart on their website as far as uses for each size battery.

 

Do you know what the CCA rating is of the 17 lb battery? That sounds like a good compromise for me. Here in the Bay Area, it doesn't get all that cold in the winter so if Chad's hot to trot for the 17 in Michigan then it should be plenty safe for California.

 

475 is what they rate the CCA at. On their test sheet, the crank amps came in much higher than rated, so i would imagine the cold crank is a little higher too.

 

Bump! Waiting for pics and further details, Darkness! Please don't neglect this thread!

 

What ever you use, be sure it is not made of a material which will rub and wear a hole through the battery if vibration is an issue.

 

I haven't forgotten guys! It's been a busy week planning my upcoming wedding and I had to run around alot to find something suitable to do this.

I put it in over the weekend and it's working out well and is nicely secured. I ended up using styrofoam insulation. I was worried about heat, but after checking out the temps the battery compartment remained very cool to the touch, so I declared it safe.

I took lots of pictures of the process and will post them in this thread or put up a separate thread for others to see and help with their own install.

 

Well I had a bunch of pictures of the whole thing but I can't get the computer to read the stupid card. I went out and took a quick snap of it to show the final install.




I got some 3/4" think styrofoam insulation from lowes. Cost was less than 10 bucks for 5 4' by 1' sheets and it took only one of them. Just measure out and cut with a knife!

Install was a quickie and it could be alot cleaner. Optimally i would like to cut a sheet to fit with a cut out of the battery and layer them up all the way to the top of the compartment for a better, cleaner looking fit. This works for now and the battery is in there solid. Just ran an autocross with it like that and had no issues!

 

Thanks Darkness! Great post!

 

Really?? So you're saying a battery manufacturer could produce a battery that would wear from the inside-out? They go in cars... surely the manuf. would test for vibration. Or did you mean, wear a hole in the battery compartment?

 

I'm pretty sure he mean wear a hole in the battery case from the outside-in