Posts from — March 2013

I’ve always wished j had a bit more battery capacity in my 05 Honda Element. The stock battery had 410cca and 500 peak amps, group size 51R? After four years it was starting to occasionally have a hard time starting the car, and If I left the lights and radio on for even 20 min or so, I may have a hard time starting the car. So at that time I had the battery replaced with an interstate pro series with 500cca and 650 peak amps, also a series 51R, which in recent days has started to really show its age. This winter has had a couple of instances where the battery barely would start the car on a cold morning. So I decided to do a complete transplant. The following images detail my replacing the interstate battery with a group 35 battery from Costco: 650cca and 800 peak amps.

Interstate battery still installed.

Old group 51R battery and new Costco group 35 battery.

After removing the old battery I had to bend back the ears of the battery tray so that the new battery would sit properly on the tray.

New battery sitting on battery tray.

New battery secured with an adjustable battery tie down and new 12inch j-hooks: both available from your local auto parts store, less than $15 total.

I cut down the top of the j hook closest to the front of the engine compartment with a hack saw to prevent it hitting the hood.

I used a baking soda and water solution to scrub the corrosion off of the battery contacts before connecting the new battery.

Battery is finally all installed and ready to go! Total install time was about 30min or so, and I spent less than $100 on the entire project.