optima battery hold down

[280~Master]

Jeff,

Do you have the dimensions for that bracket?

[Jeff G 78]

John, the answer is "sort of". I did a real quick tape measure job before I did the CAD work. I haven't had the time to make a cardboard prototype to verify the dimensions yet. I hope to do that this weekend. So far, I have a 1" wide x 1/8" thick main strap with 40mm wide angle brackets. The brackets are 165mm apart. The rear angle bracket is 15mm from the end of the main strap and the front angle bracket is 20mm from the end. The vertical part against the firewall is 65mm tall.

Once I make a cardboard prototype and fine tune the dimensions, I'll clean up the CAD work and do a screen dump with the dimensions. My goal was to make it very simple to fabricate. The bracket could certainly be better, but it would be harder to make. Most OEM brackets (like the ZX) have main straps that are folded in the middle to make them stiffer. I simply used thicker steel. The estimated weight of the bracket is around 7 ounces right now. That could be lower, but it's not horrible. I also considered dipping the bracket in that rubberized tool coating stuff. I would mask the slot area and the J-bolt hole area with everything else being plastic coated. Any other suggestions?

[280~Master]

Sounds great jeff. The plastic coating sounds good to. When you fine tune this thin you could dump those to me?

[Jeff G 78]

Will do, John.

[Jeff G 78]

Okay, I made a cardboard prototype and it looked too skinny. I widened the whole bracket and fine tuned the dimensions. I also found out that there is a feature in the firewall that requires the part to have an offset vertical component. I also plan on using thin-wall square tubing to cut the angle brackets from. Angle iron is no good since the inside of the angle is tapered and has a large radius.

NOTE: I have not made this yet out of steel, so some additional fine tuning might be required. The top of the J-bolt needs to be cut down some, but it appears to have just enough threads in my case. My dimensions are based on a Red Top sitting in the factory plastic tray.

Here is the latest screen dump as well as the dimensioned drawing.