109 battery

I finally got the battery in. It took 4 days to do it what with fab work and painting. I had cut the old battery tray off prior to galvanizing with the intention of hopefully being able to put it back on in the same place. In thinking of this I left some stubs of the old battery supports and predrilled holes. At the same time I predrilled holes in the leg portion still connected to the tray. Then every thing went to the galvanizers last year and the holes would be more protected from rusting out.

So now I just found some 1/8x1" angle iron and cut out some sections and lined them up on the bottom stubs and marked the hole position. Then the centerpunch and drills put the holes in the right places.

Once these were bolted in I put the upper tray in place and marked the holes for the angle iron. Removed them from the stubs and again centerpunched and drilled them. Then mounted the upper to the lower to make sure it fit. Then took everything apart. The angle braces were cleaned, treated with rust converter and painted with cold galvanizing. I then had to devise a side support for the battery that would also hold the J hooks to keep the battery from moving. After looking at my 88 I got a piece of 1/8x2" 4 feet long. With this I could bolt onto the upper tray portion and have sides for the battery to not slide off and put in holes for the J hooks. A centerline was put on the strip of steel and I decided to put my weld at one of the narrow ends. So starting back from one end of the steel, the upper section was placed and marked for holes.

These were centerpunched and drilled and the tray bolted in. Then a pencil mark was made for the next bend and the upper part unbolted. I used a carpenters square and made a 90deg marks across the steel. This would be a reference for the bend. Next the steel was slide in the jaws of my vise with the pencil line just above the jaws. I used my propane torch to heat the metal right at the jawline and using my hand and a hammer I bent the steel into a right angle. Back over to the table and rebolt the upper section and mark where the next bend would be for the long side bit. Unbolt. Back over to the vise and heat and bend.

Back over to the table and bolt the 2 sections together again. Mark the holes and the next bend, unbolt. Centerpunch and drill holes. Put in vise and heat and bend the last corner. At this point the ends overlap but first I needed to bolt the 2 sections together again. Then the mark was made for the place to cut off the overlap, which was done by a jigsaw after unbolting the 2 pieces. I clamped the ends together and welded up the seam. Then bolted the 2 back together and took then to try out on the 109. Everything worked out great!

So it was all unbolted. The side support was wire brushed, sprayed with rust converter then sprayed with bed liner, 2 coats. A measurment was taken at some point for the length of J hook and a trip made to the FLAPS(friendly local auto parts store) Boulder Creek Auto Parts a NAPA dealer. Here J hooks and a top support were purchased. It turned out the top support wasn't a good fit, it would be too weak for holding a battery down off road. I imagine it was fine for a road car but not for washboard roads. That meant one had to be made. For this I used some 1/8x3/4" angle iron connected across the battery by a piece of 1/8x1" flat stock. I mocked them up, marked and measured, cut and centerpunched and drilled, welded and finally test fit and wire brushed. Then sprayed with rust converter and 2 coats of bed liner. Once everything was dry I bolted it on to the chassis stubs and put the battery on.

Then attached the ground from the negative side to the engine.