Grounding

[Moparman01]

I just got my brand new built 440 right straight from the dyno where it ran flawlessly, or so i was told (i wasn't there). Anyways, the engine has Edelbrock aluminum heads and intake. My question is with the grounding. I have the negative battery cable run just like it would be on a stock iron head motor with the cable bolted to the head, but i've been told i shouldn't be grounding to the aluminum? Also, i forgot to hook up the the ground strap at the back of the engine to the firewall, i'm having serious idle issues (mis-fire?? not sure) with the new motor, somebody told me it's becuase the ground strap isn't hooked up and is screwing with the ignition, is this even a possibility? So can you ground to the aluminum heads/manifold, or do you have to find another grounding source? Thanks

[macca3441]

Earth/Ground cable to the alum head is fine!
And, as for the body earth - it could very well be the cause of your problem.
Just hook up the body earth, and see if that solves it. Then you'll know if you have to look elsewhere!

Hope this helps,

Wade

[Moparman01]

Earth/Ground cable to the alum head is fine!
And, as for the body earth - it could very well be the cause of your problem.
Just hook up the body earth, and see if that solves it. Then you'll know if you have to look elsewhere!

Hope this helps,

Wade

Great, thanks man! Yeah i am gonna hook up the rear ground strap and see what happens, i just wanted to find out first if it was OK to ground to aluminum or if i had to go thru a bell housing bolt or something that goes into the iron block. I'm really bad with electrical, i will admit all day that i know very little about it!

[John_Kunkel]

If you think about it, you're not totally grounding through the aluminum; the steel bolt contacts the cable terminal and goes through the aluminum manifold to the steel head.

[c00nhunterjoe]

I have mulriple grounds throughout the car.  I grounded my alternator as well as my engine. With the aluminum heads you could do the bell housing idea or a motor mount.

[Rolling_Thunder]

Without a ground strap from my engine to the body my car wouldnt even try to crank over    haha - grounding to the aluminum is fine. I've never had a problem at least. 

[Moparman01]

I hooked everything up, does roll over better now, but didn't help my idle/backfilre issue at all tho. The engine builder is coming up to house to take a look, hope he can figure it out.

[elacruze]

FWIW I wouldn't ground to the heads, you're adding potential resistance via the head gasket and bolts, however unlikely. Ground to the block, ground the body to the block, and be absolutely certain that your ignition module (if you have the stock style) grounded properly. I actually added a ground strap from my module bolt to the firewall because I don't trust the connection between the box and sheetmetal.

[Ghoste]

Same here on adding a ground to the ignition control.  I did the block to body as well and made it a little bigger than the stock wire guage.

[flyinlow]

The starter is bolted to the trans so the best place to hook the battery ground strap would be the trans housing from a pure resistance point of view. However nobody does this ( including me) and just ground it to the block. I have secondary grounds on each aluminum head to the firewall.   

[Ghoste]

Do you think the resistance going from the trans to the block is really that great though?

[flyinlow]

Do you think the resistance going from the trans to the block is really that great though?

No.