"thebigbossyboss" (thebigbossyboss)
12/14/2015 at 15:59 • Filed to: Ford Focus, God damnit
3
36|
"thebigbossyboss" (thebigbossyboss)
12/14/2015 at 15:59 • Filed to: Ford Focus, God damnit | 3
| 36 |
Friends, what we are looking at is a 2012 (ish?) Focus that belongs to my girlfriend. A tire pressure sensor error had come over the dash, so I thought much like OBD 11 I could just reset the onboard and it would go away since there is actually no problem with the tires (I checked).
This didn’t work...but it sure was frustrating!!!
Removing the battery on this thing was a real pain. A pain not made better by my landlord coming home halfway through and wanting to park where I was parked forcing me to reconnect it and start again. That negative terminal is so far recessed in there.
Why ford? Why? Also why is there a plastic cover for the battery? Just to confuse people? This battery layout seems like it’s impossble to jump another car from. How are you gonna manage that with that terminal way back there? This is after I pulled the battery forward a bit but you still gotta reach way under the wiper arms. Booo.
Just for easy reference here is a full car pic of a similar car.
TheHondaBro
> thebigbossyboss
12/14/2015 at 16:05 |
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That looks worse than the Ridgeline battery.
RamblinRover Luxury-Yacht
> thebigbossyboss
12/14/2015 at 16:05 |
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Call me crazy, but I would jump it/jump with it using the terminal on the firewall and the positive post, not both posts. In fact, I might not even try taking the battery side loose until it was out of the hole, in a replacement.
Twism
> thebigbossyboss
12/14/2015 at 16:06 |
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Similarly shitty battery location:
Chrysler Intrepid : you could go through the top and remove the headlight, the filter and the intake, but I found it easier to remove the front wheel, like so:
Oldsmobile aurora :
Under the rear seat. Not a bad place per se, but when you don’t know it beforehand, it’s a pain.
Also, if the positive terminal underhood gets disconnected, you have to boost the car by removing the back seat. Makes for an interesting explanation when the tow truck driver arrive and asks why you are passing the cable through the rear passenger door.
Xyl0c41n3
> Twism
12/14/2015 at 16:08 |
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Both of those are VERY what the fuck. Wow.
itschrome
> thebigbossyboss
12/14/2015 at 16:12 |
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that’s cute. Mines under my back seat. and the bolts and very hard to get too..
CB
> Twism
12/14/2015 at 16:12 |
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When I worked at Crappy Tire, I had a customer come in looking for a battery for a Sebring. After I got it for him, he asked if it was easy to replace. I pretty much laughed, and then explained where it was, and suggested he see a mechanic in order to have it put in. Poor bastard.
Sam
> Twism
12/14/2015 at 16:14 |
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My E34 has the battery under the rear seat as well.
The whole car is filled with German-engineering. Like the radiator overflow being on the firewall side of the engine bay, and the brake master cylinder being in the front left corner.
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Twism
> Sam
12/14/2015 at 16:16 |
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Genius... I guess?
That Bastard Kurtis - An Attempt to Standardize My Username Across Platforms
> thebigbossyboss
12/14/2015 at 16:16 |
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That’s pretty bad...though it looks like pulling the air box would make it a lot easier.
New Beetle is a terrible one, you had to move the power steering reservoir out of the way.
Worst one I've seen though is some late 80s early 90s GM cars that actually had the windshield washer fluid reservoir installed over the top of the battery. I used to install batteries for AAA, and those were my least favorite.
nafsucof
> thebigbossyboss
12/14/2015 at 16:17 |
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Nah, remove the top Of the air box, the front of the battery tray pops out and down and the battery slides forward...
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thebigbossyboss
> RamblinRover Luxury-Yacht
12/14/2015 at 16:18 |
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I thought about that but I thought that was just a ground on the firewall over there. Mind you I wasnt jumping anything so I said “meh”.
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RamblinRover Luxury-Yacht
> Twism
12/14/2015 at 16:18 |
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The in-front-of-left-tire thing is also seen on a number of related Mopar vehicles, such as the Sebring of that time. I believe under-seat also shows up in VW vans and some others.
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Xyl0c41n3
> thebigbossyboss
12/14/2015 at 16:19 |
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Makes the brap-alier look awesome by comparison, eh? Heh.
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thebigbossyboss
> Twism
12/14/2015 at 16:19 |
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Lol. Yeah I drove past a W123 being jumped and the battery was in the trunk also. Chrysler always wins for inaccesible batteries though.
Logansteno: Bought a VW?
> thebigbossyboss
12/14/2015 at 16:19 |
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I think this is just a Ford thing, because the battery in my mom’s Fusion is tucked up under the cowl like that too.
(Upper right hand corner by the airbox)
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thebigbossyboss
> nafsucof
12/14/2015 at 16:22 |
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Where were you like 2 hours ago while I was doing this reaching under there?
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thebigbossyboss
> Xyl0c41n3
12/14/2015 at 16:23 |
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The brapalier is so easy to fix compared to just about anything this side of emissions controls.
Luc - The Acadian Oppo
> thebigbossyboss
12/14/2015 at 16:26 |
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The back terminal is the negative terminal. just stick your negative jumper cable on this bolt and call it a day.
functionoverfashion
> Twism
12/14/2015 at 16:28 |
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In FRONT of your FRONT WHEEL?! Why is that a good place for a battery? Won’t someone think of the
children
weight distribution?
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Xyl0c41n3
> thebigbossyboss
12/14/2015 at 16:34 |
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I miss my cavalier. And I wish I had found Oppo back when I still had it, too. It would have been the perfect car to learn how to wrench on, especially with all the helpful and knowledgeable folks around here.
I’m still convinced its final death knells could have been pretty easily fixed if I had had just a little bit of knowledge and a little bit more time. But, between an untenable situation at work, and a shady mechanic (who stole a camera I had in the car!) who sat on it for a week without even touching it, and the 250,000+ miles, the quickest solution at the time was a new car.
Now I’ve got my Fiesta, which likely has the exact same engine as your girlfriend’s car. The only thing I’ve done on it myself is change the oil.
BaconSandwich is tasty.
> Twism
12/14/2015 at 16:36 |
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That’s... insanely stupid.
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BaconSandwich is tasty.
> Sam
12/14/2015 at 16:37 |
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Why?! You’d think putting the master cylinder there, it’d much more likely to be severely damaged in an accident.
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BaconSandwich is tasty.
> Xyl0c41n3
12/14/2015 at 16:37 |
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Well, we’re selling my wifes 2-door 2001 Cavalier, if you want it! :P
LeaksOil
> functionoverfashion
12/14/2015 at 16:44 |
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Actually had a neighbor get into a fender bender right where the battery was in a Sebring convertible. Luckily they had AAA who apparently brought them a battery and rigged it into place with a hammer and a bungee cord so they could get home. I wasn’t quite old enough to drive yet, so when they showed us and explained it I remember my mind was just absolutely blown. Battery. In a fender.
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LeaksOil
> thebigbossyboss
12/14/2015 at 16:47 |
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While I didn’t know that trick, working on and around cars my whole life- I still Google and/or YouTube things I’m about to take on. I’ve learned some many tips , tricks (or “hacks” as their called these days) from other guys who have spent a couple hours figuring it out and decided to share it with the world. Has definitely saved me so much time and frustration.
mazda616
> Twism
12/14/2015 at 16:56 |
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My poor grandparents had to replace the battery on their old ‘04 Cadillac Deville and spent 30 minutes trying to find it. And my grandpa was a industrial mechanic for 40 years. To be fair, until then, I'd never heard of a car having the battery under the backseat, either.
BringBackTheCommodore
> thebigbossyboss
12/14/2015 at 17:06 |
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Maybe not in location, but in expense, mine is a pain as well:
One on each side.
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Twism
> RamblinRover Luxury-Yacht
12/14/2015 at 17:09 |
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They were on the same platform, so it would make sense.
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Twism
> functionoverfashion
12/14/2015 at 17:11 |
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I’m guessing not a lot of people thought about the dynamic handling capabilities of the Intrepid, but yeah. It was a pretty bad decision.
K-Roll-PorscheTamer
> thebigbossyboss
12/14/2015 at 17:51 |
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You didn’t use the terminal on the firewall? That’s what I use to jump cars with my ST.
wkiernan
> LeaksOil
12/14/2015 at 17:58 |
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I sure wish I’d watched
both
YouTube videos on changing my Miata’s brake pads before I did it. Sure, I got it done, but it took two hours to put the new pads in, and the whole time I was saying to myself, “this isn’t a German car, it can’t be this hard to change the pads, I must be doing something wrong.” Then after I got done I watched the second video and said “you’re kidding, it’s
that
easy?” and I went outside, jacked up my car, pulled off the tire, and took them out of one corner and put them back in again in about five minutes flat.
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nafsucof
> thebigbossyboss
12/14/2015 at 18:10 |
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Sorry! There are some tricky things in there. I installed an LSD last spring had to remove most of the front clip, learned a lot that weekend!
LeonardSkeonard, FiSTer
> thebigbossyboss
12/14/2015 at 19:59 |
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The negative terminal has a ground bolted to the strut tower, visible in the photo, making jump starting the car pretty easy.
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thebigbossyboss
> K-Roll-PorscheTamer
12/15/2015 at 12:54 |
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Well I wasn’t jumping a car just removing this things battery. I just observed it would be hard to jump.
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thebigbossyboss
> BringBackTheCommodore
12/15/2015 at 12:55 |
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What is this?
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BringBackTheCommodore
> thebigbossyboss
12/15/2015 at 13:08 |
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It’s the engine bay of my F-350. Any diesel-motivated pickup truck could be inserted here, I haven’t met any that weren’t equipped with a dual-battery setup (exceptions being the Ram EcoDiesel and the Duramax-equipped Canyons and Colorados).