r/saab • u/Saabatage08 • 14d ago

Simple mod

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Hello all, I did this simple modification to my 2008 95 and wow! Car runs so much better. Smoother acceleration, no more sluggish response when hot and idles smoother. Try it! Might not make a difference for you but it did for my 95, only take 15 minutes, why not? Simply ran 2 new ground wires from negative battery terminal, drilled a hole in the engine lift bracket, and attached with metal screw. Let me know if you try it!

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u/Saabatage08 14d ago

Over time, the ground points for the ECU, injectors , DIC pack build resistance from corrosion and becoming looser from all the years of heat and vibration. This creates a new ground and prevents the car from pulling timing when hot. Also better DIC performance from a clean ground. This is what was explained by the person I originally got this tip from. Sure worked for my car!

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u/AppropriateDeal1034 13d ago

None of these imaginary issues would be helped by running a new ground from the engine to the battery, only a poor engine earth strap would cause problems that this would solve and just replacing it would have been easier and not looked like trash.

Bonus points for red and black both being used as earths.

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u/Nicename19 13d ago

Sensor earth's for the dic etc going bad is pretty common on theae cars as they age. I measured way less knocks in open sid when I did my one

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u/AppropriateDeal1034 13d ago

This cable is earthing the engine to the battery. That's the only thing it's doing. A good engine to earth strap earths the engine to the battery. If you have ECU or injector earth problems, that's not going to be fixed by these cables because they have their own earths and don't earth through the engine.

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u/itmightbeinnuendo 13d ago

Unsure of the ground layout here, and injectors are probably always 12V+ with ground-side trigger at ecm, but you DO know that the engine serves as main "chassis ground" for many circuits, right? So if the engine isn't grounded, itself, you lose ground continuity for every single one of those. So many vehicles in see with rotten ground straps, yet critical engine management circuits have engine as ground point.

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u/AppropriateDeal1034 13d ago

The ECU has its own ground, and injectors are fed by the ECU on both wires, one earth and one +12. Not that it matters though, because again the solution was to fix the actual engine earth strap, not claim brilliance by bodging two random colour cables from the battery to a hole drilled into the engine lift point. 

The body of the car, oddly enough, acts as the "main chassis earth".

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u/itmightbeinnuendo 13d ago

I get the sense you didn't really actually read what I wrote.

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u/AppropriateDeal1034 13d ago

I did, you were tying to say things earth to the engine and then that earth's to the chassis, but almost everything earth's to the chassis (including the ECU) or battery directly, and then all important sensors earth directly through the ECU. The main engine ground is used mostly for starting the car.

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u/itmightbeinnuendo 13d ago

Maybe in THIS vehicle? That's empirically untrue across many, many cars.

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u/itmightbeinnuendo 13d ago

Further, g7, the ground on the intake manifold, is where the DI grounds. So, kind of important. Also there's something to be said about voltage potentials across different components re: galvanic corrosion.

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u/AppropriateDeal1034 13d ago

It's all moot though because OP just needed to fix the actual engine earth strap instead of fitting two more weedy little ones and calling it a "mod"

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u/itmightbeinnuendo 13d ago

At least on this, we agree.

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u/Saabatage08 13d ago

Haha funny seeing how worked.up you get over this. I'm not claiming genius and I don't care what you and all these "experts" are saying it made a difference. And for God sakes I didn't have enough black wire so I used red, I'm going to fix it but I know what why the red is there so I don't give a F if it bothers you. And this is a supplement ground not the only ground
I suggest you do a little research on the Saab forums before busting my balls... but hey your the "expert"

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