My 26R does NOT have a notch in the rear bulkhead to accommodate the battery. Where is it located on a road going S1/2? And if on the left side as I suspect, where does the power cable route, same as I am accustomed on a S3 through the firewall on the left and then just under the bonnet shelf to the starter solenoid on the right?
Yes, that’s how my S1 was routed.
Jerry
I have been collecting reference photos and here is one that may help (I cannot recall where it comes from).
From what I understand the battery panels where moulded into both sides as shown on the photo below:
Just as an aside, the FIA folks have hauled up MGB owners for cutting these off…but have not yet got round to Elans on this subject.
Andrew
That is a picture of my car, 26/0045… restored now. Hope to drive it to Salt Lake City in a month for LOG.
It’s a 26R S2, they had different shells. I had one decades ago, but I can’t remember all of the differences, perhaps Jerry might be better off asking somebody with a genuine car - like Vaughan.
From a handling perspective, it is a good idea to minimise the polar moment of inertia - you want to have as much mass concentrated in the centre of the car as possible, and ideally as low as possible. I could never understand why Chapman moved the battery from low down at the rear of the passenger compartment, to as far from the centre of the car as he could, and stuck it higher up in the left hand side of the boot.
Possibly some safety requirement?
It was a road car not a racer. The early cars had rubber mats which would have coped with acid spills. The type 36’s and 45’s had carpet and were more upmarket. Previously, as reported by Graham Arnold, customers complained about the battery fumes (lead acid) and yes, it must have been safer to have it in the boot.
I can’t imagine Chapman having anything to do with details like battery location, perhaps that would have been Hickman and his team?
Thanks Andrew, that was helpful, now to decide if I’ll put a notch on the left side of the body for fitting the battery or simply lay it on the slanted rear bulkhead, an AGM can do that.
Probably going to go with a fairly small Odyssey battery as there aren’t any big electrical draws and I am going to fit an alternator.
An Extreme 30 would fit nicely on the slant . The FIA assessor I had for my GTS didn’t want to show any pictures showing the battery in the front footwell as he said, ‘it should be at the back’. I guess I would have done so if I had my time again. I don’t think they are fussy about the need for the battery box being present…yet.
Graeme,
If you have both battery boxes it helps to maintain laminar flow across the rear drivetrain reducing drag 
.
With regard to the choice of battery, each to his own. The Odyssey Extreme 30 (250 x 97 x 156mm) weighs 9 kg with 450 CCA which is enough to start a Jaguar V12.
I’m a fan of Varley’s Red Top 20 (5.4 kg) which offers 185 CCA (this is not lithium which is not FIA legal) and is 181 x 77 x 167mm.
You are right, I was running off my memory ( dangerous) , I just checked, the road Elan has a PC680, which I believe is the ‘25’. More than enough.
The GTS has a very tiny battery 
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