Hyper Ground System Cables - Ground Out

One day Eric Hsu from XS Engineering gave us a call to tell us about a new product they've been installing on a lot of cars.

"Gary, you have to check out these Hyper Ground System cables!"

"What do they do?"

"Well, to make a long story short, it replaces any car's grounding system and makes horsepower through reduced electrical resistance!"

"No way! Bullshit."

"Believe it. Come over here and I'll show you."

Knowing XS Engineering isn't new to making horsepower, we gave them the benefit of the doubt and took a short trip to see for ourselves exactly what Eric was talking about.

The Hyper Ground System is actually manufactured by Sun Automobile in Japan. Sun Automobile is a recognized manufacturer of high quality accessories for cars in Japan. Sun manufactures OEM parts for Mitsubishi, Nissan and Toyota. In fact, these manufacturers are offering the Hyper Ground System as a factory option that can be purchased at car dealerships in Japan. This makes the Hyper Ground System essentially a JDM product.

When we got over to XS, we discovered the Hyper Ground System is exactly what Eric said it would be: a series of high quality ground cables. Being that the Hyper Ground System is only a series of ground cables, it's a safe and reliable upgrade that provides lower resistance in the ground path. Sun Auto claims a better grounding path ends up helping the engine produce more power, better mileage, better response and improved starting ability.

What's so special about the Hyper Ground System and why can't you use any old wire to do the same thing? The high quality wires provided by Sun Auto are constructed of almost pure copper. Since electrons travel only on the outside of each strand of wire, each Hyper Ground wire uses 1,477 strands of 99-percent pure copper wire. Other grounding systems use less than 300 strands and some other brands use only aluminum wire that costs less but doesn't perform nearly as well as copper wire. Even the accessories included with the kits (e.g. battery adapter terminals, wire lugs, etc.) are made of almost pure copper. To keep the electrons inside the wire, the silver and gold colored Hyper Grounds use three layers of shielding to prevent electron leakage. Red, blue and yellow Hyper Grounds use two layers of shielding. So, even if you tried to use good old amplifier power wire, it would not be as effective as the Hyper Ground System. In addition, Sun Auto exclusively owns the international patent for the daisy chain type of grounding system. Other ground systems must either make a circle (i.e. start at one point, and return to the originating point) or use a big ugly distribution block and then distribute the ground wires throughout the engine. The Hyper Ground System allows a cleaner installation because of the method of installation.

All of this sounds great on paper, but as with anything else that sounds too good to be true, we needed to see proof. We dyno tested several cars before and after on XS Engineering's dynamometer. Installation is relatively easy and only simple hand tools are required to install the Hyper Ground System. The cables are attached to the ground points in series or in daisy-chain configuration with one cable directly attached to the next. There is a supplied battery terminal adapter that mounts on the negative post of the battery. From there, two cables attach to the terminal adapter, with one attaching to the chassis and the other attaching to the first ground point. Then the Hyper Ground cables should be attached to the intake manifold, head, block, transmission and finally the opposite shock tower or any other point on the chassis. There is no particular order in which the cables must attach, but, again, they must be attached together in a series or daisy-chain fashion. Last, tie up all ground cables with supplied wire ties for a clean and tidy installation.

As we found in our own testing, sometimes altering ground points can affect performance increases. For example, on the S2000 there were minimal gains with a ground point on the head. When we moved the ground point to the ignition coils, we gained a significant amount of power. On other cars, we tried multiple grounding points such as ignition coils, ignition igniters, factory ground unions, etc., to maximize performance. Ultimately, to maximize performance gains, dyno-testing may be required. However, there was never a loss in horsepower on any of our five tests, regardless of grounding points.

For the tests, we chose five cars that come in relatively common modified trims: a 1997 Nissan Maxima, 1995 Mazda RX-7, 2002 Honda S2000, and a 2002 Suzuki Aerio. We simply baselined each car, installed the Hyper Ground System, and then made another dyno pull. Each and every car showed some kind of improvement, some cars more than others. In some cases, we had to change the locations of the grounding points to find maximum performance gains. This was probably because of the cars' relatively mild state of tuning. Both Sun Auto and XS told us that highly modified cars would see even more significant gains in horsepower, because modified cars generally have a greater demand placed on their electrical systems. Overall, we were amazed at the power gains these cars generated with the Hyper Ground System.

As far as high performance products go, the Hyper Ground System is one of the best values on the market. With today's cars coming with better exhaust systems and other equipment from the factory, the Hyper Ground System becomes an even better value. On certain applications, the system can make more power than some aftermarket exhaust systems can. Starting at only $98.50 for the S size (fits most 4 cylinder cars), $103.50 for the M size (fits most 6 cylinder cars), and $143.50 for the L size (fits larger cars or rear-mounted battery cars), the horsepower gained per dollar factor looks pretty nice.