Does anybody else have an original 26R battery
 

My battery is on its last legs and I started shopping for a new one last night. Most of the places I looked didn't have a specific fitment listed for the Speed. The general 3 fitment (and the sites that did have the Speed listed) showed both 26R and 35 as batteries for the car. I've read around the forum that many people have been putting group 35 batteries in the Gen1, and a few people are also using that in the Gen2 as well. I measured the external dimensions of my original factory battery, and it's definitely a 26R. The dimensions of the different batteries are as follow:

Group 26R
8-11/16" L x 6-13/16" W x 7-11/16" H

Group 35
9-7/16" L x 6-7/8" W x 8-15/16" H

The difference between the two batteries is listed as 100 CCA, and some of the listings say the MZ3 runs the 26R with a manual trans, and the 35 with an auto trans. It seems like there is enough room front to back for the additional length of the group 35, but I might have to pull the front of the battery box to get it in. I'm more concerned about the additional 1-1/4" of height, as the eyeball says the terminals would hit the bottom of the battery box cover. Did Mazda sell Speeds with both batteries? Are people with the group 35 battery running without the cover? What's the deal?

It's pretty common for the catalogs to be wrong. If you have a group 26r just stick with it.

I agree. That's what I was planning on doing, but I thought it was a question worth asking and getting additional data posted on, since most of the info I could find on the forum said people are running the 35. Running a google search on 26R brings up 3 results on the forum, and one of them is this thread....

Correct battery is definitely a group 35. That is all. :facepalm: