Both neg wires ran to firewall.

Firstly, to use the correct terminology, the part of the body that they are attached to is the fender not firewall. The firewall is the back of the engine bay that separates the engine bay from the passenger compartment.

Yes the longer cable does not belong there. Depending on whether you have the Duratec (known as 24v or 4v) engine or Vulcan (2v) engine, it grounds somewhere else.

The location is either step 5 or step 6 on the attached. Hopefully someone else can provide better pictures of the location and advise on accessibility but generally speaking the longer cable goes to the left.

Please note that the attached are removal instructions. You need to follow the instructions in reverse to do a correct installation.

For safety, you should disconnect the negative cable entirely from the battery first and put it somewhere where it can't touch the terminal. Then take the longer cable and attach it to the location in step 5 or 6 as appropriate. Then reattach the negative cable to the battery.

rjacket said:

You can also see pictures of other 2001 Taurus engine compartments here:

2001 Ford Taurus Engines | GTCarLot.com

gtcarlot.com

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Agree one needs to know where that wire was attached on the other end. Possible the ground strap from the engine to the firewall is bad and this was a "BandAid".
Attached is my block diag. of the power as seen on G-4's seen from the front of the car.
Maybe this helps.
-chart-

This is the ground location on the transmission (04 Vulcan):


This is where it's located in the engine compartment:

haypixie said:

Do I need a rachet to get it unbolted from the wall? If so what size? My needle nose pliers are just stripping it. The bolt that is

Click to expand...

One need a quarter inch drive set. Cheap. Might find the tab on the firewall is hard to get a socket on. I use a piece of wood and pump it down a bit to get straight line access. Need an extension from the ratchet to the socket.
See pic.
-chart- .