OK, here is the theory that I have tried several times and have found to work well.
1. Amass a large amount of money by doing whatever (spice/trade/missions) to an amount roughly higher than $1milion (of course, more never hurt). Don't worry, once you start, It happens rather quickly
2. Make several purchases, making sure you have the maximum amount of health and the best interstellar drive possible. It is also a good idea to stock up on colony packs (4 is pretty good)
3. with your remaining money, buy repair packs (the ones that restore health, not energy). Don't waste your money on AOE packs, because allies will be useless in this method. After you do that, earn some more money as a traveling friend and start off to the center.
4When you approach the Grox belt, try to spot stars that are not occupied and use them as stepping stones. The Grox probably will attack you, but just keep flying.
5. Pause periodically and plan your path. A neat idea to mark your path is to fly into the atmosphere of the empty planets and have the visited tab turned on from galaxy view. If worse comes to worse, you can follow your old pathway again easily. Plus, you can find artifacts without the Grox gunning you down.
6. When you get low on health, don't panic. Use one of your packs and keep flying. I you would like, stop occasionally and place a colony as a checkpoint and, if possible, tank up on supplies or artifacts you may have found on your way there. Keep going and eventually you will make it. If you come to a dead end, don't try to save yourself, just remember which way not to go the next time and plan another path to the center.

As a general rule, try not to have your health alarm going off. Your ship and you mind will last a little longer.

With a little patience and a little luck, you can make it to the center in under an hour. I have tried this several times, and if you have any more questions, feel free to ask. Please, check out my creations and thanks for reading this.

thanks for the post

I'd already had in mind to use this basic method, I'm just starting now to get my sporebucks up, so I can buy a ton of energy and repairs

I have a colony just outside the boundary of Grox space, so I'm close, hopefully that won't hurt me none

I ended up taking 9-10 colony packs with me. I'd make a colony 8-9 jumps into grox territory in an empty system and then rinse and repeat. When I died I would go back to the closest colony and try again.

as I said in the space stage tips post, dropping monoliths on a inhabited planet in tribal or civ staged saves you the trouble in building you own colonies. since in grox space there are really no empires, new ones will quckly expand to the planets you clear the grox out of, this gives you plenty of places to buy repair and supplies, one I uplifted is up to 20 colonies now and another one I just dropped had 4 just 30 minutes after they went to space stage. and they like me since I uplifted them.

It's very difficult to do that method on hard mode with a peaceful race. Your best bet is to just go ahead and hit the Grox worlds and terraform them to be used as a base. Do not fight, just run around until you've hit T1. It's much slower, but you'll make a nice corridor on your way in which can be used and widened by other saves.

Thanks that helps alot!

do you need to worry about returning thru Grox territory after you've made it to the center of the galaxy?

If so I'm going to need more repairs and energy

I'm about ready to go for it, I just wanted to make sure I had enough

thanks.

That is gonna take much longer than a mad dash. My tips are: 1. find a wormhole that puts you into range of the grox 2. Fly 3. if your stuck, pause, and be sure to use repair packs and enegy, only when needed.

Way more complicated then it really is. All you need is the Intersteler 5 drive, and about 10 basic health packs. Follow large clusters of stars to the center, and do not try and take shortcuts. And DO NOT stop moving. Soon as you do the Grox will actually start shooting. If you keep moving then they will just follow you.

Also, keep the camera view looking straight down, and only click on stars within the ring. While moving continually click on stars you might be able to get to as soon as you get to the one your currently headed for.

This does not take an hour. It only takes 20 minutes at most when manually flying from the middle of one of the Galaxy arms.

Other helpful items:
1. Full restore energy packs (otherwise just basic energy packs.
2. Those anti-matter missiles for quick dispatching of the Grox if you do start getting shot at.