Plymouth Battery Caps Blew Off, What the?????

Approximately 9/23/03 19:19, Tom M uttered for posterity:

Roughly what year and how long a while? [computers draw key off power perhaps nuking a marginal battery]

Best case, perhaps the battery had a bad cell(s) and the alternator did all of this damage *before* she shut the key off...and did no damage to the alternator. [If this is the case, buy a lottery ticket while your luck is hot].

Does your wife have a brother....say so you can try it by temporarily just connecting your brother in law's battery to the thing?

I would get a meter and very carefully borrow a battery and hook up only one connection. Then with the meter attached to the battery, touch the other lead. That way you can quickly disconnect if bad things begin to pop. Best done with your brother in law's battery.

I'd hate to see you jump the one that is in there, very likely it has at least two dead cells. Knock wood, your alternator and electronic controls aren't hurt and it is just a blown battery.

You can try ohm meter from the red battery terminal [with the battery removed] across the fusible's, should be dead shorts.

The battery probably had a fracture in a connection between cells, whatever action your wife did immediately before the "pow" (opened door turning dome light on, cranked engine, etc.) caused an arc which ignited residual hydrogen gas above the electrolyte level.

It appears that you have a volt meter, install a new

*quality* battery, start the engine and measure the charging voltage. If the charge voltage is near 14.5 volts, all appears well. If the charge voltage is significantly above 14.5 volts, correct the reason for the over voltage.

I tend to shy away from super dooper mega high capacity batteries because in order to achieve the higher CCA rating, the plates and associated internal components have to be made thinner and smaller in order to cram more of them into the confines of a given battery size, smaller and thinner makes the internals more fragile and more suseptible to exactly the type of failure you experienced.

[snip]

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Oh yeah, one other thing....

I wonder if Mr. Cass would consider this as having successfully determined the state of charge of your "battery" with just a volt meter?

What say you Cass? Toss it or try charging it?

Battery had a bad internal connection, sparked, and suffered a hydrogen burn.

Rinse the entire underhood area thorougly, remove and dispose of the exploded battery, and install a good battery (Optima is my favorite, but Interstate and Continental are also good.)

I called my mechanic about the dead Plymouth. He indicated that they see this sometimes, and that it would be safe to change the battery.

I cautiously did so, and then checked the charging voltage. It was

13.9V so it looks like the alternator is a) working and b) not overcharging.

So I gave the engine compartment a good bath and the Plymouth Voyager Wagon Queen Family Truckster is as good as new (whatever that means).

Lesson learned, don't have your grill next to the battery when someone is cranking or you could get a face full of sulphuric.

BTW the old battery did not full explode, but it was leaking around the connections.

Regards Tom

Make sure you keep the electrolyte level correct by adding distilled water when necessary. If the level gets below the top of the plates they can spark over, esp. when under heavy load when cranking, causing an explosion. That could be what happened to your battery.

Right, sounds like he was low on maintenance. The battery was probably 6 years old too. Next we'll be hearing about the results of the engine "bath" that he gave it.