boiled-up battery!

[xbo11ox]

Yo, I put a brand new battery on my Xsara HDI about a year ago, cost about £65. Then I left the car in the garage without touching it till today and of course the battery went MEGAFLAT, like so flat a battery charger wouldnt touch it. Today i put the flat battery on my Mondeo, jump started it and drove for 4 hours. When I got out the battery was boiling! You could hear it bubbling up and steam was chuffing out the breather hole. However it had obviously woken up as it was able to spin over the engine like a good 'un.

My question is:

1) Am i likely to have ruined the battery by boiling it.

2) Presumably it has now boiled off a load of the electrolyte. I would top it up, except that its a new fangled battery with no caps on the cells so theres no means of putting any water in. Is there owt I can do to help it?

Cheers all!

[rodney]

see how it is tomorrow , if its still bubbling up a lot get rid , if its only doing it a tiny bit the it should be ok as a battery will bubble a little during normal useage,.

[Porsche]

There should be a way of getting the cover/covers off the top. They don't glue them down after filling them up new. You may find that the sticker on top covers up the covers. Remove it and you should be able to see where the covers are pushed on. Just be careful when you prise them off, as some acid may spray out. Wear goggles and rubber gloves. Neutralise any acid spillage with bicarbonate soda. (Not water).

Lead Acid Battieries will bubble somewhat when being charged.

[xbo11ox]

There arent any covers, unless the whole top of the battery is one big cover! No stickers on the lid either.

Its got a breather hole in the top though which must have an internal moulded passage to each cell, I reckon it must filled up via that in the battery factory.

[Porsche]

Well, if it's completly sealed then that must be the only way they could have filled it?
How much fluid did it loose? If it's sealed, not much should come out of the breather hole. This hole is just to let the pressure off or it would turn football shaped.

Sealed batteries are really just that. The fluid shouldn't really come out of the vent.

i wish you were closer to me, I'd be able to test it with my Midtronics battery tester and see if it was f*ck*d or not.

[cobblers]

The battery was more than likely dicked to start with - sounds like being left flat it'll haven probably lost a cell.

It'll have boiled it's head off because it's then charging at 14.odd volts into a 5 cells rather than all 6, so it'll be like charging a normal battery at 17v.

[composimmonite]

What was the warantee on the battery ? Often with modern batteries it is at least 2 or sometimes 3 years. If you can find the receipt I'd say don't mess around but take it back to the supplier and get a replacement.

paul H

[nigelbickle]

Cobblers is right.

You'll have lost a cell & warped the plates in the others through overcharging. I've had a couple of these blow their tops off because of the amount of gas being created.

You wont be able to trust it, Boll -although it may work for a little while. Dig the paperwork out & get it replaced under warranty. Or get down the breakers & spend a £10 (plus vat) on a replacement.

[dave21478]

Don't use it again.

The battery burst in my girlfriends Frontera - it went with a massive bang and showered acid all over the engine bay leaving a right nasty mess.
It was only a few months old but the shop were having none of it, assuming I had dropped it or something daft = no guarantee.

[composimmonite]

Jan 13, 2013 10:01:26 GMT dave21478 said:

Don't use it again.

The battery burst in my girlfriends Frontera - it went with a massive bang and showered acid all over the engine bay leaving a right nasty mess.
It was only a few months old but the shop were having none of it, assuming I had dropped it or something daft = no guarantee.

I had a battery boil over on a Maxi. As you say made a terrible mess and ruined the car. On mine it was a faulty alternator that was overcharging.

Paul h

[xbo11ox]

Well it was as flat as a kippers c0ck this morning so i think that tels us its game over for this battery, typically i have lost the receipt like I always do so thats £65 up the pipe. See you later money

[rodney]

get a breakers yard special,.

[composimmonite]

Don't forget you can get around £6-8 back for the old battery if you weigh it in. Not much but better than putting it in the pocket of a tatter or taking to council tip.

Paul h

[taurus]

It won't help now, but for future reference, an alternator won't charge a flat battery - as you have discovered.

If it won't take a charge off a normal trickle charger use one of the chargers for motorbike gel cells, or the type used to charge lawnmower batteries. They put out less than 500Ma which is all a totally dead battery will take.

I use a 400Ma charger to give a 24 hours charge to dead batteries - then they'll take a full charge off a conventional trickle charger - then they can go back into the car and be kept topped up by the alternator.

[xbo11ox]

Thats interesting, cheers Taurus, i'll bear that in mind

[Porsche]

Jan 13, 2013 10:57:18 GMT xbo11ox said:

Well it was as flat as a kippers c0ck this morning so I think that tels us its game over for this battery, typically I have lost the receipt like I always do so thats £65 up the pipe. See you later money

There's a lesson for us all. You can't just leave car batteries sitting around without keeping them charged.

Where did you get the battery from? If it was Halfords, you may still be able to take it back and exchange it. I think they have a no quibble guarentee policy.

They should be able to tell the date the battery was manufactured by a code branded into the battery.

Though most would proberbly just send it back to the supplier to sort out.

[ChasR]

Halfords have now changed their 'no quibble' policy. Depending on what their tester shows they will refuse to refund the battery.

[xbo11ox]

^^^They have introduced a 'quibble' policy by the sounds of it

I'll get a new bazza from my local motor factors tomorrow I reckon, (and lose the receipt again on exiting the shop).

[hairymel]

xbol i suggest you try the method i usually forget to use myself - stick a document envelope or something similar onto the battery with the receipt inside

hth ;D

[ChasR]

I got my battery from Euro Car Parts this time around. IME Exide batteries seem to take quite a bit of punishment.