(Richard Casady) wrote in
:

Is boiling the acid common? That has to be bad . Lot
of corrosion around many batteries in cars, so acid does seem to
escape.


With boaters trying to charge their house batteries in 30 minutes at a
thousand amps (500AH, right?...(c, yes, that would certainly boil the
acid before it explodes....hee hee.

Even the tinest amount of acid seeping from a battery post makes the
surrounding area look as if the whole ocean has had a go at the steel under
the paint.

Larry
--

On Tue, 21 Aug 2007 02:41:05 +0000, Larry wrote:

Even the tinest amount of acid seeping from a battery post makes the
surrounding area look as if the whole ocean has had a go at the steel under
the paint.

Part of my car maintenance was a monthly wipe down of the battery.
It normally had acid on the top just due to venting. That collects
dirt, and that provides a shorting part. Can't say I had many battery
problems, and the terminals didn't crust up either.

--Vic

(Richard Casady) wrote in
:

And they make them so you can't add water. *******s.


I'm certainly not defending "them", but modern batteries use an alloy to
hold up the soft lead plates that replaced antimony we used to use.
During the charging cycle, the antimony supports reacted with the water
in the electrolyte to form an oxide of antimony and hydrogen gas which
used to bubble a LOT during the charging, consuming lots of water in the
process that needed constant replenishment.

Now that antimony is no longer used, the percolating only happens if you
try to charge them too fast, a condition most boaters are guilty of
especially sailors trying to run the diesel 8 minutes per day. So, the
"maintenance free" battery was created that will run, in a proper
situation, for several years with no water added to it....all during its
service life. The public demanded it. No battery lasts very long,
except the Nickel-Iron-Potassium Hydroxide "Edison" cell noone produces
any more because of the nickel pollution and awful cost. It was the only
battery that was fully recoverable, not self-consuming. My ham station
ran for years on a group of cells from an old telephone exchange that
were nearly 60 years old! The guy I gave them to in 1978 is still using
them, simply adding distilled water as needed as they do use water.

Battery companies don't need to design in some conspiracy into lead-acid
batteries. They destroy themselves quite nicely no matter what you do...
(c;


Larry
--

On Tue, 21 Aug 2007 02:48:53 +0000, Larry wrote:

No battery lasts very long,
except the Nickel-Iron-Potassium Hydroxide "Edison" cell

I have one of those. Had it for fifty years. Five cell. The cell caps
are machined from stainless steel.

Casady