Car Battery Acid leak

Chocolate_Ch3rry

Chocolate_Ch3rry

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Whats up guys,

So I had a fun day yesterday. Took my car to my ford dealership to get my oil changed and come fluids flushed before I hit the road for Christmas. While waiting, one of the technicians called me into the shop to show me my car battery was leaking acid. It wasn't obvious as to where it was leaking , I told him I just got the battery less than a year ago so I would be going back to interstate. They cleaned everything up the best the could and I went to the Interstate battery dealership I purchased it from. The tech removed the old battery and gave me a new one. He cleaned everything up the best he could, but I would need to get all of the positive cables replaced since everything was covered in acid and without continuous maintenance I would have buildup on the battery post. So anyways, the dude told me to file a claim because the battery had a failure that caused damage to my vehicle. I had the ford dealership do a damage estimate, nearly $800.00 to replace the cables and clean the engine bay. I was curious, are there any attorneys that handle shit like this? Can my insurance company cover me? What's to prevent these guys from just laughing and telling me to go fuck myself? Or dragging it out a year or longer without responding to me. Any kind of help would be nice. thanks.
 
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This is like any defect products from other manufacturers. They have warranty and plans when that type of failure happen. I don't know the company but I can tell you that for sure they will end up paying you for it. You might have to fight with them over the phone depending of their mentality but since you have proof it should get done pretty easily. Just don't let them a inch, fight politely until the end.

Good luck!
 
I wouldn't create a problem where none exists yet. It's nice to be proactive and all, but give them a chance to make it right before you get too emotionally involved in a fight that might not even happen.

Parts break, sometimes prematurely, but I'm sure it's not the first time they've had something like this happen. Hopefully the rest of your charging system is still fine once the new battery is installed and it wasn't a voltage regulator that failed and gave it too much juice and over charged it or something.

Happy that you're safe and it didn't explode and hurt you or your family. And make sure that keep that acid away from pets, clothing, and body parts. Good luck, let us know how it goes.
 
just get bunch of cans of battery acid remover and clean it up best you can with that and hot water and a scrub brush . their feeding you a line of shit, battery acid is not going to destroy the battery cables.
 
Deputy Swan said:
just get bunch of cans of battery acid remover and clean it up best you can with that and hot water and a scrub brush . their feeding you a line of shit, battery acid is not going to destroy the battery cables.
Click to expand...

It's not the cables themselves that are damaged. my car has a plate with fuses that is part of the connector for the battery. it has serious erosion and it's not sold separately for my car. you have to buy it in a kit with all the positive cables for the car and it's about $300 and $500 for labor running it all. I could care less to be honest. if my car had a standard connector for the battery like my f150 had, I would go to advance auto, spend $20 and replace it myself.
 
If it's old enough to be on it's 3rd battery its old enough to find the piece you need in a junkyard. But that is up to you. If you want to know the actual cost of the part versus what ford is selling it to you at give me the vin number and I will let you know what the markup is on it.
 
The car is 4 years old. That was the only replacement battery I put in the car. I'll PM you the VIN #. Worst case, if I'm going to have issues, I'll pull one off a junk car or find it on Ebay for a lot less.
 
Baking soda and water mixed together and spray on the areas of concern will neutralize the acid/corrosion. The post on the battery is broken and in many years of seeing this sort of thing. The battery looks abused those post dont just break some sort of force caused that break. Most likely when it was installed. One other thing I know of that would cause damage like that is If a excessive electrical load is put on that terminal l seen them do shit like in the picture. @Deputy Swan is correct those cables can be cleaned up no need for replacement. Baking soda + water + a small wire brush will do the job.
edited> You can commercially buy battery cleaner that works great as well.
 
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1968USMC said:
Baking soda and water mixed together and spray on the areas of concern will neutralize the acid/corrosion. The post on the battery is broken and in many years of seeing this sort of thing. The battery looks abused those post dont just break some sort of force caused that break. Most likely when it was installed. One other thing I know of that would cause damage like that is If a excessive electrical load is put on that terminal l seen them do shit like in the picture. @Deputy Swan is correct those cables can be cleaned up no need for replacement. Baking soda + water + a small wire brush will do the job.
edited> You can commercially buy battery cleaner that works great as well.
Click to expand...

The acid was leaking from the top of the battery and that caused corrosion. The connector was stuck to the post from the corrosion. So, when he was trying to get them separated is how it bent back. He was the store manager and told me he's seen batteries fail at the base of the post a lot, but said mine looked like it had been leaking for awhile. That didn't happen over night. I told him Ford handles my maintenance and checks everything every 3k miles when I get my oil changed. So the last time anything was looked at was about 6 months ago.
 
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They make several types of tools to remove battery terminals without breaking things. Just a fact. Wear eye protection if you clean that up by your self.
 
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