Bump - this is what I found when I was setting off on a road trip this AM...somehow I cooked my battery. Note, this did not happen at the race track.

Pictures say it all:



Battery acid SUCKS. Now I have to do the engine bay again.

Crappy!!

Maybe the voltage regulator is toast and it boiled the battery? You would smell that though...

Man, that blows. No, it BLOWS!

Ugly.

My current theory (pun intended) is that the racing shook loose a plate and that the battery shorted and off-gassed. Battery guy first thought that the batter had froze (he wasn't that bright) then offered that gem. "Old battery - they do that you know." Whatever - just more paint to fix and that damn battery is going in the trunk.

Har har. Current.

Did it actually explode, or did it crack? The picture isn't terribly clear. It looks like it cracked right at that bracket and spilled everywhere, but I can't tell if there's another crack on the lid or if that's a surface feature. When that battery exploded on me, there wasn't very much left and you KNEW that it exploded.

I wouldn't think that a shorted plate would cause an explosion - they should all be completely under the acid solution. What happened to me was that the positive terminal was loose in the case, and it had worked its way loose from whatever connects it to the bus bar. That caused a spark within the hydrogen-rich gas zone.

Get a gel next time, I guess. I'm tempted to do the same, but I haven't bought a "new" battery in years - they're always from PNP.

Ugh, sorry to see that happen, your underhood area looked better than a lot of peoples cars...

And it will once again...not unlike the venerable phoenix, the Canuck will arise with an even more kick-ass engine compartment than before.

// anxious to see how perfection can be improved on.

Fuel injection?
Turbo?
Whiteblock?
Airbrushed flames?

You'll see...you'll see.

This??

Can't wait!

I'm going to try hydrogen-assisted combustion in mine - a bit of a lark, but supposedly there are ways to get quite a bit of hydrogen using not much electricity. We're not talking perpetual motion here or anything, but it is supposed to give you bigger gains because of improved combustion. It would mean faster burning I guess, and so a little adjustment in the timing advance, which I can do using the tunable ignition - another reason for the dyno. A friend is lending me the system he bought. Easier to install in my car, and if it works, I'll keep it, and he can try to flange it up in a newer engine where all such adjustments are done automatically via sensors and computer, only it will be a bear to get under the hood.

Jim