DryBatteries

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Frank Hurst

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Sep 21, 2009
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Since I do relief veterinary work and will often use the MH in my work. And since I am often called with short notice, I leave the MH connected to a 110 electrical outlet in order to keep the refrigerator cold and the batteries charged. I have done this for 19 years (12 years with my 2003 Phaeton). Of course I check the batteries about ever 3 months and cap off the water in the batteries. Yesterday when I checked the house batteries two of the batteries were completely dry. I was sure that they were damaged but I put distilled water in them any way. When I added the water it turned a "milky" white. I turned the charger off before I reconnected the electricity. The water level in the other two batteries were at a normal level. My plans are to take all 4 batteries tomorrow and have them tested and replace if necessary. (I am sure that I will have to replace the two that were dry). My question: What happened?  They were about 3-4 years old.
 
Never heard of it before. Sounds to me like it may be a cracked case...or two.

Were they exposed to freezing temperatures?
 
We have had a very cold winter for Alabama. Got down to around 10 degrees twice. I would not have thought that they would have cracked if they were charged. I did think of that. They may have lost their charge for some reason.
 
Batteries were approaching end-of-life (3 to 4 yrs usually means 5 to 6) and probably developed a bad cell each which would boil them out due to the Converter trying to get/keep them charged.
 
Cracked case or a bad cell would explain it, per weewun's and fijidad's replies.  Cracks are a common result of freezing, so maybe something happened that the charge wasn't kept up as expected.

The milky white coloring with water was added can have multiple meanings. That can mean some sort of impurities in the cell, or just a lot of hydrogen bubbles as the chemical reactions starts again. If the milkiness clears up in a day of charging, it's probably just bubbles. If not, it's toast.
 
Only way a battery can freeze it becomes discharged. The white color is most likely sulphation of the plates for being deeply discharged. Which might explain the freezing of the battery too.
 
I was thinking hydrogen bubbles myself under the assumption there are no telltale signs of acid damage around or under the batteries. No mention of any damage.

Maybe the charger section of the converter went south and is over charging, in wrong charge mode, charging too long?
 
I did not see any leakage when I added the distilled water. However, I stopped adding the water when I saw the "milky" color. I have had a lot of things going on the past 7 months. Wife has been in 4 different hospitals for a total of 8 times. (Two major heart surgeries plus other procedures). So I thought that I might not have kept the batteries plates covered. However, water was over the plates on the other two batteries. Raining today so I have not had the batteries checked. I am sure that I will have to replace them. Just did not want the same thing to happen to the new batteries.
 
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