It is some background help I need.Friend has a For Ka 18 months old.Parked on a long stay car park.Apparant flat battery. A company (no names) tried to charge the battery.

Result was,car smoking,electrics all shot.I think buggered everything .Talking abou £2500 to £3000 to put right.Car still sitting at Ford garage

Is it possible to use too high a voltage or(and I know this beggers belief) attach to something else other than terminals? Apparantly a portable battery charger of sorts was used.

Help appreciated

Before charging the battery this way you are meant to disconnect at least the -ve terminal. Another possibility, maybe the charger was connected the wrong way round.

It is some background help I need.Friend has a Ford Ka 18 months old.Parked on a long stay car park.Apparant flat battery. A company (no names) tried to charge the battery.

Result was' date='car smoking,electrics all shot.I think buggered everything .Talking abou £2500 to £3000 to put right.Car still sitting at Ford garage

Is it possible to use too high a voltage or(and I know this beggers belief) attach to something else other than terminals? Apparantly a portable battery charger of sorts was used.

Help appreciated[/quote']

If the "company" used a heavy duty professional fast charger then this could certainly blow the car's electrics due to over-voltage, particularly if the battery is an old one with a high internal resistance. With this type of charger it is essential to disconnect the battery first and if they didn't do so it is entirely their fault. But you will have to prove it of course.

Sal

Maybe if charger was 12v and 24v,if 24v was used maybe?

Hi

Average home charger hover around 14 -14.5V and can usually be connected to the car to charge the battery while it is conneted PROVIDED THAT, there is nothing powered up at the time. Interior lamps are usually ok, but stuff like alarms can be sensitive to both the overvoltage and the half wave rectified nature of the current delivery. This voltage is not too far away from that delivered by the alternator.

Some booster chargers can go to 16V + which is pushing things a bit for most circuitry particularly unprotected IC based devices. I cannot however see a charger melting the whole cars wiring unless there was another fault allowing lots of current to ground.

Chris

The only way i can see a battery charger blowing electrics is if its used on 24v, connected up the wrong way around, used on boost setting or its faulty

However all chargers are fused and the last three should blow the fuse BEFORE they damage the car.

Might well be another cause.

The only way i can see a battery charger blowing electrics is if its used on 24v' date=' connected up the wrong way around, used on boost setting or its faulty

However all chargers are fused and the last three should blow the fuse BEFORE they damage the car.

Might well be another cause.[/quote']

This will make things very complicated.Its early stages so I need more info from those involved.

I was hoping it would simply be the 12v/ 24v problem and I could look to the company that charged the battery.If it is potentially something wrong with a nearly new car I think it will become a pain.Can't see Ford bowing down

Looks like we will see what an independant says.

Thanks for the help folks

Has your friend established why the battery went flat. With a nearly new car it should last many many weeks before going flat. My octy vrs was hardly used over the previous winter and was left for 6 weeks and still started 1st time. This was with the alarm set, and normal electrical drain.

Its possible the electrics were already fried before the charger was connected and was highlighted once current started to flow once more through already cooked wiring.