Word to the Wise learn from my mistake...

[dave_mcmillan]

Well first off I admit that I made a total rookie mistake. Here is some quick background...I am the grandson to a automechanic of over 40 yrs who taught me everything. I have been driving for well over 20 years as well. All that being said I thought I would enlighten all to the problem that I just resolved this morning.

I went to crank my 98 4runner this morning and it was more than dead. The problem was a dead battery. Simple right...and I was a little suprised since I just put this new battery in on August of 2009 (more on that later). So I grabbed my trusty 20' long jumper cables and hooked them up. The battery took a couple min's to even register a small charge. So I went to the front of the truck and looked at the cables and of made sure everyting was hooked up nice and tight.

Now here is were I showed just how much an idiot that I am. While checking my wifes van's cables I disconnected the pos and it re-connected it (of course I new better...but I did it anyways)..and then the light show began. My 4runner blew it's horn and the positive post on the battery of the 4runner sparked and smoked. So now I am thinking :wtf: and of couse on the inside I was :bash:. So not to be detered I re-hooked up everything and nothing. The whole car was dead.

So... Here is where I am lucky and have a neighbor who works for Toyota and I quizzed him on what exactly could I have blown up. Turns out the 100amp fuse and the 15 amp Dome fuse were toast. So I have always heard the newer cars that have computers in them are really problematic to jump start and you can really toast expensive parts if your not careful. So given that I have been jumping off cars since I was 7 years old I thought that was just something that people were bing told to keep the shops in buisness and to scare away all the panzies. So all in all leason learned and now I know that there is something to all that story after all...

In case anyone needs it O'Reilys carry 100amp fuses and I picked up a spare for the future or :happens:. In case you have to ever replace this 100amp fuse know that it is bolted into the fuse box (Engine bay) and you have to completly remove the fuse box and the bottom plastic cover to get to the bolts one on each side.

So now I am on my second AutoZone Duralast "gold" battery in as many years. The battery has a 3 year warranty and was a free exchange. Has anyone else had any issues with Duralast batterys?

 

[Sig220]

My rule is to always hook positive side up first and ground up last.

I had a friend who had a battery explode on him when jumping it, luckily no long term damage. So of course, I always do it at a arms length away as well.

Don't go hooking up jumper cables under your chin nothing good can come of it.

 

[zcruiser]

Don't go hooking up jumper cables under your chin nothing good can come of it.

:bigok:

 

[Ron Helmuth]

good of you to share

I appreciate you letting us know what not to do.... I had just heard recently about jumping a dead vehicle with the donor vehicle-not running.

Had not heard of that before-but it appears that is the new favored method to prevent possibility of a blow up. I'm over 40 and back in the day-we even revved up the engine of the donor vehicle to get the amps up. Now I learn that is just plain foolish....

But of course you still have to pay very close attention to the polarity-and with the 4Runner's reversed posts it does get a bit tricky.

 

[004Gunner]

My rule is to always hook positive side up first and ground up last.

You're not the only one. The circuit isn't completed until the ground is connected. It is getting harder to find good grounding points on some of the new vehicles, which might be why people are inadvertently frying electronics

 

[CarolinaCowboy]

So now I am on my second AutoZone Duralast "gold" battery in as many years. The battery has a 3 year warranty and was a free exchange. Has anyone else had any issues with Duralast batterys?

My Duralast "gold" died on me about 6 weeks ago. And when I say died, I mean had to get a charge to start, and when it did my electronics & instruments were going crazy, and when I (luckily) made it all the way to Autozone and parked, it wouldn't even light up my clock or anything. The lady even asked me to pull the truck to the door for the exchange :lmao: BUUUT all that said, I had the battery for over 2 years and they replaced it with a brand new one and not a dime out of my pocket. So the warranty is definitely nice, but IMO I'd rather not have to deal with those :happens: situations in the first place.