Leaky battery

[SteveInMD]

</font><font color="blue" class="small">( Usually the leaking is actually boil-over from being overcharged.)</font>

That was my first guess too, but it didn't turn out to be the case for me, or for many other here on TBN with battery acid trouble. My charging system operates completely within specs. I'm not sure if it's the bouncy ride, or operating on various inclines that cause the problem, but an Absorbed Glass Mat (AGM) battery solved my troubles.

 

[Highbeam]

So here is a picture. This is the 1000 cca AGM bought at NAPA for 111$. I bounced all over mowing yesterdy and no liquid came out, of course the acid is a paste on these so I didn't expect any leakage. The battery is a little less wide than the previous one so the brass colored bar needed to be tightened carefully to avoid bending the brass hold down bar. You can see some of the corrosion in this photo. I made the mistake of greasing the terminals after the leads were in place. A habit I got from years past to prevent corrosion, but since no acid, no gas, no corrion I didn't need to do it.

I mowed for 4 hours and bounced myself silly on the now hard bumps and ruts as a test. I also took one of my scrap acid batteries which was supposedly a sealed type and shook it around only to see acid come out pretty easily. Liquid electrolyte batteries do not belong on tractors in rough environments. There is better technology now. When they say "sealed" maintenance free battery on the liquid type they really mean sealed from the customer messing with the levels unlike the old ones with screw on caps. The vents are still very good at leaking acid.

AGM = more gooder.

Thanks folks. I will still put my meter on the battery to check charging voltage.