Dont leave car battery charger in rain

[jw]

I was charging a battery on my car and left it plugged in during rain. I put a plastic bag on top but it must have blown off. The charger was not working and it blew the breaker in the garage. When I flipped the breaker it popped again. I opened the charger and found the transformer was completely burned up. That paper like coating on the outside was totally black and burned exposing the windings. It looks like it was not actually on fire because the plastic handle on top did not burn or melt. It has a metal cabinet but that handle is on top. I guess the rain must have caused it to short out. I wont be leaving chargers outside anymore. Guess I'll have to make some sort of tin cover for the next one, or something that wont blow off. I do sort of wonder how that much water got inside though. The top has no vent holes, so the only water that could get in was by the handle and the seams, but I suppose that was enough to get into the transformer.

[The Daring Dufas]

I have a charger hooked up to one of my vans outside right now. I never leave a charger out in the weather, it's under the hood of the vehicle.

TDD

[JoeSpareBedroom]

That was as easy to predict as the sun rising in the east. Are you a teenager?

[hallerb]

Its far better and costs just a bit more to replace vehicle batteries every X years before they usually fail:).

Waiting till the battery dies is like not buying gas till the tank runs dry.

Its highly inconvenient>

Besides I have found alternator failure dropped to near zero for me since I went to preventive mantence battery replacement:)

My theory is weak batteries require more charging thats hard on alternators. The only alternators that still fail have bad bearings...

[hallerb]

Since the OP is buying a NEW charger get one with 200 amp boost:)

It will start a stone daed battery within minutes :) so it wouldnt be out in the rain long enough to matter:)

[salty]

I wouldn't recommend operating a charger in the rain, but I'm also not sure it was water that caused your problem. It may be that the plastic bag you covered it with made it overheat. Chargers usually have a LOT of vent slots for good reason. Blocking them is unwise.

[LSMFT]

The average person would not leave it in the rain. Some people need a warning sticker for everything.

[Oren]

Tightening the belt to tight will cause the bearings to fail prematurely. The belt needs a little slack and helps prevent this failure.

[hrhofmann]

You're supposed to put the charge INSIDE the plastic bag, with plenty of air space inside the bag for heat to circulate.

[mkirsch1]

No shit, Sherlock.

If only the breaker had not tripped when you reset it. You would've gotten electrocuted when you picked up the charger and we all would've been spared from your so-called wisdom.

[ktos]

[e-mail] wrote in news: [e-mail]:

geesh, no shit!

[clare]

That doesn't help if you leave the dome light on, or the headlights. A perfectly good (even brand new) battery can go down to the point you need to charge it.

[salty]

If you leave a light on and the battery goes completely flat, you have severely shortened it's service life.

[aemeijers]

JSB never makes distracted mistakes. He is right that keeping a young strong battery in a car helps- I haven't had to use my plug-in charger/starter in years- but I have no plans to get rid of it. I'm sure I will space out and leave something running and kill the battery again some day. My shiny car turns stuff off itself- can't leave the headlights on when I park in the street to plow the sloped driveway before driving on it and packing down the snow- but the other car is not that smart.

[jw]

That would irritate the heck out of me. I often use my headlights to work on something at night if I dont have power nearby. If I had a car like that, I'd likely run a bypass switch to the lights.