Melted battery terminal in half

[ronstang94]

car shut off going down the road. opened the hood and the terminal was melted in half, right in the middle, between the post and the wires on the negative side. pulled it away and it sparked and spit some of the molten lead on my hand. ouch

What happened? how do I fix it?

also, I dont know if its related or not but the car has an intermittent problem where it sputters, stumbles, starts dropping cylinders and then dies. wont start... 30 minutes later its fine.

Maybe its related? I have no clue

 

[toyman]

I would think that to melt the battery terminal post the positive lead from the battery is shorting to the chassis before the fuse box. It takes a lot of current to create that amount of heat and would be well above the highest rated fuse (60 Amps) or circuit breaker in the system.

 

[BlownFiveLiter]

Has your car always lived in AZ? The reason I ask is, because mine did the exact same thing and it was corrosion inside the insulation. In your climate, it's probably not an issue like here in the midwest. In my case, the cable itself was just so covered with corrosion that it would cause a ton of resistance and melted the terminal clean off.

 

[HISSIN50]

A loose connection could have built a lot of heat.

Go over the rest of the cable connections and clean them up. Add an extra motor ground if you don't have one.

 

[Black95GTS]

Has your car always lived in AZ? The reason I ask is, because mine did the exact same thing and it was corrosion inside the insulation. In your climate, it's probably not an issue like here in the midwest. In my case, the cable itself was just so covered with corrosion that it would cause a ton of resistance and melted the terminal clean off.

Exactly what I was thinking.

Adam

 

[Dropped95]

Major short to ground will do that, had a bad starter that did that, cooked the terminal right off.

 

[ronstang94]

Fixed it. I thought something complicated and crazy happened, but it was easy. When I got my PA performance alternator I also got the upgrade cable for it. I routed it around the front end instead of over the engine. Right after the in-line fuse block it arced and welded itself to the frame.

I routed it there like 2 weeks ago, so it might have rubbed through the insolation or just arced right through it. Repaired the wire and put it in a better spot. Hopefully it doesnt happed again. Thanks for the help.

 

[HISSIN50]

Is the charge cable fused appropriately (for the weakest link)?

If you use a 4 AWG cable, I would want something along the lines of a 125 amp fuse on it. A short to ground that doesn't blow the fuse is a problem.

 

[Husky44]

I dont know if its related or not but the car has an intermittent problem where it sputters, stumbles, starts dropping cylinders and then dies. wont start... 30 minutes later its fine.

Maybe its related? I have no clue

Interested to hear if this goes away now that you've found the other problem. I had an old Chebby pickup that did this to me. Starter was too close to the headers, and when it got really hot, truck would crap out and die. Truck would leave you dead on the side of the road. Once you got a ride somewhere, got some tools or a tow strap, and got back 30 minutes later, darn thing would fire right up.

Took me like 2 months to figure out what was going on and put a blanket around the starter. Problem solved.

Don't know if that's what was going on with yours; hopefully your new cable will fix this one, but I thought I'd throw it out there.

 

[Chythar]

My guess on the stumbling problem is the PIP in the distributor. Also check you cap & rotor, see if they have any corrosion.