Wired battery wrong for a couple seconds....

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kdubbya

Joined
Aug 21, 2019
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Location
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Hey gents, full open kamono, I connected by battery wrong temporarily (~3sec). Horn went off in my face, scared the s*** out me, and I pulled the negative terminal quickly. Had a Northstar nsb-agm24 that was 6yrs old and showing its age and went to the odyssey extreme odx-agm24f. The terminals, with the batteries oriented the same way, are reversed and I just wasn't paying attention/in a hurry. Got the new battery in and the engine attempts to turn over but never fully to start. No circuit breakers in the interior appear to be blown. searched for a thread on this via Google fu but only thing I found always a 60 series article that didnt resolve. any threads you recommend or troubleshooting steps? Thanks kw
 
Here ya go; I did the same thing a while back. :lol:

Don't just guess; read the thread and proceed slowly and logically. As long as your electrical system was in stock configuration when this happened, it's almost guaranteed you didn't do any real damage.

CJF

Post in thread 'Fuseable links, backward battery charging and smoke! What did I break, blow or melt?'

...And, now I too have jump-started a rig backwards. Really, really thought I'd make it thru life without ever doing that. :bang:

Here's where I'm at: 91 FJ80, bone stock. Replaced battery and fusible links after the incident. Cranks strong, but no CEL so ain't gonna start. Did some blind checking/testing of EFI fuse, 50amp main fuse, and tried a new EFI relay for giggles. No change.

So: Time to start logically diagnosing. When I get home today I'll verify which dash lights are/aren't on. I *think* only the CEL is MIA, but I'll compare against FSM. I have a multimeter and (barely) know...
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CEL comes on with key to 'on'? Check fuses in engine bay and also meter/check your fusible links.

And yes, you are a twit :)

cheers,
george
 
kdubbya said:
Hey gents, full open kamono, I connected by battery wrong temporarily (~3sec). Horn went off in my face, scared the s*** out me, and I pulled the negative terminal quickly. Had a Northstar nsb-agm24 that was 6yrs old and showing its age and went to the odyssey extreme odx-agm24f. The terminals, with the batteries oriented the same way, are reversed and I just wasn't paying attention/in a hurry. Got the new battery in and the engine attempts to turn over but never fully to start. No circuit breakers in the interior appear to be blown. searched for a thread on this via Google fu but only thing I found always a 60 series article that didnt resolve. any threads you recommend or troubleshooting steps? Thanks kw
Click to expand...
Fusible link and probably all of the fuses. LOL BTDT

Cool thing was, I had broken camp and cruised down to a hot spring when everything went south. :lol:
 
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Thanks for the help gents. Broke out the multimeter this morning and checked all the fuses. All checked good except for the dome light ironically. Moved to the fusible link to check continuity and it was not there. Replaced with the one I kept in the dash and she turned over no problem. Ordered the spare fusible link already thanks again
 
kdubbya said:
Hey gents, full open kamono, I connected by battery wrong temporarily (~3sec). Horn went off in my face, scared the s*** out me, and I pulled the negative terminal quickly. Had a Northstar nsb-agm24 that was 6yrs old and showing its age and went to the odyssey extreme odx-agm24f. The terminals, with the batteries oriented the same way, are reversed and I just wasn't paying attention/in a hurry. Got the new battery in and the engine attempts to turn over but never fully to start. No circuit breakers in the interior appear to be blown. searched for a thread on this via Google fu but only thing I found always a 60 series article that didnt resolve. any threads you recommend or troubleshooting steps? Thanks kw
Click to expand...
Since electricity travels at 386 thousand miles per second (approximately): in 3 seconds it went through a million miles of wiring in your beloved 80 - potentially.

I wish you both luck and success. You aren't the first, and, won't be the last person to mix polarity on a battery.

They really should make each side physically different. One round, one square???
 
Thanks @manofthewoods. I guess they are different in size just not shape. Idk might be smart but circular shapes have a lot for fatigue resistance, i.e. cracking. Maybe square fileted corners? I just need to abide by the rule of slow is smooth, smooth is fast and pay more attention. Lol
 
kdubbya said:
Thanks for the help gents. Broke out the multimeter this morning and checked all the fuses. All checked good except for the dome light ironically. Moved to the fusible link to check continuity and it was not there. Replaced with the one I kept in the dash and she turned over no problem. Ordered the spare fusible link already thanks again
Click to expand...
Good deal. That was the first thing I did, fusible link. It wasn't till hours later that I discovered that I had blown most of my fuses. ALWAYS CARRY SPARES.
 
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