Battery fluid leakage

So on from my other thread in the AZ regional section, I lifted the hood on my 2007 Prerunner to find this mess. It's an OEM battery. Is this a problem or should I just clean it up with a sponge?

 

Yes.

 

?...How that happen?

 

Get in there and use baking soda diluted with water and get that shit off of everything. It will eat all of that shit.

 

Dunno - I haven't done anything under the hood. Other than regular servicing (that I don't do) I haven't looked under there.

 

And get another battery ASAP. I had an old battery set on the tailgate and the paint was eaten away real quick. Get on it man.

 

If it's that bad should I go back to Toyota? It's an OEM battery.

I'm past the 36k warranty.

 

I just read that batteries leak when the alternator is putting out too much of a charge or if the battery just wearing out.

 

If you're past warranty you might be better off springing for a sealed battery. I recently upgraded my RX8 to an Optima red top and it's great so far. If you have the TRD inverter and use it frequently a deep-cycle wouldn't be a bad idea (Optima's deep-cycles are the yellow tops). Optimas will usually run around $150-200 so there are definitely cheaper replacement options, possibly even other sealed lead batteries (Optima is the only brand I know of, but I didn't do a whole lot of research before buying mine).

Advantages of a sealed battery are that it won't leak on you and can be shaken around a lot more than the kind that come OEM in most cars. If you roll the truck, you've probably got bigger problems than a leaking battery, but it would make for one less thing to worry about.

 

Yeah like afwrestler1986 has said and others, you need to get in there quick and start cleaning with baking soda and water.

I had this exact type of situation happen to my 05, a month after I got it. Looked at the garage floor and saw a huge puddle of battery acid, which I can still see at my parents house. Opened the hood and looked down and could see a bubble of paint about in inch high and others. The acid got everywhere, down into my frame, clips, etc.
It took my local stealership three tries to fix it and repaint, and after three times they still couldn't fix the paint from chipping off and all of the damage from the acid. They said three was enough and stopped accepting it for repairs.

So my advice is to check everything in your engine compartment, and then work down. Think of it like water going down and where it could go. I would also recommend getting under the truck and checking it out too.

 

On the basis that it's an OEM battery wouldn't Toyota have some commitment to fix it instead of me doing all the work?

 

Not if the warranty is past date. You may need to more closely look at the Toyota warranty and maybe call Toyota corp. to see if you are still covered. Some of the information should have came with your truck with the trucks manual. If your not covered, there isn't a lot you can do, except buy a new battery yourself.

You may also want to check the top of the battery and see if it has information on that too.

Have you been doing any type of offroading/jumping? I heard this can sometimes cause this, if your battery strap isn't secure. I was just doing normal city driving.

 

I dunno about the warranty stuff. But I would call and find out. But deff. get that stuff cleaned out of there. And if you crawl under there make sure you have eye protection on.

 

Take care of that ASAP, a similar thing happened to me. Aside from having the inside fender paint strip, I've had to replace engine cover, battery tray, oil filler cap, fuse box cover and the fuel vapor canister. My alternator was fine, the tech at the battery shop says he's seen it happen a few times. All the plastic that got exposed to the acid became very brittle.

 

X2. I was thinking the same thing--Get some safety glasses.

 

I did some offfroading about 18 months ago, nothing serious. Definitely no jumping.

Thanks everyoner else for the suggestions. If the damage extends to other stuff (like plastic parts) I'll be p1ssed!

 

Without some expletive to emphasize, I'd get on that acid right away. It will destroy everything under that hood if given the time. Get a couple boxes of baking soda, use 2 per 5 gallon pail of water and get out a squirt bottle and spray/brush that stuff down. Use the remaining left of the pail to evenly wash away the remaining then pressure wash the soda away.
$10 and 2 hours of your labor is worth $1000's in fixing paint, aluminum mounts, etc. Luckily most plastic is relatively unharmed from battery acid less cosmetic issues.

 

Check your battery voltage with the engine running. If the regulator is malfunctioning, it can cause voltage to climb high enough to boil the fluid out of your battery. Run RPMs up to at least 3K and make sure the voltage doesn't go much over 14V. If it's not regulating, you could easily see 15, 16 or even higher voltage.