Jumpstart with wrong terminals

M

MaximaGuy

Joined
Sep 20, 2003
Messages
1,713
Location
Austin, TX
I helped my neighbor jump start his vehicle but he accidentally connect the terminals opposite his end. My car was off so no big deal but there was a small flash on my battery before I realized he had done a mistake.

He cranked it with it and then realized his mistake, corrected the cables and started up.

I was wondering did he screw up his car or inadvertently my battery (nothing could have happened to my car as it wasn’t the load and was turned off).

Any thoughts
 
Nothing or alternator problems. Pretty sure the ECU's have protection built in them. Any dash lights? Get a scanner and read the stored codes. Keep your fingers crossed.
 
I've only ever heard of and seen the vehicle being jumped having issues afterwards when jumped backwards. Although I'm sure it's happened, I've never seen an issue with the donor vehicle. I've replaced a ton of bus bars and fuse boxes from vehicles that were jumped backwards.
 
Actually what surprised me was the car did jump back to life and didn’t notice anything going wrong. Will know soon as he is my neighbor and we bump into each other while walking our dogs
 
Hopefully nothing went wrong and probably didn't since you are up and running ok. Don't do that again. I know that crazy thing can happen electrically with Ford Transits when jumping.
 
MaximaGuy said:
You guys are scaring me now and making me nervous!! I don't want a good deed to go punished.
Click to expand...
I wouldn't worry too much. Although the possibility of frying ECUs is real, the most damage I've actually seen from backwards jumping has been a bunch of 10 cent fuses and a couple dollar bus bar/main fuse.
 
My brother did this one time with my moms car and truck, the battery died and she drove out to jump start it. They called me in a panic later saying there was sparks and lots of smoke and the cables melted the insulation. He insisted he did it correctly but when my mom sent pictures there was red plastic melted on top of the battery right next to the negative sign embossed on the battery....

They did get it jumped and the truck made it about 5 miles until it just died on the side of the road dead as a door nail. I drove to meet them and put a new battery in it and its worked fine ever since... i told him he was lucky all he did was ruin the battery

this was an 03 dodge truck and 2017 volvo car
 
don't let clueless people use jumper cables? i always check all the polarities (on both cars) before hooking up the last clamp. jumped many cars without a problem.
 
Thank you all for your inputs. This was a honest error in judgement anyone could do it wrong and bet he feels stupid. Having said that one lesson I learnt in this process is if Iam giving a jump, Iam I charge of the cables.

I shall let him know his battery is compromised.
 
If the battery was dead enough that it didnt spark and let you know it was hooked up wrong, then it was compromised already.
 
Weird things can happen and it isn't predictable. ECU could be fried, radio fried, battery fried, fuses blown, or nothing at all could happen.
 
I’ve made the same mistake. My 90A main fuse died and a replacement fuse was needed. No problems month after that. If your car is bahaving normally, I doubt any problems.
 
A friend of my son's cross jumped his older Infiniti G35 and all sorts of bad things happened. He never did get the car right after that.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Similar threads

Boomer
Paint Scrape Removal
Replies
4
Views
391
KrisZ
N
Bizarre Electrical Issue/No Start On 2013 LaCrosse
2
Replies
33
Views
3K
Lacrosse13
T
frame flex with floor jack normal?
2
Replies
32
Views
2K
Turbo Actual
Blake1107
2008 HHR Electrical Issues?
Replies
14
Views
436
Rmay635703
eljefino
How to buy a car on Facebook Marketplace
Replies
16
Views
757
Elkins45
Back
Top