On 09/03/19, after driving a short distance, I returned to my car several hours later and it would not start. All of the accessories and lights came on but engine would not start and message on my dash said "key required". I assumed key fob battery was dead and called husband to bring spare. In the meantime I tried to start my car again and nothing turned on. I opened my door and stepped out of the sauna my car had become and all of the sudden all of the accessories turned on again. I sat back down in my car and the air blowing out of the AC vents smelled like sulfur. My husband arrived and I tried to start car with spare fob with no luck, so we opened the hood, took off the battery compartment cover and found an excessive amount of bubbling corrosion around my positive battery terminal. The corrosion was so bad that the bolt that holds the terminal end to the batter had disintegrated and fell off upon touching it. We poured a Coke over the terminal to wash away the corrosion (that was all we had available) and found that the terminal end was not making contact with the battery terminal, so in order to get it running long enough to get it home and then to dealership the next day, pliers were used to clamp the terminal end to the battery terminal. I brought it to dealership the next day, and they said battery was bad (a little over 3 years old with 30,352 miles) and also said they replaced terminal end on positive battery cable.
Fast forward to 09/19/19, I walk outside and find what looks like battery acid under my car where battery compartment located. I opened my hood and found that there was again corrosion around my positive battery terminal. I called the dealership and they had it towed back to their repair shop where they said that the problem was that the battery terminal was not cleaned properly and that the fluid I found on my carport was from the cleaner they when they originally worked on the car (despite the fact that it was almost 2 weeks ago and the fluid showed up for the first time yesterday). I asked for further explanation as to why improper cleaning of a new battery and terminal end that were brand new could cause corrosion 2 weeks later and found out that they put a new terminal end on the negative cable and not the positive one. I asked why this was done since there was no corrosion on the negative side and he said that they didn't have any bolts to replace the one on the positive side, so he took the one from the negative terminal and used it to connect the positive terminal and then replaced the negative end terminal with a non OED part. I was told they used a non OED part because they had to replace these frequently and only had the generic part. I also asked how a battery that was only 3 years old with only 30,000 miles could already be bad and have so much corrosion, without any warning, and he said he sees it all the time on Mustangs, Explorers, Escapes and Focus and many of them have even less miles than my car.
Needless to say, I am not sure that the issue was fixed considering that they tech told me that the problem was "on" him, as he was very busy and didn't do the job properly. After searching online, I have found that this is a recurring problem with Ford vehicles so there is obviously some sort of problem with Ford's factory installed batteries, or end terminals, or possibly alternator overcharging. I have owned quite a few cars and I have seen many batteries with corrosion but nothing to the extent that was on my Mustang. But onto the brighter side, while driving home from the dealership, my AC was blowing warm air out of the driver side vents (cool air on passenger side), which is apparently another recurring issue with Ford. I'll be heading back to the dealership tomorrow but not the one I just picked my car up from. This will be my 5th visit in the past year so I think I'll be going back to Hyundai on my next car purchase.
A D V E R T I S E M E N T S
On 09/03/19, after driving a short distance, I returned to my car several hours later and it would not start. All of the accessories and lights came on but engine would not start and message on my dash said "key required". I assumed key fob battery was dead and called husband to bring spare. In the meantime I tried to start my car again and nothing turned on. I opened my door and stepped out of the sauna my car had become and all of the sudden all of the accessories turned on again. I sat back down in my car and the air blowing out of the AC vents smelled like sulfur. My husband arrived and I tried to start car with spare fob with no luck, so we opened the hood, took off the battery compartment cover and found an excessive amount of bubbling corrosion around my positive battery terminal. The corrosion was so bad that the bolt that holds the terminal end to the batter had disintegrated and fell off upon touching it. We poured a Coke over the terminal to wash away the corrosion (that was all we had available) and found that the terminal end was not making contact with the battery terminal, so in order to get it running long enough to get it home and then to dealership the next day, pliers were used to clamp the terminal end to the battery terminal. I brought it to dealership the next day, and they said battery was bad (a little over 3 years old with 30,352 miles) and also said they replaced terminal end on positive battery cable.
Fast forward to 09/19/19, I walk outside and find what looks like battery acid under my car where battery compartment located. I opened my hood and found that there was again corrosion around my positive battery terminal. I called the dealership and they had it towed back to their repair shop where they said that the problem was that the battery terminal was not cleaned properly and that the fluid I found on my carport was from the cleaner they when they originally worked on the car (despite the fact that it was almost 2 weeks ago and the fluid showed up for the first time yesterday). I asked for further explanation as to why improper cleaning of a new battery and terminal end that were brand new could cause corrosion 2 weeks later and found out that they put a new terminal end on the negative cable and not the positive one. I asked why this was done since there was no corrosion on the negative side and he said that they didn't have any bolts to replace the one on the positive side, so he took the one from the negative terminal and used it to connect the positive terminal and then replaced the negative end terminal with a non OED part. I was told they used a non OED part because they had to replace these frequently and only had the generic part. I also asked how a battery that was only 3 years old with only 30,000 miles could already be bad and have so much corrosion, without any warning, and he said he sees it all the time on Mustangs, Explorers, Escapes and Focus and many of them have even less miles than my car.
Needless to say, I am not sure that the issue was fixed considering that they tech told me that the problem was "on" him, as he was very busy and didn't do the job properly. After searching online, I have found that this is a recurring problem with Ford vehicles so there is obviously some sort of problem with Ford's factory installed batteries, or end terminals, or possibly alternator overcharging. I have owned quite a few cars and I have seen many batteries with corrosion but nothing to the extent that was on my Mustang. But onto the brighter side, while driving home from the dealership, my AC was blowing warm air out of the driver side vents (cool air on passenger side), which is apparently another recurring issue with Ford. I'll be heading back to the dealership tomorrow but not the one I just picked my car up from. This will be my 5th visit in the past year so I think I'll be going back to Hyundai on my next car purchase.
- Rach M., PRAIRIEVILLE, LA, US