Battery terminal trick

[wasilvers]

If you are like me, you pull your batteries after every trip and charge them. I also unhook the batteries if I'm not useing the boat right away. The problem is, all the batteries I buy are not color coded but all my wiring is. The batteries just have a "+" or "-" in the black plastic, but if the light isn't shining right, it can be hard to see. This can be a problem when hooking up the wiring or charger! I used to take a sticker and put it next to the positive terminal so I could tell in the semidarkness what was what - of course that sticker didn't always stay on....

So last night I was painting some red on the boat and had an idea. I grabbed all my batteries and sprayed red paint near the "+" terminals - careful not to get it on the actual metal terminal. Now I can see clear across the garage which side is positve - it should be really easy to see which is which in the semi darkness before fishing

 

[BaitCaster]

That's a good trick. I used to take my battery out of the boat to charge it, but now I just leave it in and connected to everything and bring the charger to the boat. Too much hassle connecting and disconnecting everything.

 

[wasilvers]

I left one hooked up this year, and all the air exposed termials were corroded on my trolling motor foot control. If it had some 'juice' to it, it had some corrosion. I took them off and cleaned them, but maybe I wouldn't have had to do it if I had unhooked the battery? The other stuff that was unhooked just had normal winter aging.

 

[MOE]

That is a great idea! I will be doing this to mine.

 

[Waterwings]

You can also take some "White Out" (or white paint), and paint the + and - marks which are normally molded-into the battery body. The white shows-up well against the black color of the battery.