pretty much finished my car, just those silly jobs to go, i wired the alternator up a week ago, but made a mistake in that i put the small wire directly to the battery with no lamp on it. it worked, and the voltage on the battery went up to 14.5 when thrashing the engine. but now the batt is flat as a pancake and just blows the fuse in my mains trickle when i plug it in. i guess i should have put the little wire to an ignition live, not direct to the battery. is my battery now bin fodder or does anyone have some life saving ideas?

Possibly over-discharged, causing bent plates inside, leading to short-circuits.

Maybe time to get a new battery...

David

Noooooooooooo !!
that wasnt what you were meant to say !!

did i guess right as to whats caused the problem? the little wire having 12v shoved down it all the time, a constant draw on the battery?

i've just bought an optimate battery charger off ebay which is meant to be very good at recovering deep discharge batteries (assuming its not damaged)

Ned.

You can get the Optimate in most decent bike shops...

Be prepared to allow several days before you know whether the battery has recovered.

David

I assume you had dissconnected the battery from the car before tryiung to charge it to eliminate the possibillity of a vehicle wiring fault?

Hi,

I am the original electric dipstick so this is probably wrong but I ran my engine without wiring the alternator and it blew the diodes inside it, (I think).

Whatever I did cost me £35 for a new one.

Paul G

cheers guys.
Ive "borrowed" the battery from my girlfriends old beetle and all is fine now.
new battery time i think for the sake of a few quid, at least i will know for sure its a good one then
for some reason the beetle wont start anymore......... i wonder why???