For those unknowns, a car battery is equivalent to the mystery unraveled. Additionally, it is not something avoidable in the long term, and hence, sooner or longer, one has to face the car battery. As astounding as it may sound, car batteries resemble cellphone batteries.

Not to mention, the drivers are bound to face a dead car battery sooner or later. Instead of running to the mechanic over and over again, you can as well fix the battery on your own. You can change your dead battery anywhere if you have the proper equipment, like a portable battery charger.

Charging your car battery is an easy process.

Altogether, charging car batteries is as easy as plugging your cell phone into your charging point. Hence, why even bother paying someone else to do the job while you can easily do it yourself?

How To Charge Your Car Battery?

The initial step to charging your car battery is to learn about itself first. A car battery is a box filled with acid and electricity; hence, it is crucial to focus on safety before trying to charge one.

Before you start charging, removing the battery from the vehicle is essential. This is necessary as if your battery is overcharged or undercharged can cause catastrophic battery damage.

Moving on, while removing the car battery, you should lift it with your legs and not the back. Hence, while doing so, ensure you wear safety glasses, a long-sleeve shirt, pants, and nitrile gloves. Likewise, some of the items you will need are a socket set or crescent wrench and a car battery charger.

Guidelines To Charge Your Car Battery

To have a freshly charged battery, follow these step-by-step guidelines.

Battery Preparation

First, you must ensure you have a fresh battery prepared before you start charging it. Pop the hood of your trunk and remove the battery from the vehicle. To remove the battery, you should first figure out the terminals.

Here the terminals with the red indicator are the positive terminal, while the black arrow is the negative terminal. You have to be extra careful as removing the wrong wires can result in harmful and dangerous sparks.

Turn Off The Car Electronics

Before you start the work, first make sure that all electronics in your car are powered down. It also includes off the stereo and the radios there. If you do not turn off the electronics, the battery might experience an electrical arc.

Remove The Negative Cable And Then Positive

As we discussed, you should initially remove the negative cable with a “-“ symbol and the positive line with a “+“character. Not to mention, your battery has plastic caps over its terminals that you should open before you remove the cables.

After you remove the caps, use a wrench to loosen the cables and move both terminals away from each other.

Clean The Battery Terminals

While you open your battery for charging, clean the terminals as well. You can use terminal cleaning brushes as it helps to clear away corrosive debris and dirt. For cleaning, you can use the commercial battery cleaning solution if you have one.

However, if you do not have the solution, you can use baking soda with water; that will work just the same. So9 why is the terminal cleaning necessary?

This cleaning process is a must as it neutralizes battery acid and prevents malfunctions from occurring.

Connect Battery Charger

All these above procedures are for the basic foundation to start charging your battery. Before you abruptly charge your car battery, there are certain things to not miss about.

Hook the positive cable to the charging unit to the corresponding positive terminal. Following it, please do the same for the opposing line and hook it up. One thing to remember here is that you should not connect the negative terminal before the positive terminal.

After you have connected both cables in the correct order, turn on the charger. Again, if you are charging your car battery for the first time, start by setting it to the lowest rate by default.

In addition, some car battery chargers have a timer setting, and if you do have it, you can set it to a specific time. However, if you do not know how to operate it, check out its manual.

Remove The Charger Once Complete

After charging for a particular duration, remove the charger’s connecting cables from your car battery. Or, if you have no idea when the charging gets complete, the wires will have an indicator that states when the charging is done and is safe to disconnect.

For your safety, you should not directly jump to disconnect the charger as it may be dangerous. Hence, you should turn off the power before touching any of the cables in the unit. Once the power is off, remove the line, starting with the negative terminals.

Then, you should remove the cables and replace them on the terminals for your car battery. Again, connect the positive cable first and only the negative cable while replacing it. Lastly, you will need screws, bolts, and wrenches to tie everything together.

Charging car battery with the correct terminals

Some Questions Regarding Car Battery And Charging

Why won’t my car battery charge up to 100%?

Most car batteries and chargers are designed to prevent overcharging to avoid harm to you. However, if the battery can not be fully charged, it is also deemed a flaw of the charger itself.

How long do I need to charge my car battery?

The duration to charge your car battery depends upon the type of charger, car batteries, and the condition your battery is in. One simple rule for charging your car battery is to set it overnight.

Can’t I leave the battery in the vehicle and use jumper cables to recharge the vehicle from another car?

You can leave the battery in the vehicle and use jumper cables to recharge, called jump start. However, most of the time, this process is not feasible at all.