How To: Clean your Battery Terminals

[LeSabre in Buffalo]

When poking around in the engine bay, I noticed the positive battery terminal had a lot of corrosion built up. So I disassembled and cleaned both terminals. This is a good thing to do when you get a new battery, or when looking for a half-hour project.

Here's how, at least for 92-99's.

Materials:

5/16" wrench (my terminals were, yours might vary)
Razor blade or knife
Baking soda
Water
Cup
Old toothbrush
Dielectric grease
Gloves
Clean rag

Procedure:
1. Mix the baking soda and water in a 3:1 ratio. I used 3 tbsp baking soda and 1 tbsp water to make a thick paste.
2. Pop the hood, and disconnect the battery. Put on your gloves at this point, as battery acid can burn skin.
3. Make 2 cuts in the insulation 180* apart so you can get the bolt holding the cables to the battery out.
4. Wiggle the bolt holding the cables to the battery out. This will require some finessing the rubber insulation, but the cuts you made will make things go much easier.
5. Once the bolt is free, pull apart the positive terminal. You will get two cable ends when you do so.
6. Apply the baking soda paste to the exposed surfaces of the cable ends and the bolt. Anywhere you find acid buildup, apply the paste. It will fizz and bubble as it neutralizes the acid. Some trippy colors will show up, too.
7. Scrub the areas you applied paste to with the toothbrush.
8. Rinse well with water.
9. Repeat steps 6-8 as needed. You should see clean metal when you're done.
10. Rinse everything well, including the areas now covered by rinse water from the above steps.
11. Dry everything off with the rag.
12. Liberally apply dielectric grease to the areas you cleaned to keep them clean.
13. Reassemble the battery terminals.
14. Enjoy knowing your battery cables are clean and tightly secured to the battery!

Sorry, no pics, as I forgot my camera.

This netted me brighter interior lights so far. Will see what else later on this afternoon running errands.

[Bugsi]

Also beware that the corrosion on the positive cable usually wicks on down the length of the positive cable. The only way to really tell if you have a totally corroded cable or not is to take a razorblade and slit the insulation a few inches along its lenght, peel it back, and take a look. If you have fresh uncorroded copper, wrap electrical tape around the insulation where you slit it, and carry on. If the cable is found to be corroded along its length, then you're looking at replacing the cable. *IN GENERAL* it is better to get the correct factory cable, it isn't so easy to just buy a proper aftermarket cable at Pep Boys or something.