Ventilation Hose in Battery Compartment

I replaced the factory Fiam with a Braille B3121 (sealed) battery. Note the manual states that you should only use " replacement batteries equipped with a ventilation hose." How vital is this?? Is it advisable to just plug the end of the ventilation hose, as the Braille doesn't have ventilation opening that I can find.

 

If your battery is sealed you would not need the vent.

You could just plug it with a golf tee.

 

I have a sealed dry cell battery in my car. Just wire tie the hose out of the way. You don't even really need to plug it. I think on my car I just folded it over on itself. I might have put a plug in there. If you pull the wire tie enough, it will pinch off the hose.

Ray

 

That's what I was thinking. Thanks guys.

The golf tee is innovative. I"ve got a few old ear plugs around. I think I'm going to pinch a piece from an old foam ear plug and stuff it in the plug.

 

I disagree. My buddy has a Porsche Carerra GT. Battery is sealed and in a compartment in the passenger seat area. It is also vented. The batter blew up the other day when he started it. Carbon fiber everywhere but fortunately he was not injured. Porsche now says the vent was blocked, to no fault of their own, and refuses to do anything about it. I don't know how a sealed battery might leak gasses but when they say to vent it you had better do so.

 

Sealed batteries don't leak gasses and don't vent.

Your friend was obviously dealing with a different issue.

I can refer a lawyer in his area if he considers one!

 

Sealed batteries do produce gasses and do need venting. The only thing that is sealed about them is there are no caps to add water.

Not venting the battery is asking for serious trouble. It is producing hydrogen in an area where electrical components are operating. Just use the correct battery which is designed for interior use and has a hose hook up to the venting system they all have.

 

That's good to know eventhough I don't have one.

 

If you look carefully at the Braille battery website they indicate that the Braille AGM sealed batteries do have a special vent. The AGM batteries will produce some gas when being charged/overcharged. The vent is not obvious and is also designed to keep moisture out so as not to contaminate the interior of the battery.

I don't think that you can attach the Ferrari rubber hose to the Braille vent. I don't think that very much gas is produced, but I am not sure about this.

I recently replaced my battery and did quite a bit of research. I ended up with a no maintenance LA battery with a vent and connected the Ferrari rubber hose.

(Rifledriver is right again)

 

Maybe this is what happened to h00kem's friend's car.

 

Maybe so. Hydrogen gas is flammable!

 

What i`ve been told as well. Be sure that the hose work as intended or you can blow up your car !

 

Amen Rifledriver!

 

Porsche says they do. Save the lawyers number for yourself because if you block the vents for the battery you may end up in the same position he is now in. The question at hand in his case is whether the blockage in the vent was caused by Porsche or somehow my him. Hard to believe it was him given he had never even opened the battery compartment and he isn't a golfer! Go forth and Vent!

 

That's my exact point.

Do you understand products liability?

 

Is the venting need also true with the Odyssey batteries? Don't flame me for asking - I don't recall seeing any vent attachment point on the battery, I know that several F-Chat guys have used them (even had to fabricate various means of securing the battery because it is smaller than stock) and so far I've not heard of any explosions. I acknowledge that may be luck rather than because it's not necessary. If someone has knowledge yes or no about these batteries specifically, I would be grateful for the non-flammatory guidance. I believe others will also benefit because Odyssey batteries have been installed by quite a few other members.

 

I do not know about the Odyssey. SkidKid would though.

However, the Interstate MTP-91 I put in did have a vent pipe and it comes with a vent tube which was a simple connection to the car vent tube (you have to make sure the seller gives you that tube, however).

I was surprised that a "sealed" battery would require a vent. Surprise to me.

 

I have the Odyssey 925 in my car. It's a sealed dry cell battery. As long as the battery is operating correctly and not over heating or anything strange, then there is zero gas from it and as such there is no need to vent anything. I can't speak for other brands of batteries, but at least with Odyssey it's totally fume free according to the company.

Ray

 

I think it depends on the definition of "sealed" in relation to the battery. There are batteries on the market which do not allow you to open them up to add water, etc. but in some cases those batteries (even though they are "sealed" as far as the end user is concerned) still produce some fumes. In the case of a totally enclosed dry cell battery, it doesn't produce any more gas than the batteries in your flashlight for example (unless of course it bursts open or something).

Ray

 

Now this explanation is interesting.

I assumed that if the battery were "sealed" that was it but the dry cell analogy makes good sense.

Is that Odyssey about 20 +/- lbs lighter than the OEM?

 

Rifledriver is da' man!

 

Hey Greg,

Yes, it's smaller and considerably lighter than the stock battery. I had very good success with an Odyssey battery in one of my motorcycles, so I figured I'd give it a try in the car after hearing the endorsements from others.

Hey Ray Johns - thanks for the information about the battery; one less thing to worry about!

Brian

 

here's the information I have on the weights:

925 battery weight is 23.52 lbs
FIAMM stock lead acid battery weighs 46.3 lbs

total weight savings of 22.78 lbs.

http://www.ferrarichat.com/forum/showthread.php?t=121500

Ray

 

Unable to find any info on Braille's website regarding a vent. I'll try and contact them on Monday and see if I can get more info on the vent.

I'm pretty sure I'm gonna er on the side of caution and get a new battery. This guy named Murphy has this law that I always seems to affect me in the worst of ways. I would be THAT ONE who got the "sealed" battery that was produced in a run of batteries that contained 2% more lead thus causing ONLY my battery to be slightly more susceptible to producing higher levels of fumes than an ordinary Braile. LOL. I type in jest but no really, I would be THAT GUY.

I think I saw Interstate MPT-91 in an earlier post. The way they side barred the ventilation blurb gives me pause although I can't find any occurrences of an explosion I can't risk it with my run of luck the past year.

..and to think I checked the thread the other day thinking it could be resolved by just plugging the hose.

 

The Interstate is an MTP-91. There is a drain hose available from Interstate, but you have to make sure the seller gives that to you.

It effortlessly connects to the OEM drain tube.