In cold weather, automotive batteries are especially prone to discharge due to frequent idling and lots of starts and stops. When a battery charge drops below 12.4 volts, the acid (60%) and water (40%) mixture, known as electrolyte , in the battery separates. The battery acid then reacts with lead plates inside the battery creating a highly explosive hydrogen gas. As the pressure inside the battery increases, the gas is vented to the outside via ventilations openings. In cold weather, the water can also freeze and expand, placing pressure on the battery casing.
There are three possible explanations for battery explosions:
- Gas created cannot be vented fast enough and the cover blows off or the battery explodes
- Gas is vented property and an external spark ignites the fumes released from the battery, which can then back draft and ignite fumes inside the battery, causing it to explode.
- An internal spark ignited fumes inside the battery, leading to an explosion.
Recommended boosting procedure guidelines:
- Avoid boosting or charging a frozen battery. For batteries with removable caps, check for signs of freezing by removing the filler plug situated on top of the cells and look inside for signs of frozen electrolyte. For the newer sealed batteries, check for signs of bulging or cracking.
- Ensure that the booster cable ends NEVER touch each other or a metal surface while a battery is connected to it.
- Ensure that the vehicles NEVER touch against each other.
- Pull the vehicles along side of each other or hood to hood, in a safe location.
- Ensure the vehicles are not close enough to touch during the procedure.
- Turn off all accessories in both vehicles , including the radio.
1) Connect the " + " clamp of the red cable to the " + " terminal on the discharged battery.
2) Connect the clamp on the other end of the red cable to the " + " terminal on the booster battery.
3) Connect the " - " clamp on the black cable to the " - " terminal of the booster battery.
4) Connect the clamp on the other end of the black cable to the vehicle being boosted Ensure it is clamped to a solid, unpainted metallic surface located away from the battery and it's associated fumes .
5) Start the " BOOSTER" vehicle.
6) Start the " DISABLED " vehicle
7) Once the vehicle is started, disconnect the cable clamps in reverse order ( 4,3,2,1, )
Break & Enter in North Kawartha
Peterborough County O.P.P. are investigating several break and enters into cottages along Fire Route #17a in North Kawartha Twp. Police were called yesterday afternoon (15 January 2006) when area residents observed one of the cottages has been entered. A check in the area revealed that two other cottages had been forcibly entered. Police continue to investigate the matter and a Scene of Crime Officer ( S.O.C.O.) has attended the locations for the purpose of attempting to locate any physical evidence that may have been left behind by the culprit(s). If you have any information that may assist this investigation , you are asked to call: The Peterborough County O.P.P. at 1-705-742-0401 or CRIME STOPPERS at 1-800-222- T.I.P.S.
by Gladys Blackburn Wasmund
When my parents [Thomas BLACKBURN and Clara JONES)] moved up to Chamberlain Township in 1918, they bought a 160 acre lot [Lot 2 Concession 3 in Chamberlain Township]. There was just about an acre of land cleared and a small house. Dad had looked at the farm in 1916 when he was up with his first wife, Nellie May McCoy, who took ill and died after they returned to Coe Hill that same year.
There was no stable, so my Dad tied cows to trees at the foot of the hill. He would get up in the morning to find bears and moose sleeping with the cattle, so he had a stable built for them. When he got a herd of cattle built up, he had a better, bigger barn built so he could ship milk to the Dairy (in Kirkland Lake). Then he had a milk house built. It had a concrete tank which we had to keep fresh water to keep eight gallon cans of milk cold. At one end of the milk house, he stored blocks of ice in sawdust. He would put blocks of ice in the tank to help keep the milk cold.
He had some Finlanders cut pulp wood to get the land cleared for growing crops.
I was two days old when a forest fire broke out. A school teacher boarded at our place. He took the train to a Haileybury for a Teachers Convention, but when he got there, there was no Haileybury left.
The T&NO Railroad was built along one side of our place. We would walk up that way to the Post Office to get our mail. The tracks were a short cut. Some folks walked through our place to go to church on Sunday, which was held in the school house. The schoolhouse was on a section of our farm. Some would stop in for dinner rather than walk home to get their dinner, so Mother always had a big dinner every Sunday. We always had a big garden so we grew most stuff for the table.
Dad had three teams of horses, which were used to do farm work in the summer. My two brothers [John and Walter] each took a team to lumber camps in the winter. Once Dad got a horse from a fellow up at Hough Lake, but it was too slow to work with the other horses, so he took it back. The next morning when we got up, the horse was back in the yard - he had walked 25 miles in the dark.
We had a collie dog we called "Watch". Everywhere Dad went, the dog went with him. He was driving through the bush and lost something of the sleigh. "Watch" stayed with it until Dad went back the next morning to get it. Somebody wanted the dog so Dad let him have it but the dog didn't stay there, he came back home. When Dad went to town (Englehart) to get supplies, the dog went with him. He would stay with the wagon or the sleigh while Dad did his business.
There was a gravel pit on the farm. The township and a Construction Company got their gravel there, so we had boarders for a while.
There are just four sisters alive now; Mae McGUIRE in a nursing home in Kirkland Lake, Eva PALMATEER of Tweed, Ont., Alice BOOTH, Etobicoke and myself, Gladys WASMUND of Spruce Corners retirement Home in Apsley, Ont. My brother John died in 1971, my sister, Della DEKKER died in 1996 and brother, Walter, died in 1997.