Great Balls 'o Fire

"Do I still have eyebrows?" -me

As I dissected the E-bug it became very obvious to me that the car was only driven and not "maintained". At least not the electric-drive portion. Dry batteries, non-functional instruments, and some questionable segments of wiring and that wasn't all.

The charger needed adjustments to properly charge the new batteries I had finally installed. I still wasn't sure that I had set it right or even if the charger was working properly. I opened the trunk and noticed a wetness on top of the charger. I looked up and noticed that the trunk vent wasn't properly plugged and that the charger lives right beneath it. Shhhhhhh!!!t. But it's all puddled on top and none has gone into the charger which is not weather proof. So I mopped it up and vowed to fix the vent.

A couple of days later I'm convinced that the charger isn't shutting off after finishing the charge like it should. No wonder. Water probably got into it at some point in the last 2 years before I owned it. After changing some settings, I plugged the car in to see if things work right. Nothing. I didn't hear the sound of the cooling fans spooling up. I pop the trunk and see the power breaker is off. Well I must have left it that way while making adjustments. I flipped it on.

For a brief second I heard a zzzzzZZZZZZZZTTT and saw a white light inside. I didn't dare touch it for fear of shock and then a ka-POW! and a hot, white ball flew out at me. Sniff....wow. So that's what plasma smells like.

The freaky thing? The charger still worked. It still won't turn off automatically though. It's an unknown quantity so I'm done with it. The next day I started researching replacement battery chargers.