How to Clean Leaking Batteries in a Flashlight
Potassium hydroxide, a strong base, can leak from alkaline batteries inside your flashlight---even solidifying the batteries to the inner wall. To fix it yourself, the best strategy is to neutralize the leaked substance and liquefy it, thus breaking any adhesion. You'd generally use acid on an alkaline battery and a base on an acid battery.
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Things You'll Need
- Sodium bicarbonate
- Lemon juice
- Vinegar
- Cotton swabs
- Paper towels
- Old toothbrush
- Pencil eraser
Instructions
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1
Find a well-ventilated place to work. Consider gloves and eyewear as well.
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2
Add vinegar or lemon juice to an alkaline battery. Add a high-concentration mixture of baking soda in water to an acid battery. White powder is likely acid, while a grey stain is likely alkaline. To avoid flooding it, you may want to pour a little in, let it neutralize for awhile, and then pour it out after it has lost its strength. Then pour a little more in, and so on. You can also apply the solution with cotton swabs.
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3
Pour the solution down the drain, being careful not to hit any stainless steel that might superficially stain on contact. Remove the batteries.
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4
Clean out the mess with cotton swabs, paper towels or an old toothbrush, using the solution you added in Step 2 to remove more and more of the stain.
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5
Use cola on paper towels or cotton swabs to clean the flashlight's battery contacts. Fine sandpaper also works. Use a pencil eraser on white residue.
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Tips & Warnings
Inspect rarely-used flashlights every six months for battery corrosion. Replace dead batteries at once, since they are the mostly likely to leak.
Mag will replace your Mag Lite flashlight for free if the leak was from one of a list of certain batteries.
Throw the leaky batteries out with the regular trash. They are designed not to be toxic to ground water.
Make sure the flashlight is completely dry before adding new batteries.
Don't mix batteries in the future, since the remedy above requires two leaking batteries to be of the same type.
References
Resources
- Photo Credit flashlight image by Wayne Abraham from Fotolia.com
