Hello,

Swictehd out the battery terminals and negative (red) is turning brown and black one is not.

What could be causing this?

Thanks

 

um...negative is black not red

 

Red is Positive, Black is Negative. Edit: lol ^ beat me to it.

(hope you didn't wire them up backwards, that will lead to an entirely different problem)

Changing of color on battery terminals could be caused by oxidation or corrosion.

I've heard old timers pour Coke (or a similar carbonated beverage) over the terminals, let it set a while & wash off with clean water.

Never tried it myself, but I have those little red & green felt rings (that are supposed to prevent corrosion) installed under my battery terminals. I haven't seen any corrosion on mine.

 

Clean the terminals with a paste of baking soda and water.Brush it on and let sit for a couple minutes , then rinse with water.

 

The fact that the red one (which should be positive) is turning brown, sounds like you are overheating the cable, causing the cable's sheathing to overheat/burn/melt, which could cause it to discolor.

This could be happening for a couple of reasons, one, you placed the positive wire (red) on the negative terminal and the negative wire (black) on the positive terminal, which would cause all sorts of over loading/shorting problems and possibly fry your entire electrical system.

The other reason this could be happening is you have WAY too much draw (overloading) on that battery (i.e. you have an amp, offroading lights, and a bunch of other stuff wired directly to it and constantly running).

I'm really hoping its the later of the two...because in all honesty if you can't tell the positive wire from the negative wire, you shouldn't be doing any work on your truck...

 

 

Bad Connections are causing part of the problem. Check all the battery cable connections, battery end and where they go.
Over Charging can be part of it - have the battery and alternator checked at the local auto store.

1st thing to do:
Clean up the outside as suggested with Baking Soda.
Take off both cables and clean the posts with a terminal cleaner.
Clean both cable ends with an internal cleaner.
Apply a good quality anti-corrosion battery terminal paste all over the connection.
Keep an eye in it for a while to see if more corrosion forms.
2nd:
Get the system check ing for over-charging.

If the problem continues and the system is working OK then start checking all of your connections in the battery electrical system especially the grounding system. You did say the black was OK but sometimes a bad ground can manifest itself in other places.

Luck