So today my car battery died, couldn’t even be revived with a jump. I was able to walk to an auto store to get tools and a new battery (damn that mfer was heavier than I expected). I had never had to replace my own car battery before.
I screwed the fastener nuts the wrong way for like 5 minutes, cut my hand, and ultimately accidentally crossed the positive and negative terminals with a wrench that exploded in sparks. I don’t even know what stopped me from being electrocuted but I didn’t feel a thing.
While I’m happy I was able to take care of it myself and will be able to in the future, I also feel like such a dunce for not knowing wtf I was doing and almost shocking myself
You’d basically have to roll around in salt water for 20 minutes to zap yourself on a car battery – they only put out 12-13 volts DC, but there’s a decent amount of amperage behind that (typically 550+ for cranking a gas engine, though I’ve had batteries that were capable of around 1,000). With car batteries, your two main safety concerns are going to be tools or metal parts (e.g., battery retaining brackets) getting extremely hot if they bridge between positive and ground – and the risk of burn injuries that would come along with that – and the battery just outright exploding and flinging hot sulfuric acid everywhere. The second one is rare, since the battery will usually discharge itself before that point.
Hybrid battery packs – the ones typically stashed under the back seat, not the 12V starter/auxiliary battery that you may find under the hood or in the trunk – are a very different beast, and typically put out closer to 48VDC. Those beefy bastards absolutely can kill you.