new ‘57 T-Bird owner: basic question about battery charging negative clamp location

[willcarter]

Hello all,

As a new owner of a ‘57 Thunderbird, I’m looking forward to learning from you all and contributing where I can. By way of background, I have *no* (literally, zero) prior experience either as a classic car owner or with even basic auto maintenance. I’ve never even changed my own oil before. So, I hope you’ll bear with me as I post a series of newbie questions that will likely seem exceedingly elementary or even dumb to most of you.

Here’s the first one:

I bought an optima 1200 battery charger in preparation for needing to charge and/or maintain the battery while the car is in winter storage. On the few occasions over the years when I’ve had to jump start a battery, I didn’t think about it much: I just connected the jumper cables to both batteries’ positive and negative terminals. Because part of my motivation for getting the T-Bird is that I wanted to learn basic auto maintenance, I decided to actually read the instruction manual for the optima charger. The instructions say to connect the positive clamp of the charger to the positive battery terminal and then to connect the negative clamp to the car’s chassis, *not* to the battery’s negative terminal. Fair enough, I thought: but my question was (and is): *where exactly* on the chassis should I connect it? I called optima to ask this very question, and they were exceedingly unhelpful. So, I put the question to you all:

If you use a battery charger/maintainer and if you do not connect the negative clamp to the battery’s negative terminal, where exactly do you clamp the negative clamp on your ‘57 T-Bird? (Note: saying “clamp it to the Smith-Jones reverse manifold bolt” or whatever won’t be helpful to me: remember, I know nothing about car maintenance and can’t yet identify parts by name. I want to learn those things, but don’t know them yet). I now know - at the cost of a tiny bit of paint - that the most logical place on the chassis (I.e., the frame of the car under the hood adjacent to the battery) won’t work, because I got an error message on the optima charger when I connected it there. I did know somewhere in the recesses of my brain that it can’t be on a painted surface, but I forgot...

So: where exactly in the engine bay of your ‘57 T-Bird do you personally connect the negative clamp of your battery charger? I’ve identified a couple of possible places within reach of the cable: (1) the silver-colored bare metal receptacle for the catches/latches for the hood, shown below and to the immediate left of the battery compartment in the attached (sideways) picture and (2) the black metal screw protruding from the car’s frame (on the “firewall”?) toward and adjacent to the battery, shown to the immediate left of the battery compartment in the attached picture. But I have no idea if those are the proper places. (Also: I assume, but do not know, that I should not use any of the screws of the posts holding the battery tray, since the goal is apparently to get the negative clamp as far away from the battery as possible in case of a spark?)

Any guidance is appreciated. And sorry for the newbie question: please be gentle!

Thanks,

William

[JimCunn]

Connect it to the battery terminal and don't worry about it.

Do not do that on a modern car without disconnecting the battery terminals, but it is OK on these.

[willcarter]

Thanks for your quick reply, Jim! Much obliged.

[T-Bird Bob]

Hello Will,
Welcome and congratulations to the best way of entering the hobby! (It might not be the best though. I started with 1965 Mustang where explanations, documentations end parts are abundant everywhere - for the T-bird a little less)

I think this forum is good to ask noob questions, and nobody will attack or insult you for being a beginner.

Here is my take on the battery charging: I also use the battery clamps, but the reason is I disconnect the battery when the car is parked and charging. The reason is that this might prevent your car from catching fire when you are not there. Remember: This car has very few fuses and the cable insulation is probably 60 years old.

The reason everybody proposes to connect the negative clamp to the chassis is that a battery charging might release some hydrogen gas which is flammable. when connecting or disconnecting a charger there might be sparks. When the contact is on the chassis, those sparks are away from the battery and no explosion will occur.
I never experienced hydrogen gas from batteries, but if you are concerned, blow on you battery. That will disperse any gas cloud easily and the explosion limit will not be reached.

Good luck!

Bob

[willcarter]

Thanks, Bob! I appreciate your response.

[ICON 1956]

Welcome to our forum Will, to start first the battery you are showing C50-XHD is the WRONG battery for the car, You have a gap showing the battery clamp the battery you should be using from interstate is 29NF-VHD.If your worried about gases coming from a acid base battery there is another option. Antique Auto Battery is still in business now called Jim's Batteries phone number 800-426-7580 or 330-480-0755. These batteries have no acid these are electric charged and are the exact copies of the battery that come with the year of car. but these cost around $300.00... https://www.batterycentralmall.com/Batt ... cript.html
https://www.interstatebatteries.com/pro ... l-standard
Second. I order to understand your NEW car you will need these Manuals, It is imperative that you read and understand how these 60 plus years autos work.
You can obtain these Manuals from Jim Osborn reproductions 770-962-7556
1957 Shop Manual
1957 Wiring Wiring Diagram Manual MP0117
1957 Body/Trim Sealant Assembly Manual AM 0092
1957 Electrical Assembly Manual AM0094
I hope I haven't over burden you with these Manuals BUT you need these to educate you to understand these cars are very old and need attention to keep them on the road.

[paul2748]

Follow the directions on the charger. The negative clamp can be attached to any metal piece on the engine or chassis. Make sure that there is no paint on the part you connect the clamp to.. As far as the battery you have, don't worry about it being the "correct" one. Worry about this only if you are going for concours judging. The battery hold down you have is for the optional battery, not the standard one so that is why it is bigger than the battery. Replacement batteries for the optional battery are not available (so I understand) unless you go for the super-duper repro ones.

I always disconnect the regular cables before charging a battery

Good luck with and enjoy your TBird -they are a fun car to drive

[willcarter]

Thanks for the further input! I may have some follow-ups after reading the additional posts.

I did charge the battery successfully today (well, no explosions plus it charged to 100%, so I consider that “successful”!)

I do have the shop manual: it came with the car. It’s still way above my head in terms of actually doing anything from it, but I’ve at least started reading it to initially familiarize myself with the names of parts and terminology...