Topic: battery corrsion..travel question

[astrobeck]

Happy New Year to all.

My first question of the year is...
Does battery corrosion actually
"travel" along wires, or does it just ooze, or drain/seep along the wires due to gravity?

I have had the impression that corrosion eats along the wires like Pac-man. But is this really the case or is it more like a bead of sweat that crawls down your elbow after an afternoon of raking leaves in the yard?

I've been puzzled by this for some time, and just now thought of it again while taking the bottom battery compartment plate off my Nikon N2000 to find corrosion...

thanks to all!

[Pete_R]

Yes it can travel along wires. Nothing to do with gravity.

[Francois]

It has everything to do with capillarity.
And it's not just battery juice that does it. Leaky capacitors are notorious for doing that in most electronics. Liquids can creep in the most unexpected places.

[astrobeck]

I wondered about the capacitors...because one of my disposable cameras that I had used to reload and taken the battery out to avoid the shock had a ton of corrosion. It had "wicked" up to the flash! Quite impressive.. I threw it in the trash yesterday.

[Francois]

It's funny because electronics guys have a chart of "corrosiveness" according to the component.

5th position: Nickel Cadnium batteries
4th position: Alkaline Batteries
3rd position: Varta batteries found on old computer motherboards (they all leaked their guts and contained a lot of liquid).
2nd position: Leaky Capacitors
1st position: Lithium batteries. When they leak, they can corrode almost anything!