2000 monte SS , Car normally sits long periods of time in the winter and there must be a battery strain with the car amps I have installed , This has been going on for years when I stopped driving it in the winter . This past summer I put a brand new battery and started up like nothing after 3 weeks of not driving it but it wasn't cold yet , So I let it go a little longer , Was about 4 weeks since last start and just tried today and as soon as I turned the key got a poof bang from upfront around engine one crank sound and went quite with a big puff of smoke from front , Tried a second time and all light work had one crank but not enough to start , Left it alone , Pooped the hood , Couldn't really see where the smoke came from . The smoke went away fast . Didn't want to jump it with our new car incase something blew . Going to call AAA with my membership and have it pushed outside garage and see what they can do . But what could have happened . Starter blow ? A solenoid ? Spark plug ? Would it be dangerous to jumpstart ? Didn't really smell like anything and smells gone fast .
Really strange , never heard or seen this in 23 years since owning the car . AAA should know something . Hopefully nothing damaged . If I can get it going will take it out, drive it for an hour and then park it and disconnect the battery this time for winter .

 

Id bet it was from the engine itself. Cranking on a low battery (combined with another issue like a leaky injector or leaky fpr) is the primary cause of exploding intake manifolds on 3800s. Perhaps you got lucky and the intake held up (forcing it out the intake), but maybe not - Id take a real close look. Even if it did go out the intake it probably wrecked the map and maf sensors.

Aftermarket amps aside (you could easily pull the fuse to the power wire feeding them if they're truly causing parasitic drain), I wouldnt let any modern car sit for 4 weeks without starting. Id either get a battery maintainer on there or pull the battery completely.

 

The main thing is , Is it safe to get jumped by AAA ? I don't believe there was anything leaking and the car was running great after a got a new battery in the summer . The best its run in years . Changed all the fluids added some seafoam in gas tank , really helped clean out the injectors . This is the first time anything like this ever happened , usually the battery is just dead if left for a long time in the cold . A jump and no problems . All the light come on right now but not messing with it till AAA comes out not till Monday .

 

No one here can tell you that as no one knows what actually happened. Id get someone who knows cars to get in there with a flashlight and take a close look at the starter, primary wiring, and intake manifold/ fuel rail.


Id just strongly suggest against cranking any NA 3800 on a low battery - plenty of examples of intake explosions out there. The leaking items I mentioned aren't leaking externally, they leak internally and often aren't known by the owner.

 

Had triple A come out , look it over and attempted to jump it , Was really hard to get a signal . no light were coming at at all , something has shorted out . Finally started and had to rev it pretty high or it would die , started it again and same thing , would not idle , Never had that happen on this car , Engine sounded strong but wound not stay on . no smoke this time anywhere , so whatever blew needs to be replaced . (if it cracked the block its definitely a goner) All the intake manifold stuff is like 3 years old , I replaced about everything . Have to get it towed after Christmas and see what they say and if its worth fixing . The AAA guy offered me $1k , if its going to cost 1K+ to fix I might have to take him up on his offer , The whole undercarriage is rotted and all brake lines need to be replaced , front brakes shot , Also sticker is due at $151 Illinois is crazy priced . hate paying that for a car I drive 4 months out of the year .

 

Finally the deepfreeze is over here in Chicago and car has just been sitting , I'm sure the battery is done now , I bought it last year from Walmart , Bad choice but well anyway should I pull the battery and take it to Walmart for a exchange with the warranty ? That way when i get it towed to the repair shop they have a freshly charged battery to work with . Might save me a little on labor , Do I install it back in or let them do it ? There is a short somewhere and possibly blown fuses as when the AAA guy was trying to jump it it was all whacky and he couldn't get a proper charge , He took the i think positive cable to hook up to the engine frame and we were getting nothing , But his voltage gadget was saying the battery was putting out about 12 volts . The dome light would not come on but the headlights worked at that time and it did start but would not idle and **** off if you didn't keep your foot on the gas revving pretty hard . Now its been over a month in deep freeze weather so that battery got to be shot . I had most of the intake gaskets and all kind of engine stuff replaced . He thinks its the starter solenoid that burned and caused the puff of smoke . Would the car turn over and start if that blew ? Anyhow I'm not doing anything other then taking out the battery if that helps the labor costs . Plus they would want to make me buy a new battery if I brought a dead one .

 

Never bought a Walmart battery, but Id be really susprised if they just handed you a brand new free battery just because you think/say it's bad. They really should charge it and perform a load test to confirm (unless the case burst or something obvious). Maybe you'll get lucky, but that sure would be an awful business practice. Otherwise you'd get a bunch of people coming in the day before the warranty was up to get a new one on their word that it was bad.


If the solenoid was destroyed - no. But honestly it doesn't really matter much, as someone needs to go through and diagnose it properly.

Id leave the whole thing as is and take it in. You're not going to save any money by doing 5 minutes of battery removal labor - you're already into it for a full electrical diagnostic anyways, so Id really doubt they'll charge you extra labor for battery removal.

I definitely wouldn't connect a new battery until a pro looks at it - something is cooked pretty bad if it has 0 voltage delta from + to chassis.

 

Just curious.. Where are you in Chicago?

 

Way out by Elgin . Town called Pingree Grove .

 

Well there is a long story about Walmart and them blowing the fuses of my car stereo head unit which ended up costing me $100 , I bought this battery last year . There going to replace it . Nothing to do with bad business practice . They sell crappy battery's and don't even now how to install one properly . Don't know where you came up with the assumption I'm going to return the battery just before the warrant expired . If people did that I would tell them to get lost . Its a new battery and they owe me $100 . Store manager has it on record .