I tried to give my friend's Mazda a jump from my E30 M3, which led to a horrific fireworks show in his engine bay, and a trip to the store for new fuses. None of us realized the BMW battery cables were colored differently from the norm. Thus we learned that the colors red and black should not be trusted; it's safest to look for the positive and negative symbols on the terminals.
But why is this so?
2007-03-28 10:12:13 · 5 answers · asked by thephonicsmonkey 2 in Cars & Transportation ➔ Car Makes ➔ BMW
Um, well... so you know which cable is negative and which is positive.
2007-03-31 08:57:34 · answer #1 · answered by gregksinger 2 · 0⤊ 2⤋
BMWs (and a few other European makes) use black for hot/positive, and brown (which can be mistaken for dirty, faded red) for negative.
Why? Because black is for hot wires (the same as house wiring), and brown is for frame ground (which might be different than battery negative in some vehicles).
Yes, very confusing. Not a good idea. BMW should have at least put a red band around the battery clamp. But that's the way it is.
2015-01-12 10:01:49 · answer #2 · answered by Donald B 2 · 0⤊ 0⤋
Dude...Cables come in both colors. This is why they put POS and NEG on the battery posts. You go by color, you're begging for a hurting.
2007-03-31 16:51:22 · answer #3 · answered by schizophreniabeatsdiningalone 5 · 0⤊ 2⤋
Absolutely Brian, Red is ALWAYS positive and black is ALWAYS negative
2007-03-29 08:04:31 · answer #4 · answered by mojosc 3 · 0⤊ 1⤋
Someone did some after-market work on it.
2007-03-28 10:20:21 · answer #5 · answered by Brian O 1 · 0⤊ 2⤋