On Sun, 25 Mar 2012 17:42:53 -0400, Gary wrote:

On Sat, 24 Mar 2012 10:32:31 -0700, "William Sommerwerck"
wrote:

OK, I will try as you suggest. You said something about watching the
polarity across the output of the charger -- what exactly did you mean?

The plus output of the charger goes to the plus terminal of the battery.

I'm aware of that. I was asking about how the polarity of the AC
output affects how the capacitor should be placed?

I urge you NOT to do this. There is no guarantee this charger will correctly
charge your battery. Find someone knowledgeable to help you. Or pay a
service shop to charge the battery. Or buy a new, working charger.

You're missing the point. Sometimes we play around with old, obsolete
kit, just to see if it'll work.
To cut out a lot of the BS, there is a simple test you can perform.
Set a DMM to the 20VDC range and connect it to the output of the
battery charger. If you get a reading of over 14VDC the charger is
probably good. If you get a reading of a lower voltage, suspect the
charger is bad (unless there is a 6/12 switch). If you get a reading
of 0 VDC, but a reading of 12 -15 VAC, the rectifiers are shorted.

It MIGHT be possible that selenium rectifiers are so leaky that you
would not get a DC reading, but I would doubt it.

PlainBill