My travel trailers battery has a rancid smell and the wires are always hot when it's plugged into power, Why?

Could be the battery or the charger,


I once had a truck the the voltage regulator would stick. The battery would let of a very acidic smell. I would boil the acid out of the battery, very dangerous.


Take the battery to a parts store, they can test it and it's free. If it checks out good, have someone look at the charging circuit.|||sounds like maybe there is a short in the battery, like the plates have shorted out inside.|||you have a faulty battery dont use it because it can catch fire real quick|||The reason that it smells probably like "rotten-eggs" is because it is being over charged. If you have a short in the wiring (or something touching) it will lead to excessive heat because it's over charging. Almost like NPN transistor type. Extra charging will burn the wiring and cook the Sulfuric Acid out of the battery. Again leading to a "short".|||Rancid smell=sulpheric acid vapor. Probably the battery is being overcharged, either because your charging system has problems, or the battery has a dead cell. unplug it and let it cool down and measure the battery voltage with a voltmeter. Open circuit voltage of a good battery is 12.6 volts. If it's around 10, it has a dead cell. Plug it in and see what voltage it's charging at. Should be 13.6-14.6. More than 14.7 or so and you can boil the water out of the battery. Also, if the charger has no overcharging protection you can ruin the battery just the same.