Computer turns off when battery installed...

found a spare energy star one, didnt work. pulled the logic board, found water damage directly on the logic board where the battery connector goes in on hte bottom half. cleaned it with alcohol as well as trace water damage from elsewhere and it did not fix the issue....might have to sell it as a parts computer!

@Steve, I see you here with a couple of machines. If you are buying these used or working less than 100% always pull them apart and look for signs of liquid damage prior to applying electric to them. Most liquid damage is not water and has a higher concentration of contaminates in it than tap water. Pure water doesn't conduct electricity or leave residue. The contaminates in water are what conduct electricity and leave residue (which also conducts electricity). Final note: Most damage on laptops, aside from peripheral failure, is caused by liquid damage - directly or from condensation.

ABcellars, thanks a lot, youre post now and in the past have helped my diagnose or atleast figure out where to go with my macbooks next. i like to tinker around with macbooks, usually just broken screens but i got this 2.4ghz with battery, hard drive, 2gb ram and charger for 150. it works perfect as a desktop computer and i can sell it as such and make a little money. i always open these computers, clean them out, reapply the thermal paste and basically make them like new, but the ones i post on here are weird situations that i post after i dont know where to go next (except my personal macbook pro which sucked because i just got it recently, i dont really mess with pros much)

Sounds like you got a good deal. The only reason I made the comment I did is because the postings here give hint that you connected the charger prior to looking for liquid damage. - On this one I would take a jewelers loupe (preferably 20x magnification 10x may work) in a well lit area and look for burn marks on/in the female connections on the battery connecter header/socket on the motherboard. If any are black or corroded, they can be cleaned with a small drill bit or Dremel bit (You can take the board down to the hardware store to get the proper size.) Also look in front of that connecter for discoloration or burning on the board and components there. Many of the connections from that header go to sublevels of the board right in there. You may get lucky and find that cleaning a bad connection solves your problem.

I once had this problem with a 1181 board. Sent it to a shop for repair and when they sent it back the charging battery board was glued inside the socket and the charging function was working well. I don't know what kind of glue they used for repair, must be a conductive glue. I agree with ABCellars that the socket holes should be cleaned but I would try to avoid oversizing the holes using a drill. There should exist a fluid electronic cleaner that could do the job without a modification of the holes size. The connector pins should keep a tight contact inside the holes.