Lately, I've noticed a lot of acid on top of my truck battery. It's a 2005 Tacoma. Both the battery and alternator are about a year old. I even used those little felt pads and greases the terminals.
Could this be as simple as a bad ground or is the battery getting overcharged by a failing regulator? Or something else?
Battery is bad or it's being overcharged, my best guesses.
The smart-assed answer here is too much spicy foods.
Was it a re-manufactured alternator or a genuine Toyota part? If it was a reman, I also lean towards overcharging. Maybe feel it after you drive around a bit, it should be hot if it is overcharging. Wear gloves, but you knew that already.
In reply to Brett_Murphy:
Remanufactured.
actual acid or corrosion on the terminals?
Check voltage with engine running, suspect bad voltage regulator if it's over 14.5 volts.
BrokenYugo wrote: Check voltage with engine running, suspect bad voltage regulator if it's over 14.5 volts.
This. And don't just check it at idle. Run the RPM's up a little and see if it changes.
jfryjfry wrote: actual acid or corrosion on the terminals?
Sorry, corrosion at the terminals and the clamp.
Is it more prevalent on the negative or positive side?
Cracked case at the posts? This happened with the old battery in my Dakota. I couldn't fault the thing though, because the battery was well over 10 years old! And it still held a charge! 
I had something similar, also on a Tacoma. In my case I found a bunch of acid had run down onto the chassis below the battery on my 6-month old truck :(. Turned out the battery case was cracked. I dumped a bunch of baking soda on the spill and washed it off with water, but there was forever some damage done.
To actually contribute something useful to your issue, maybe they overfilled the battery, or your driving style pulls a lot of Gs, causing the acid to ride up and get out its poorly-constructed top seals. Related to above, if you get any acid on the chassis (or even yourself) use baking soda to neutralize it.
Every Toyota I've owned has this issue. My '98 Camry and my '06 RAV4 seem to corrode at the terminals at an alarming rate. None of my other vehicles have this issue. I wonder if it's the metal composition of the terminals themselves?
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