Starting problem--troubleshooting help?

[WantaWinnie]

Hi Winnebago owners,

We just picked up our beautiful new 2011 Itasca Sunova 33C two days ago. Drove it out of the RV dealership with everything working fine. Drove to a campground 30 minutes away, registered, and then the motor home would not restart--had to use the battery boost.

Next morning it started fine. Driving it back to the dealer we discovered that the dash AC was turning on and off on its own--would blow cold for a while, then hot, then cold, etc.

The RV dealer said to take it to a Ford dealer, so our 2 day old motor home is now parked at our local Ford truck dealer, where so far they have yet to diagnose the problems. We've called Winnebago and put them in touch with the Ford dealer, but have yet to hear back. Needless to say, we are unhappy campers.

The starting problem seems to occur only after we have been driving for a while and the engine is warm. The AC problem is intermittent.

Do any of you mechanical/electrical gurus out there have any ideas?

[94-Newmar]

Electrical gremlins are certainly no fun especially on a brand new coach. Keep us posted on their findings.

[WantaWinnie]

Well the Ford dealer got us nowhere--after 4 days they gave up and told us to take it to a Winnebago dealer. So we dropped it at the Itasca dealer today. On the way we developed another problem--the rear view monitor would turn on and off randomly.

Is it possible that all the problems are related to one bad ground somewhere? Of course, there is nothing worse than tracing intermittent problems.

Anyway, we now wait to see if the Itasca dealer (our selling dealer) can figure it out. We love the floor plan and are eager to get the coach back so we can start using it!

[bbminn]

hello, we are looking at a sunova 33c. what was the cause / solution for the electric problems??

[YC1]

I bet it was a loose battery cable.

[ga traveler]

If you had a problem with the ecu, starter, switch, or starter circuit, The engine would not start on the house batteries. Your problem has to be in the main battery.
check the positive and negetive connections. Make sure you check the ground strap at the frame.

[WantaWinnie]

Ford ended up replacing the starter. We hope that has fixed the problem. It was an intermittent problem and we haven't used the motorhome enough since the repair to know for sure. Thanks to all who responded.

[ga traveler]

Originally Posted by WantaWinnie

Ford ended up replacing the starter. We hope that has fixed the problem. It was an intermittent problem and we haven't used the motorhome enough since the repair to know for sure. Thanks to all who responded.

Like you, I hope it is fixed. However, if it started every time on house batteries and would not start on chassis battery. I don't see how it could be the starter.

[Hartsie]

I have a 1998 Brave 32' . Tried to start it couple days ago and when I turn on switch I have dash lights and both signal light indicators are on steady and high beam indicator is also on. When I hit start position on switch nothing happens, but all dash lights dim a little. I cleaned all battery conections from battery to starter, charged battery and still the same. I have power at battery cable that connects to starter. I am taking starter to have it checked. The switch on dash to get starting boost from house batteries has never worked, would also like to find out problem with that also. Any help would be greatly appreciated.

[zippo]

I'm sure this is not the answer your looking for. But our 2008 on a Ford chassis when it was new had twice within the first 500 miles it would not start (not even a click) battery boost did help. The Ford dealer never did find the problem. But since then I've never had another problem with it not starting. The only other Ford problem I had was the Tow/Haul mode stopped working at 700 miles. Ford found a pinched wire in the steering column.