House Batteries??????

[NHRAF145]

I am new to the motorhome game so go easy on me if I am being silly.

Here's the deal, my 2005 Itasca Meridian 34H house batteries seems to discharge at a rate of about 2.5-3 volts per week. Now I do run the fridge while not plugged in, but is that enough to kill the batteries in 2 weeks? Let me know your thoughts.

Shawn

[NHRAF145]

I am new to the motorhome game so go easy on me if I am being silly.

Here's the deal, my 2005 Itasca Meridian 34H house batteries seems to discharge at a rate of about 2.5-3 volts per week. Now I do run the fridge while not plugged in, but is that enough to kill the batteries in 2 weeks? Let me know your thoughts.

Shawn

[troth]

Shawn, your plaint is not unique or silly. I know in my '04 Brave gasser that I can run just the fridge on propane for 10 days and not really dent the batteries much. But I will say that I seem to see a lot more complaints about loss of battery charge from DP owners than gassers. I don't know why. There are a lot more "parasitic" power drawing things on the new coaches. -Seemingly they're "off", but power, even at milliamp levels, is being drawn by them. Things like the radio in the outside entertainment center, the propane detector, the satellite dish, antenna booster, yadda yadda. Start by checking your battery cell levels and get them up to snuff. You might also try a battery load tester on each; -it's not unheard of to get a new coach with sub-par batteries. Keep us posted on what you find. We're here to help.

[NHRAF145]

Thanks Troth. Thats exactly it, everything seems off and yet they dont seem to hold. I will do some research and see what I can find.

Shawn

[vicsryd]

Shawn,

When storing without shoreline power be sure to:
1. Set the Aux Bat switch in the cockpit to off.
2. Set the Radio Power switch in the cockpit to Aux.
3. Make sure the Inverter is OFF (not Standby or On).
4. Make sure the power panel is OFF.

After I did this the phantom draw on the house batteries dropped to 4 milliamps. At that rate the batts can go a couple of weeks and stay above 10 volts. After a couple of weeks you need to turn the generator and engine over anyway.

Also, see House Battery Charging Problem Solved to make sure your house batteries will charge from the engine alternator.

[NHRAF145]

Thanks John & Vicki,

It appears that my house batteries in fact do charge when either the gen set is runnning, the shorepower is plugged in, or the engine is running.

I like to leave the refrigerator on all of the time and I believe that that is probably part of my problem. I have been plugging in shore power during the week and I use my motorhome every weekend. Thanks for the input.

Shawn

[Lucky13]

Shawn,
I'm watching this with interest. We've made one trip in our 2005 Meridian 36G and the batteries were a real problem, all 3 House batt. had dead cells. Upon my return all three batt. were replaced under warranty with SRM29. There is a tread that says the group 31 that came in the Winnebago's DP had a design flaw and are being replaced with SRM29 (group 29). Interstate Batt. people told me that the group 31's were designed for Winn. only, and they don't sell that batt. to anyone else.
I'm leaving this week for 2 weeks which will include dry camping, so I'm going to test these new ones pretty good. I also am questioning the 2 coach batt. which don't seem to be holding up very well. There are several threads that address this also, the bottom line seems to be there is substantial parasitic draw and the fix is to buy a "battery minder" for these two batt. and live with it. I'm not at the point to buy into that yet, time and experience will tell.
Jim

[NHRAF145]

Well, this thread is 4 months older.....and my problem is much worse!!!!

We just came back from a 2 week trip to Florida. The day before we left I noticed the batteries were run down to about 9.2 volts. I had assumed that my girlfriend while cleaning had been running many of the accessories and never turned on the generator. Not the case. Heres what I found.

-After I noticed the batteries were low, I tried to cycle the gennie. Wouldn't start. Started coach, relay tripped and the House batteries were being charged by the alternator. Gennie started, let the charger do its thing and then left it over night.
-The next morning we left for florida. When I got to Florida we were in a wedding and stayed in a hotel for the first week. After 2 days I went out to the coach and the batteries were back down to 8.5 volts. Did the same thing as above. This was repeated every day basically for the rest of the week.
-The second week was spent in Fort Wilderness with a 50 amp service, no problem. House batteries don't matter in that case.
-When we left we drove, 1100 miles and 17 hours. I parked the rig in the garage friday night and purposely did not supply shore power. 13.1v friday night.......8.8v sat morning. Started investigating how things were charging. The alternator, and the charger are providing 13.5-14.2 volts when the coach is running, plugged into shore power or the gennie is running.
-What I found was (1) battery that was extemely low on water. I filled it back up and proceed to go racing all weekend. I typically run the gennie all weekend at the races.
-When I came home sunday night I again parked the coach with no shore power. I had 13.3v when I shut down, this evening(monday night) I went out and checked and again had 8.7v.
Again, I have done some more investigation and I have removed one of the batteries from the series. One which seemed to be discharging at a rate of about .2v per hour. Currently I have 2 house batteries in use and I will again check my voltage tomorrow night.

Any info that anyone can pass along in relation to this problem would be great. I do understand that there have been numerous problems with the batteries on the DP's and I am curious to hear what everyones experiences have been.

Thanks in advance, Shawn

[Rick Buddrus]

Shawn,

Get a Hydrometer and check EVERY cell in all your batteries. Since one was discovered to be very low on water I suspect you may now have multiple cells that are bad.

[troth]

<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-title">quote:</div><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-content">What I found was (1) battery that was extemely low on water. I filled it back up and proceed to go racing all weekend. </div></BLOCKQUOTE>
Bingo! Sometimes batteries recover from being used with low water, but it's been my experience that if they've had considerable use and multiple charging events while low on water, the battery basically is dying and will not revive. A good way to test it's capability is a battery load tester, applied after the battery has been filled with water, charged overnite, then at rest for 4 hours.

[kenbt]

Yes, especially if you have the four door model...even though its on propane, the electronics in the circuit board do use a bit of amps to run...you can see the pull on your OnePlace meter showning amps being drawn with use of items

[MrTransistor]

Hi NHRAF145,
Remember that if the refrigerator is set to ˜AU' and the inverter is on, it will draw 20 to 30 Amps. from the House batteries when cooling. To ensure that the refrigerator is using propane, either turn the inverter off or set the refrigerator to ˜LP'. Also, if your batteries have been discharged to a voltage below 10 Volts, they will probably never recover. RV/Marine lead acid batteries hate being discharged more than about 50%. Their life is shortened exponentially as the depth of discharge increases. Having 400 Amp. Hours worth of batteries doesn't mean you can use all 400 all the time. 400 Amp. Hours equates to a practical 100 Amp. Hours discharge / recharge for 1000 cycles. As the depth of discharge increase, the number of cycles decreases at a higher rate i.e. 50% may yield 400 cycles and 75% could be as low as 200 cycles. The charts show that at 100% discharge, the battery life may only be 20 cycles. Also remember that battery life endpoint is normally considered to be that point at which the battery still has 80% of its new or rated Amp. Hour capacity. A good place to familiarize yourself with battery technology is http://www.trojan-attery.com/Tech-Su...intenance.aspx

[MrTransistor]

Hi NHRAF145,
Sorry, a 'b' got dropped from the link. It should be http://www.trojan-battery.com/Tech-S...intenance.aspx

[dstinch]

do yourself a favor,install a 125 watt solar panel and never worry about your batt. again. also if batt won't hold a charge overnite replace all batt.

[NHRAF145]

Thanks all. Spoke to the dealer and they did acknowledge that the "Interstate Workaholic Group 31" batteries were a problem. They have been since discontinued.

Winnie is replacing all 3 of my house batteries under warranty with Group 29 batteries.

Thanks for all of the input.

Shawn

[Beabop]

Shawn ,battery drawdown on the 2004/2005 Journey/Meredian is a known problem. There have been many threads on it.The house batteries work the slides/elec steps/awnings etc. Most of us keep a trickle charger(batter minder) on our batteries when on shore power to keep the batteries up. If you still have the problem after you get your new ones, you may want to go that route. Good Luck

[NHRAF145]

Beabop......If I am plugged into shore power then my charger/inverter is actively managing the status of the batteries. I wouldn't think I would need the battery minder in that case. Curious if I am missing something.

As for the batteries, the dealer dropped 3 new ones off at my house today!!! Now thats what I call service, my dealer has been absolutely phenomenal on the few problems I have had.

Anyway, they replaced the 3 group31's, with 3 group 29's. They are currently taking a slight charge from the charger and tomorrow morning I will unplug the charger and see how they hold up through the day.

Thanks again for the input.

Shawn

[MrTransistor]

Hi NHRAF145,
If your coach is wired and working as ours, (and per the schematics) the charger/inverter should only be charging the coach batteries. If you have a defective tie solenoid (welded contacts, stuck closed or permanently energized) then the scenario you describe of the charger/inverter managing 'all' of the batteries would be true. Seems nice at first until a power failure leaves you with dead coach ˜and' chassis batteries. We are full timers and leave most things in our RV on all the time including the inverter. Under these circumstances, a power failure or tripped breaker at the pedestal would leave us dead in the water in three or four days in the summer and probably 24 hours in the winter (furnace fans pull about 10 Amps.). Hence the reason for installing the Energy Command 30.

If your charger really isn't charging your chassis batteries then some other device wired in would be the answer. A battery minder of course requires a connection to 120 VAC that would only be applied when connected to shore power or the generator is running i.e. before the inverter. An Echo~Charge is just three connections at the batteries or the tie solenoid and utilizes the existing coach charging system to keep the chassis batteries topped off.

Currently, about every week or so, I activate the Battery Boost switch for a couple of hours to energize the tie relay to top off the chassis batteries. This is a minor inconvenience that will be solved with the addition of an Echo~Charge. I have an Echo~Charge on order.

Today, I'm replacing the stock Transfer Switch with something more intelligent. Automated Eng. Corp. out of Tampa, FL has a microprocessor controlled switch that pre-qualifies pedestal power and will not connect if faults are detected. This is great since the worst fault, an open Neutral on a 50 Amp. circuit, isn't easy to discover before hand and can wipe out lots of expensive toys in your RV. The 10040A AECS/ESP isn't cheap but if it saves one TV set or one computer, I figure I'm ahead.

[NHRAF145]

Thanks for the info Mr. Transitor, I may have a been a bit misleading. I meant "all" of the house batteries. My chassis batteries have been fine and seem to be holding upi well.

Shawn