|
Disappearing power
I am not sure this is the right forum for this question. It is solar related, but it is about our new RV which is not a Winnebago. Still, there are so many experts here that I will try. If I should be on another forum please let me know, but I have been posting here for so long about our Fuse that it feels a bit like home.
We took our new Regency Ultra Brougham out for its second shakedown trip, and the first one since I got the BM installed and felt I could see what was going on. On our first trip we found ourselves the first morning after arrival with an almost dead set of BB batteries and on our second morning we had 2 completely dead batteries, and on this trip I wanted to see what I could find out with the BM.
On our first morning this trip I got up before first light and checked the current flow. At night I had turned off everything except the propane fridge and noticed that the normal overhead usage seems to be about 2 amps, but shortly after the sun rose DW got up and started puttering around and I noticed a spike in the current usage up to first 4.7 and the 8.5 amps. I could not see anything that would cause that and I started turning off circuit breakers and then pulling fuses. None of that made any difference. I then switched off the battery disconnect and still noticed the drain, down to about 4.7 amps. Checked everything I could, but found nothing and began to wonder if we had an issue with the batteries themselves. The dealer who moved them screwed up the wiring of the B2B and I have been suspicious of their work since then. In any case after about an hour the usage dropped back to the 2.2 amps of overhead.
During the day our batteries charged back to 100% and the second night I again switched off everything except the propane fridge. Got up before light and the overnight usage was the same as the previous night - about 2 amps per hour but when the sun rose I again noticed the same jump to about 4.7 amps and then about 8.5 amps before it dropped back down to normal. Aha, I said. A repeat of the previous morning, and at the same time - around sun rise.
So I began to wonder if the sun might be causing the solar equipment to do some basic housekeeping when it wakes up in the morning and whether or not that might cause the 4.7 and 8.5 amp usage (actually more like 2.5 and 6.3 amps due to the 2.2 amp overhead of the RV).
I am no longer really as worried since it happened a second time, and the profile of usage was almost identical. Whatever it is, rightly or wrongly, it seems associated with sunrise. Can anyone tell me what this might be?
Also, 2 amps seems like a lot for overhead for an RV with nothing running except a propane fridge, and the 2000 watt Xantrex inverter seems to use another 2.2 amps or so when running when nothing is actually turned on except the inverter. Are those in the normal ranges?
|
Linear Mode
