Intermitent problem w Heart Interface Freedom 15 converter charger in 2002 JourneyDL

[medarwin]

I recently noticed while the coach is parked (more often now @ $5.39/gal) that the charging function will occasionally shut down and not charge the house batteries. Turning the switch off and on at the charger will usually re-start the charging process. However, it has been necessary at times to disconnect the AC power in and then re-connect to get the charging function started again.


Not sure what is going on, cooling fans run when appropriate as far as I can tell. We just took a 3 day trip and it shut down once. My driveway power is 30A and the State Park we were in had a 50A connection.


Anyone have any ideas? I really hate the idea that this thing is going away and needs to be replaced Thanks in advance,


Darwin

[Morich]

This may be just a hope and prayer but there may be value in going into the EMS (load shedder) to take a look at the wires and make sure they are tight there as it "could" be shutting the power off to the converter if things are intermitant. Maybe worth flipping the two breakers off and tighten the screws in the load shedder before fully jumping to the converter being bad?

Any signs the frig stops working at times when on AC? Loose connection at breakers?

Sometimes those wild guesses can save a few bucks and lots of confusion and we do know things get shook around a lot on RV??

Click this snip to get a better view.

[creativepart]

Just a small correction in terminology, the Heart Interface Freedom 15 is an Inverter/Charger, not a converter.

It would not be out of character for a 20 year old Inverter/charger to have reliability issues. We've seen a number of members recently posting about charging problems from older Inverter/Chargers.

Heart Interface, now known as Xantrex was an early leader in Boat and RV inverters but these units have been known to be problematic when they get this old. And, in general are not easy to find parts or personnel to repair them. Newer Inverter/Chargers are much improved and have come down in price and so the market to repair the older units has pretty much disappeared.

I'm not saying your Inverter/Charger is totally broken, just that electronic devices over 20 years old that cease to work properly can be an indication that it's time to find a replacement.

[Morich]

Originally Posted by creativepart

Just a small correction in terminology, the Heart Interface Freedom 15 is an Inverter/Charger, not a converter.

It would not be out of character for a 20 year old Inverter/charger to have reliability issues. We've seen a number of members recently posting about charging problems from older Inverter/Chargers.

Heart Interface, now known as Xantrex was an early leader in Boat and RV inverters but these units have been known to be problematic when they get this old. And, in general are not easy to find parts or personnel to repair them. Newer Inverter/Chargers are much improved and have come down in price and so the market to repair the older units has pretty much disappeared.

I'm not saying your Inverter/Charger is totally broken, just that electronic devices over 20 years old that cease to work properly can be an indication that it's time to find a replacement.

Good point on the inverter possibly aging out but since I have mentioned the load shedder, I can't spot it listed on the parts drawing! Can anybody tell us where it might be and how to get to it--- if one did want to check it?

[dickb46]

My Freedom 15 quit charging my batteries 4 years ago and it's the best thing that it's ever done.
We bought a 2000 (don't recall the brand) and it was a simple swap except for:
The Freedom 15 was hardwired to the coach so we had to take it apart still connected to the wires to get inside and disconnect the wires.
The lug holes in the wires were slightly small for the new 2000 inverter/charger so we drilled them out and bolted it up, screwed it down and plugged in power.
WaLa!! It worked just like that, nothing else to do, nada.

[dickb46]

Um.. also, the control wires for the inverter (looks like a flat phone line) was squeezed, in the bundle, between the two high current lines from the battery to the inverter and had melted. I'm thinking that's what the initial fault was. We replaced that before we did anything else.