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Old 07-01-2020, 05:47 PM   #21
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Originally Posted by SLOweather View Post
OK, you are missing my point. There is NO outlet for the converter to plug into. The plug has been cut off the converter cord, and it is wired directly into the breaker panel.
My bad. I got digging around and found that outlet. It was hard to find under all the wiring behind the CB panel, under the floor of the cabinet aft of the main door.
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Old 07-01-2020, 05:48 PM   #22
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If you remove the Phillips head screw in the middle of the circuit labels area, the front bezel will come out. Pry it a little on the right end with a pocket knife or thin screwdriver. (If you are not feeling confident or adventurous, shut off the AC first.)



The breaker on the bottom is the one for the converter. I'll wager that either:
1) there is no wire connected to the breaker, or...
2) there is a wire, it's black, and if you were to tug on it, you would find that it has been cut off inside the cabinet (unless it's taped or zip tied).


Sorry, no picture. I have one but recently temporarily lost my ability to upload to my web server.
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Old 07-01-2020, 05:51 PM   #23
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That outlet will work but it's in the basement, and meant for outdoor use. There is a mouse hole in the bottom of the basement compartment for dropping a cord out of. It's also on the GFCI outlet circuit on the end of the counter by the door. If something pops the GFCI, you lose the converter.


Figure out the CONV breaker wiring, and it will be better than using that outlet.
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Old 07-01-2020, 05:56 PM   #24
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Originally Posted by SLOweather View Post
If you remove the Phillips head screw in the middle of the circuit labels area, the front bezel will come out. Pry it a little on the right end with a pocket knife or thin screwdriver. (If you are not feeling confident or adventurous, shut off the AC first.)



The breaker on the bottom is the one for the converter. I'll wager that either:
1) there is no wire connected to the breaker, or...
2) there is a wire, it's black, and if you were to tug on it, you would find that it has been cut off inside the cabinet (unless it's taped or zip tied).


Sorry, no picture. I have one but recently temporarily lost my ability to upload to my web server.
Thanks SLOweather.

I’m not sure if this is a delayed reply, but that photo of the outlet a couple of posts ago is actually on the rear of the 15amp breaker under the kitchen cabinet. I plugged the converter into the outlet then flipped the breaker on and it powered the DC side of the electrical system. It actually might be better like yours — hardwired into the breaker but I’ll take this for the time being.

Still can’t find a solution why the DC doesn’t work on its own...
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Old 07-01-2020, 06:03 PM   #25
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Progress sometimes comes slow and there may be more than one gremlin? But there's one less now!
So we should find the coach batteries getting charged when the RV is on shore power or if the cord is plugged into the outlet in the bay, while the generator is running. So what's the situation? Can you plug the RV in, even to a 15 amp circuit for testing to make sure the batteries get charged or do you need to get the generator started to use it to test the coach battery charge part?
What I would expend, if all is as it should be, is that starting the RV engine does a couple things. One is the alternator running charges the start battery and at the same time, that power pulls up a relay that connects both battery strings together, letting both charge. At that point, if you try to start the generator, you have the coach batteries, the start battery and the alternator all ready to provide plenty of cranking power to the generator as they often take a bit to get fuel pumped up and get fired up.
Bears checking but I "think" the generator will be starting off the chassis start battery rather than the coach battery.
But either way, maybe try starting the generator with all things connected together as the best shot and then after you get it running, that might be a chance to go back and kick the coach battery switch off and see if the generator cranks using only the start battery?
Why did trying the genset kill the 12 volt lights when you tried earlier? Don't know!
Batteries tend to be funky things that seem really simple but do several weird things to mess with our minds. Or there could be other problems like relays not working right or something. I sometimes have to go back and try things again when I don't understand what I found the first time.
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Old 07-01-2020, 06:16 PM   #26
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Originally Posted by SLOweather View Post
That outlet will work but it's in the basement, and meant for outdoor use. There is a mouse hole in the bottom of the basement compartment for dropping a cord out of. It's also on the GFCI outlet circuit on the end of the counter by the door. If something pops the GFCI, you lose the converter.


Figure out the CONV breaker wiring, and it will be better than using that outlet.
SLO,

This one isn’t the double outlet in the basement. It’s a 110 receptacle on the back of the CONV circuit breaker under the kitchen cabinets. Works great!
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Old 07-01-2020, 06:20 PM   #27
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Progress sometimes comes slow and there may be more than one gremlin? But there's one less now!
So we should find the coach batteries getting charged when the RV is on shore power or if the cord is plugged into the outlet in the bay, while the generator is running. So what's the situation? Can you plug the RV in, even to a 15 amp circuit for testing to make sure the batteries get charged or do you need to get the generator started to use it to test the coach battery charge part?
What I would expend, if all is as it should be, is that starting the RV engine does a couple things. One is the alternator running charges the start battery and at the same time, that power pulls up a relay that connects both battery strings together, letting both charge. At that point, if you try to start the generator, you have the coach batteries, the start battery and the alternator all ready to provide plenty of cranking power to the generator as they often take a bit to get fuel pumped up and get fired up.
Bears checking but I "think" the generator will be starting off the chassis start battery rather than the coach battery.
But either way, maybe try starting the generator with all things connected together as the best shot and then after you get it running, that might be a chance to go back and kick the coach battery switch off and see if the generator cranks using only the start battery?
Why did trying the genset kill the 12 volt lights when you tried earlier? Don't know!
Batteries tend to be funky things that seem really simple but do several weird things to mess with our minds. Or there could be other problems like relays not working right or something. I sometimes have to go back and try things again when I don't understand what I found the first time.
Many gremlins, yes.
The batteries are charged.
They show 13.2~ on the converter (plugged into the CB)
They do reduce to 12.6~ after a few hours of no charging.
I’ve tried it on shore power with and without the cooach engine running. Not successful.
I’m going to start the gen on the gen mounted switch instead of the Remote switch on the interior control panel.
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Old 07-01-2020, 06:30 PM   #28
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Yes, one gremlin down?
First I might want to test that the converter is actually charging the coach batteries before moving on but then there should be near 12 volt battery on those auto type fuses on the right side of the load center with the AC breakers as that box is split, left AC, right DC for the coach interior. Should be power there all the time without the converter running at all as it powers the pump, lights and all the things we use going down the road.
Are you aware of the breaker box outside just behind the drivers seat? The relay that does the battery cutoff and another solenoid are behind those breakers. I don't recommend trying to get to them unless you get desperate as the panel doesn't come off in a way that you can get it very far, so I've only peeked in there!!
Figuring how to get the right hand screw out was enough for one day's work.
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Old 07-01-2020, 06:40 PM   #29
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Yes, one gremlin down?
First I might want to test that the converter is actually charging the coach batteries before moving on but then there should be near 12 volt battery on those auto type fuses on the right side of the load center with the AC breakers as that box is split, left AC, right DC for the coach interior. Should be power there all the time without the converter running at all as it powers the pump, lights and all the things we use going down the road.
Are you aware of the breaker box outside just behind the drivers seat? The relay that does the battery cutoff and another solenoid are behind those breakers. I don't recommend trying to get to them unless you get desperate as the panel doesn't come off in a way that you can get it very far, so I've only peeked in there!!
Figuring how to get the right hand screw out was enough for one day's work.
I checked and the converter is charging the batteries.
I am aware of the outside CB panel behind the driver seat. I removed it and replaced the solenoid and the coach battery relay. Neither fixed the original problem with the battery switch. The coach battery switch is the only remaining culprit I haven’t changed. First, it’s so tight I can’t easily remove it. Secondly, I can find a way to test the switch with a multimeter. None of the multiple yellow wires nor the white one show they have any power though.
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Old 07-01-2020, 07:10 PM   #30
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Maybe a clue to the converter is on the load center?
Does this look like what you have?
In my load center that looks like this, there is a single grounded outlet on the lower back side of it, can be hard to see with all the other 120 V and 12 Wires above it. Winnebago used a converter/charger with a grounded power cord on my Vista that plugs into that outlet.
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Old 07-01-2020, 07:58 PM   #31
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In my load center that looks like this, there is a single grounded outlet on the lower back side of it, can be hard to see with all the other 120 V and 12 Wires above it. Winnebago used a converter/charger with a grounded power cord on my Vista that plugs into that outlet.
That’s the plug I found and it worked well. Thank you.
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Old 07-01-2020, 09:01 PM   #32
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I checked and the converter is charging the batteries.
I am aware of the outside CB panel behind the driver seat. I removed it and replaced the solenoid and the coach battery relay. Neither fixed the original problem with the battery switch. The coach battery switch is the only remaining culprit I haven’t changed. First, it’s so tight I can’t easily remove it. Secondly, I can find a way to test the switch with a multimeter. None of the multiple yellow wires nor the white one show they have any power though.
Moving to looking at this switch, it seems to be a bit strange but for good reason. It moves the relay to open or close the contacts, but because we don't want it using current all the time the relay is in open or closed (runs down batteries?) is moves the relay and the relay is of a latching type which once moved will then stay moved, using a magnet in the relay. So we get a switch which is momentary to move the relay and then the switch is released but the relay stays. Then when we want to move the relay the other way, the polarity on the coil of the relay has to be reversed to pull the relay the opposite direction. Mind boggled?
I have not looked at that relay but where it gets tricky is that we may find battery on a lug of the switch and ground on the mating lug, but when we press the momentary switch, that battery and ground swap places to reverse the polarity to the relay.
Really seems there should be battery or ground found on some of the contacts but since it is doing these weird things, as well as being momentary, I can also see it might be really easy to find a ground for testing but when looking for battery with the other probe we would not expect to find the ground we just checked to now be battery. Does that make any sense?
And it may not be the case as you may be testing totally different than I might. My first run at that type which, I went round and round but finally got down to using a clip to put a meter probe on a point that I KNEW was ground and stayed ground like a ground wire, then went looking for battery, found it but boggled my mind when it suddenly became ground as the relay swapped positions and swapped polarity. With a digital meter, one probe on ground looking for voltage, you get nothing if it swaps to ground on the other lug! Same if I connect one lead to battery thinking I'm testing to a ground and it actually has changed to battery. Testing battery to battery, you just get a big zero!
The big problem is that we are so unlucky that we own the years of RV which Winnebago decided NOT to post the actual wiring schematics which give the individual wiring layout to trace. We only get kinda/sorta where they go and not what wires to chase. This was my first chase on this type switch/relay setup and I finally had to move on without figuring it out as that would require taking the dash off!
https://www.winnieowners.com/forums/...ys-356986.html
I know that logic says there has to be battery and/or ground to make the switch work but how it gets there is a mystery that I assume has to come back from the relay. Getting pretty risky to assume that, for sure!
If the switch has a Carling number on it, it's possible to pull up a drawing to sort out which contact makes with which on the switch but it's a big mystery from there. for testing, I was able to push the probes down into the contact on the back side of the switch to avoid taking it off the wiring harness, etc.
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Old 07-20-2020, 05:07 PM   #33
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Hi All,

Been watching this forum for quite a while now and realized I should offer some help. So, the OP could possibly make use the the schematics on the Winnebago site: https://www.winnebagoind.com/diagram...e31ke_wire.htm .

It does take some time to digest the information but should shed some light.

Hope this helps -

Be well and be safe.
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