2018 Vista 31BE questions

[Jim_SB]

Originally Posted by tderonne

What's your last 5 digits of your serial number? I can look if you have an inverter at the link I mentioned.

54334. I looked through that and didn’t see one. Is that the build sheet?

[creativepart]

I have attached a photo of where the Inverter control (it's called a "remote" by Magnum, the manufacturer) is located. It's circled. If you don't have this remote then you very likely do not have an inverter.

Also, there are photos of it and the inverter and the inverter's location in the Operator's Manual, which it sounds like you did not receive with your coach. So, here's a link to that all important and huge resource:

https://winnebago.com/Admin/Public/D...18/18Vista.pdf

[Jim_SB]

That is very helpful, thank you.

We clearly don’t have an inverter. I’ll research this further and determine whether I’d like to try to add one myself.

[Morich]

Getting the manuals passed a long may be due to the way they are treated as "excess" baggage. Used RV dealers seem to be a somewhat "willfully ignorant" group when questions are asked, so getting rid of any extra info is one way to avoid slowing down their day!
Also I have found several where the handy spot to get the info out of the way is the space under the dash AC unit where it catches the condensation drips!

[tderonne]

Your Service Parts List

Says it's an engineering pilot. May be the first 31BE of the 10E36X2 batch.

[Jim_SB]

Originally Posted by tderonne

Your Service Parts List

Says it's an engineering pilot. May be the first 31BE of the 10E36X2 batch.

I wondered what Engineering Pilot meant.

Thank you.

[Ted Fyden]

the inverter on my 2017 Vista 27N is in outside compartment on passenger side below stove. control is inside with other control switches.

[Jim_SB]

I just got back from a week long trip to Northern California and back. We did mostly dry camping but spent a couple of nights in an RV park with hookups.

Our 2022 Les Schwab tire stores batteries (came with the RV) got to where they’d only last a few hours (even after being fully charged).

Wearing out the cell phones and internet for battery options a friend came up with the idea to try Costco (there’s one in Redding).

They had new Group 27 deep cycle batteries for $89 each! That was much less than what we were finding at auto parts stores in the area.

Since removing the 24’s and putting in the 27’s in the Costco parking lot I’ve only seen FULL charge show on the indicators, even after spending a very cold night in the mountains with the furnace running all night. I’m very happy with the upgrade and with the price.

This trip was also a good test for the dash A/C repairs (the fix required both a new VCS Temperature control valve and a new expansion valve in the A/C system plus recharging). But it kept us comfortable driving through the San Joaquin valley when the temperature outside was 90 degrees F.

Next up is researching how to add an Inverter so I can make a pot of coffee in the morning and briefly run the microwave without having to start the generator. We camped at some beautiful public lands campgrounds which were great but had no power. I’d prefer not to disturb other campers (there were some) with an early morning generator run.

Thanks to all who helped me sort these issues out.

[creativepart]

Originally Posted by Jim_SB

Next up is researching how to add an Inverter so I can make a pot of coffee in the morning and briefly run the microwave without having to start the generator.

Jim, I'm going to be the bearer of bad news to you. But you need to learn it and it might as well be now.

You are not going to be able to add an inverter to run the microwave or a coffee maker on those in adequate batteries.

Besides your A/C on the roof, the two biggest power hungry devices are the Microwave and any coffee maker, toaster oven, or similar resistive heat source.

Two new Group 27 batteries have at most 130 amp hours of combined battery storage. And this means you have AT MOST 1,500 watts of battery power. And that's if you completely deplete both batteries. I mean take them to zero and ruin them.

Your microwave is likely to take 900w to 1200w to operate and those are 110v watts. So, your inverter would have to run perfectly 1:1 efficient to create that much power from your batteries even for one minute. Yeah, it's not going to do that. And most coffee makers are very close in wattage requirements.

Next those inefficient lead acid batteries can't put out enough power instantaneously or over a lengthy period. Youl'd be lucky to get 1/2 of the available amps out at any given time. And over more than a few seconds it's just not going to happen.

Here's a real world example: My motorhome came with 4-Group 31 DEEP CYCLE batteries for 400 amp hours of power. Roughly 4 times as much as you have. And, it came with a 2000w inverter. Yeah. I'm ready to run the microwave! NOT EVEN CLOSE. The microwave would start the power would massively jump and the batteries would sag and the inverter would fault. This is within the first 5 seconds.

So, think about how that could possibly work in your rig???? It can't and you should realize this right now.

It's great you went from Group 24 to Group 27. As you go up in battery size you go up in amp hours - a bigger battery has bigger cells. But you really should have bought Group 31. Because you went from two 65-amp hour batteries to two 85-amp hour batteries and what you want for dry camping is two 100-amp hour batteries.

I get it. You needed batteries and you needed them now and this is what you could get.

Running a coffee maker or microwave off of batteries with and inverter IS possible. You just need to make a huge change and spend probably $3,000 worth of batteries, inverter, cabling, etc to make it even kind of possible.

Heat your food with your propane stove and also get a coffee peculator for that stove OR fire up the generator.

Sorry to be the barer of bad news.

[creativepart]

I do want folks to know that it is possible to run the microwave, etc off of your batteries with inverted 110 power but you have to be aware of the power requirements involved in your battery bank's output.

In Jim's example above if he had purchased two 100-amp hour Lithium batteries and had a 2000+ watt inverter and proper charging and recharging and cabling, he might be able to run the microwave for 30 seconds or more.

The microwave is still going to take a LOT of power but LFP batteries can output at a higher rate and be drawn down further and can recharge much faster.

The above scenario is only if his microwave is a smaller lower wattage device.

You'd also want 400+ watts of solar available to recharge because that up to 1 min of microwave is going to use up a lot of battery power that will need to be recharged.

On the web you'll see folks doing everything without running the generator - but they have massive battery banks and massive solar recharging capabilities.

It's not particularly difficult - it just takes money and hard work to make these things possible. And, when you are figuring out how to do this you realize that that little quiet generator does it all so effortlessly and so affordably.

[Jim_SB]

Originally Posted by creativepart

Jim, I'm going to be the bearer of bad news to you. But you need to learn it and it might as well be now.

You are not going to be able to add an inverter to run the microwave or a coffee maker on those in adequate batteries.

Okay!

Thank you for taking the time to explain it all. I’ll find a solution using propane for coffee and we certainly can live without the microwave.