Automatic Leveler Alarm in my 2024 Navion

[Lornadoon66]

We have a 2024 Navion with automatic levelers. When the levelers are down we can’t turn on the engine without an alarm sounding. Is that how it is supposed to work? Thank you.

 

[creativepart]

Yes!
So you don't try to drive away with your jacks down.

 

[Lornadoon66]

Yes!
So you don't try to drive away with your jacks down.

Thank you. Our coach battery had drained overnight and we needed to charge it with the engine. Had to retract the levelers to turn that alarm off.

 

[Pointyears]

Thank you. Our coach battery had drained overnight and we needed to charge it with the engine. Had to retract the levelers to turn that alarm off.

How did that drain happen?

 

[Lornadoon66]

How did that drain happen?

We don’t know exactly what caused the drain. We have a light in a closet that doesn’t go off and the refrigerator was running all night. The coach battery went from fully charged when we went to bed to 12.4 when we woke up in the morning. We were at a state camp ground with no services. This was concerning so we thought we should charge the coach battery with the engine. This was our first camping experience in this new RV.

 

[Bnystrom]

Why didn't you use the generator? If it won't start due to the low batteries, you just start the engine, start the generator, then shut the engine off.

 

[SeeTheUSA]

Why didn't you use the generator? If it won't start due to the low batteries, you just start the engine, start the generator, then shut the engine off.

I must admit, I didn’t know that! Haven’t ever experienced the situation, but now if I do, I’ll know. Thanks.

 

[Morich]

But there is likely to be more to the story!
One of the big issues with batteries is that they are a slow chemical process! It varies with the type of battery but if you are dealing with lead acid batteries, it may not be practical to try to run the engine long enough to recharge a battery which is very low??
The RV shows it came with lead acid batteries, so unless changed, we might want to assume that is still true?
The problem with battery charge is that it is very easy to assume them charged much more than true!
One reason we may find problems is that we can often get into misleading ourself about the true state of charge.
It can take as much as six hours to fully recover from being run down!

What we have to watch out for is what is called "surface charge" as it can make us think the battery is charged when it is actually just the chemicals near the battery posts!
When we use the voltage taken at the posts it can be very tricky!

This is sometimes explained as being somewhat like looking in a hole in a barrel we are filling with syrup? If we put syrup in and look in that hole to see how full the barrel, we may get the idea the barrel is full. We need to wait for both the barrel or the battery to settle and become stable before we can trust what we see!

Not knowing the truth of how it happened, I can see something like this.

If you go camping, use the batteries for a while so that the voltage shows down, then connect to some form of charging, we can get the idea we have "refilled" the barrel if we look too soon!
Is this what may have happened?
You used the batteries and noticed they were down, say 12.4. So you put them on charge and after a short time saw the voltage was good again, so stopped charging.
then the next time they seemed to go dead rather quickly!

If that sounds like what may have happens, it is just the tricky way of batteries and chemicals! And you are certainly not the only folks getting tricked!
the true story is the best newest batteries that get run down, will take time to fully recover all down through all the chemicals in all the cells!
We get frequent reports of folks having really extra good batteries as they show `13+ volts! But we know that is confusion because the best battery will only hold a charge of 12.8or less if they have become stable after charging!

If we go back to the syrup in a barrel, it is like this? If the barrel is only 12.8 inches high and we find the syrup is 13 inches high, we have to assume there is a problem!

Batteries seem so simple but they are the most frequent cause of problems we hear about! You may have heard about putting a charger on a battery for overnight? That is because it takes so long to fully charge and it can't be rushed in any way with the lead/acid combo doing the work!
I've never felt running either the engine nor the generator to be a practical way to recover the charge on a dead battery. It just takes too long! If we get it done in an hour, we are simply fooling ourselves and that battery will go down much quicker and lower the second and third cycle!

 

[Bnystrom]

Additionally, if lead-acid batteries are run down to a low voltage, it damages them permanently and they'll no longer take as much of a charge. If the water level in the cells is allowed to drop to the point that the plates are exposed, that also causes permanent damage.

Most auto parts stores can run a capacity test to determine the state of your batteries. If they need to be replaced, I strongly suggest that you go with lithium (LiFePO4) batteries, as they're not much more expensive than lead-acid, you'll at least double your usable battery capacity, they're half the weight, and they're maintenance-free. On a 2024 model RV, your charging systems should be capable of charging lithium batteries properly.

One last thing, Mercedes specifically recommends against prolonged idling of the engine. as it will clog the Diesel Particulate Filter (DPF). The DPF will regenerate (clean itself) during a long drive, so you may want to do that if you did let it idle for quite a while.

 

[Sparky19053]

If you are referencing the leveler alarm on the dash, you you can disconnect the plug on the back of the noise maker. You will still get the alarm warning from the leveler control panel but it not nearly as loud. Disconnect this was one of the first things I did after leaving the dealer. 2021V.