Battery Questions

[Chuggs]

It may be the charger has a processor. If your voltage is too low on your batteries...it may be thinking you have connected it wrong. 12v to a 6v battery, or 6v charge to a 12v battery, if it is 6v/12v selectable or auto select. This is why and old timey dumb charger is needed when your bank is so low. It's an entirely different animal when you habe low batteries...and they still have 11v or so...but need to be charged back up. If you let them die to the point they have less than 10v...the typical smart charger isn't gonna like that.

Try hooking up that charger to your car. It might take to that and charge like it's designed. If it doesn't work on your car, with reasonable voltage...maybe the charger is toast.

 

[Kevin D Pem]

Yes golf cart batteries.
Only a few months old should be under warranty.
Will be quite a project.

This is late in the conversation, but did you check water levels?

4volts indicate one cell has shorted out. This can happen when a battery has gone below 50% needless to say a battery that has been brought to "dead" in your case 6 volts may not recover, and 4volts is a proof of that. The charge current required for the voltage difference would easily trip the built in protection.

 

[DennisT]

They should be 6 volt batteries.

4 volts is still pretty low though.

The water level looks like it is going to be hard to check on at least one in the picture. The three caps are ganged together under those bars that need to move to unlock the caps.

 

[Chuggs]

Yes...6v deep cycle batteries are used...the system is wired with four sets of two 6v batteries series connected...so it is a 12v systems for the coach systems.

He hasn't said wherr the 4v reading is from...but if it is from a display inside the coach...it would be 4v out of what should be a 12.6 - 12.8 v for a normal reading.

 

[Zman300]

Checked the voltage at the two blue circles in the picture.
Checking there should be 12 volts. Correct?

 

[Chuggs]

The photo with blue circle did show terminals at the end of a series pair. If there is no charge source or recent surface charge on the bank…you should have at least 12.6v. Without a load 12.2v is considered 50% charged. 12.0 would be even less…

 

[Chuggs]

It is a good idea to be able to identify the raised symbols on the battery casing. They are labeled to identify the polarity Plus +, or Minus - . When you see jumpers attached between “+” and “-“…that is a series connection. It adds the voltage, but keeps the amp hours the same. If you see jumpers attached between “+” and “+” …and also “-“ and “-“…that is a parallel connection. Parallel connections keep the voltage the same, but add amp hours.

Newmar wires the eight battery bank using eight 6v batteries. They are trying to achieve a 12v system to be compatible with your coaches normal dc voltage. So, they take two batteries and series connect them. They are 6v (6.4v) and 210 aH generally. So in series…this yields 12v (12.8v) and 210 aH.

Next they replicate this three more times…and connect the four sets in parallel. Connecting positives to each other and negatives to each other. This keeps the voltage at 12v (12.8v)…but gives you more amp hours 4 x 210aH = 840 aH.

Don’t worry…the first time you deal with these things…it is overwhelming to the eyes. Complete chaos going in with all of those cables. Take your time…and start with identifying the positive and negative terminals. Get an overall picture of how they are organized. Then take one step at a time… Identify the short jumper cables between just two batteries…nothing else on those terminals. That is your series connections turning two 6v into a pseudo 12v. Then identify the slightly longer jumpers going between like terminals…this are your parallel.

It is important to be able to identify these…so that you can get them filtered out.

The final steep is to identify the actual connections to the coach.

Generally…there are three sets of connections. You will have a plus and a minus..and they will connect to those blue circled ends of a pair of batteries. Or at opposite ends of the four sets. One positive and one negative.

The devices connected are

1) Inverter
2) House Distribution
3) Bi-directional relay

Note: the negative for the bi-directional relay is bolted to the frame rail…instead of running a cable the entire length of the coach.

Again…it can be daunting..,but once you do this, it will be much easier to understand what is going in. Very useful in troubleshooting..and super important if you decide to replace your batteries, or pull them for routine maintenance of the bay.

 

[Kevin D Pem]

Here is some information on batteries, that owners of lead acid batteries would do good to learn. Nothing Here applies to lithium owners.

Trojan Battery | Battery Maintenance

The key to achieving optimum performance and long battery life is to follow a regular care and maintenance program. Read our tips for high performance battery maintenance.

www.trojanbattery.com

 

[Zman300]

Thank you for all the replies.
Much appreciated

Hooked the jump pack up to house batteries.
That got the voltage up enough to trick Silverleaf into charging on shore power.
Now it's hooked up getting a good charge.

Did buy another charger but then thought to try the jump pack.
Will have to hook it up some time see if it reacts like the other one.

Chassis batteries are junk.
They went dead after two days, even with chassis disconnect off.

I'm learning.

Have another question, different topic kind of, will do a search or start another thread.

Feel like I accomplished something today, so it's time for a beer.

 

[Zman300]

Here is some information on batteries, that owners of lead acid batteries would do good to learn. Nothing Here applies to lithium owners.

Trojan Battery | Battery Maintenance

The key to achieving optimum performance and long battery life is to follow a regular care and maintenance program. Read our tips for high performance battery maintenance.

www.trojanbattery.com

Thanks,.
I will check it out.