Check your B.I.R.D.

[RetiredBob]

I've reported earlier that my chassis battery wasn't getting charged when plugged into shore power. After returning home from the south (much too early!), I took my coach to my dealer to have this problem looked at. They determined that the BIRD was incorrectly wired. After correcting the wiring, the system seems to be working properly, although I'll have to wait a few days to be sure. If anyone else is having this problem, you may want to make sure your BIRD is wired correctly.

["007"]

There are two BIRD wiring systems one for a DP &
One for a gas chassis.

MAYBE THEY MIXED THEM UP.

[rcatter]

Quote:

Originally Posted by RetiredBob I've reported earlier that my chassis battery wasn't getting charged when plugged into shore power. After returning home from the south (much too early!), I took my coach to my dealer to have this problem looked at. They determined that the BIRD was incorrectly wired. After correcting the wiring, the system seems to be working properly, although I'll have to wait a few days to be sure. If anyone else is having this problem, you may want to make sure your BIRD is wired correctly.

What does the acronym stand for?

["007"]

B.I.R.D. Bi-directional--Isolator--Relay---Delay

DP-BIRD

GAS CHASSIS Bird

Welcome to irv2.

[pkmesser]

I've reported elsewhere, my 05 KountryStar was miswired also. Sounds like people at Newmar are not reading the instructions that come with the BIRD unit. For those of you that want to check yourself. the 12 volt feed wire, that goes to the coach battery connector of the BIRD needs to come from the BATTERY side of the battery disconnect solinoid. (it is actually fed through a connector strip). There may be other miswiring issues in addition. (Mine was wired to the convertor side of that solinoid).

["007"]

Your other post pkmesser is in Quick Tips I have added this thread on the end of it with your answer to your problem.
Newmar laid off some people during the RV MFG downturn maybe the new help needs some training.

[birdcage]

Quote:

Originally Posted by pkmesser I've reported elsewhere, my 05 KountryStar was miswired also. Sounds like people at Newmar are not reading the instructions that come with the BIRD unit. For those of you that want to check yourself. the 12 volt feed wire, that goes to the coach battery connector of the BIRD needs to come from the BATTERY side of the battery disconnect solinoid. (it is actually fed through a connector strip). There may be other miswiring issues in addition. (Mine was wired to the convertor side of that solinoid).

pkmesser-could you please reply and tell me why the bird must be wired to the coach baterry side of the disconnect solenoid. I have blown several birds-need answers.

[Qwert66]

From Intellitec (I added the red line)
They may be able to explain if this doesn't.

[ottffss]

Quote:

Originally Posted by birdcage ...tell me why the bird must be wired to the coach baterry side of the disconnect solenoid. I have blown several birds-need answers.

It might be a subtle triggering voltage problem. Historically, there have been "issues" with chassis bat discharging over time when continuously connected to shore power. This (at one time) was attributed to insufficient float charge-curve voltage to keep the BIRD triggered (on possibly only AGM equipped rigs). A solution was to use the lead-acid charge setting on the inverter which apparently (on perhaps Magnum inverters only) has a near similar charge curve to the AGM curve and something like a 0.1v higher float charge which is all the BIRD needed to keep the chassis isolator energized and thus bind the chassis battery to the charger. Since we are only talking something like 0.1v (in this case) it is possible that the "coach battery" wiring traveling through too many junctions could lose just enough voltage to cause the BIRD to drop the chassis battery waiting for the coach battery to come up just one more 0.1v in order to trigger the isolator and bind in the chassis batteries.

One could test this - When the chassis bat goes into a discharged state (while on shore/charger) just jump a solid 13v to the "coach bat" terminal on the BIRD and see if the isolator triggers. If it does the low trigger voltage problem is confirmed.

Just a thought...

["007"]

Welcome to the forum & irv2 birdcage.
The coach batteries are your house batteries in this case if you have a dead chassis battery the isolator relay will cut in battery from house to your chassis battery to start your coach.
That red wire should not be needed if the black wire is wired between the disconnect relay and isolator relay.
The heavy black wires for coach or house batteries feed through the disconnect relay when battery disconnect switch is operated.
Is your BIRD wired as diagrams shown in beginning posts of thread?

[birdcage]

Quote:

Originally Posted by "007" Welcome to the forum & irv2 birdcage. The coach batteries are your house batteries in this case if you have a dead chassis battery the isolator relay will cut in battery from house to your chassis battery to start your coach. That red wire should not be needed if the black wire is wired between the disconnect relay and isolator relay. The heavy black wires for coach or house batteries feed through the disconnect relay when battery disconnect switch is operated. Is your BIRD wired as diagrams shown in beginning posts of thread?

Thank you 007-This is a 2004 dsdp-I had newmar send bird layout and it looks different than the one you sent-may be for a gas?? The last thing I did was unhook the bat/boost from coachbat line and also other side at isolator relay. So the battery boost switch is completely disabled and out of system. Now with another new bird a 5amp fuse(calls for 7.5) locks bird in and voltage on solenoid coil drops right off to 3.5v. Batteries are all hooked up. This is on shore power-am almost afraid to try to start engine and see if alternator can charge all six. My bird has deisel-2 on it. Looks like I have a problem in boost wire but it is so easy to get distracted.

[pkmesser]

Quote:

Originally Posted by birdcage pkmesser-could you please reply and tell me why the bird must be wired to the coach baterry side of the disconnect solenoid. I have blown several birds-need answers.

If the battery switch is set to disconnect, and if the unit is connected to shore power:

With the BiRD getting the voltage value from the convertor side, that voltage will be above the trigger point, (13.1 volts). The bird will then direct the isolator solinoid to close, thus putting the chassis battery on charge. In my case, the convertor is not a 3 stage charger. The voltage is high enough to "cook" the chassis battery. (If wired to the battery side, the voltage is below the 13.1 trigger point).

The above applies to the gas chassis, diesel may be different.

[Dave78Chief]

There are 4 different models of the BIRD device and at least 2 different types of isolation relays (from INTELLITEC alone; Battery Products). It is possible the current requirements of the relay do not match the capabilities of the BIRD unit you are using and resulting in the BIRD failure so,
What model (P/N) BIRD device do you have?
What brand and P/N of isolation relay do you have?
It would also be nice to know how the leads from the bird down to the isolation/disconnect relays are connected also.

Dave

["007"]

Here is the DP-2 wiring setup completely different setup.

Here is a different PDF with a trouble section but same wiring setup, seems to me a better version than older setups less to go wrong.
This is copy of 200 amp Bigboy