Batteries

[Ted III]

Jerry Davis, I have an 05-34' as you know and I basically do the same thing you do. I plug my unit in to A/C and walk away. I have not used it know for 4 months although I do start it and had to get inspected. Beyond that I have done nothing. Whatever is charging my batteries is just doing fine. I am only writing this because I don't want to see you do something that is avoiding another problem. I do not want to tell you what to do but was not the Echo Charger used on older units? E. Mike might be able to put some light on your problem. He just loves it when we give neat little problems. Worth a note.

[Ted III]

Jerry Davis, I have an 05-34' as you know and I basically do the same thing you do. I plug my unit in to A/C and walk away. I have not used it know for 4 months although I do start it and had to get inspected. Beyond that I have done nothing. Whatever is charging my batteries is just doing fine. I am only writing this because I don't want to see you do something that is avoiding another problem. I do not want to tell you what to do but was not the Echo Charger used on older units? E. Mike might be able to put some light on your problem. He just loves it when we give neat little problems. Worth a note.

[EngineerMike]

I got nuthin

[dgerstel]

The Echo charger only charges the chassis batteries when the house batteries are being charged. It does not charge the house, when the coach is running. The older coaches that had the Echo chargers, had a solenoid that jumped the 2 battery banks just while the coach was running. The stock setup on the Alpine's with the Vansco system does both. It works very well, as long as the HD solenoid is OK. My only problem with the system is that when the solar output drops in the later part of the day, it will cycle too much. Solenoid kicks in, the voltage in the system drops due to load from chassis batteries causing the Vansco to cut the power to the solenoid, then voltage jumps causing the cycle to start again.

In my post to Jerry about the relay may not be the only problem, I was referring to the likes of bad batteries, wire connections, etc. As you probably know I do like adding gadgets and I would not add an echo charger to my system.

[jerry davis]

I am going to install the new solenoid first to see if that solves the problem. This will be my third solenoid so if this one goes I will install the echo charger. Can think of no reason for the demise of the solenoids......bad luck I guess.

[Old Rv'er]

All, I don't know if this comment is germain, but here goes.

On my coach where the batteries, etc are located, are my - house/chassis/cannot remember the name of this one - switches. I turn on the coach and chassis switches and happly go down the road. The other switch "I think" ties the chassis and house batteries together so I can start the coach if those batteries are run down. But I was warned to not use it, because there is a very expensive fuse which will blow, if I do. So I leave it off all the time. I don't have charging problems, so I have not got into the issues discussed here.

With that said, I hope you are not throwing the wrong switch and causing this problem.

Dale, you know the switch I am mentioning here, it's the one in the middle, exactly what does it do?

[dgerstel]

Jerry,

Are you replacing it with the same large capacity solenoid as the original?


Monty,

It does jump the two battery banks, but can not handle the starter load. It is used when the chassis batteries are too dead to power the Vansco system. The Vansco system has to have some power from the chassis battery to be able to use the battery boost system. The battery boost uses the same large solenoid that we have been talking about. You use it like this:
1) Turn it on long enough to give the chassis batteries a small charge, maybe 2-5 min.
2) Turn it off, make sure Vansco module in batt compartment LED's are on.
3) Press the "30 sec battery boost only" switch for about 15-20 seconds and start the coach.
(This applies only to the coaches with the Vansco system and the 3 battery switches in the battery compartment.)

[jerry davis]

My 05 does not have the aforementioned switches in the battery compartment. As for the solenoids, the first replacement was a White- Rogers recommended in an earlier post by Emike. This time I am replacing with the Cole-Hersee that was the other recommended unit from the previous post.

[Old Rv'er]

Dale, thank you, that is the best explaniation I have ever heard. When we picked up the coach, the technician explained something like that, but the warning is what stayed with me, not so much how it works.

Thank you again.