Battery draw on 97 Monaco Dynasty

[cardsfan89]

I have a 97 Monaco Dynasty that has a battery draw issue. If I do not shut both battery disconnect switches off in the engine compartment the starting battery will go dead overnight. Anyone have any idea what this may be. I have had three different shops look at it but all 3 have low skilled mechanics.

[onechaddude]

Could be a number of things. If you take a volt ohm meter that will read amps and put it in line on batteries you will see the amp draw. Then you can pull fuses one at a time and see where the big draw is. Could be something malfunctioning or could be lights left on somewhere that were forgotten. Takes a little time but not very difficult.

Chad

[Dunner]

What he said. Good route to take. Should be in the mAh range.

[Retd_ontheRd]

I agree with the previous posts on looking for the source(s) of chassis battery drain.

But it could also be what happened to my chassis batteries. Over two years of full-timing the drain on the chassis batteries was always minimal, even when parked for a month at a time, so when I left the coach for a month-long trip away I didn't bother to use the battery disconnect switch in the battery bay. I came back to dead chassis batteries, and no matter how long I left my battery conditioner plugged to them I never managed to recover them. Time of death was 7 years, so they had a fairly good life.

So, my point is that your battery drain might be "within specs" but if the batteries are dead or dying, they just won't hold a charge no matter how small the parasitic drain is, and new batteries might be in your future.

I also added a Trik-L-Start when I installed the new chassis batteries and haven't had any issues since then. Hope this helps.

[cardsfan89]

Thanks to all for the information. I will see if I can track down the draw.

[norwestie]

My Dynasty had a very similar problem. On mine, the big 12 volt feed that goes from the back of the alternator to the batteries had loosened, resulting in the terminal melting and lose of charging. Worth checking.

[cardsfan89]

Thanks I will look at that also.

[Papa_Jim]

Originally Posted by cardsfan89

I have a 97 Monaco Dynasty that has a battery draw issue. If I do not shut both battery disconnect switches off in the engine compartment the starting battery will go dead overnight. Anyone have any idea what this may be. I have had three different shops look at it but all 3 have low skilled mechanics.

Check if the alternator is warm. If it is, maybe there's a short to ground in it, and it needs rebuilding.

??

Jim