Monaco Newbie - be gentle LOL

[vito.a]

On almost every Monaco legacy coach I've checked, the Intellitec Big Boy was not working correctly. A friend had his quit less than 6 months after he purchased it new back in 2006. The dielectric grease used inside has a tendency to burn and gum up the copper contacts.

Attached below is a "How To" rebuild your Big Boy (courtesy of Mike Canter). However, don't be surprised if your Big Boy contacts burn again.

A permanent fix is to replace the Big Boy with a Blue Sea ML-ARC. PWhittle has done this on more than one coach with great success.
http://www.irv2.com/forums/f115/repl...cr-468617.html

[96 Wideglide]

Our's is just over 10 years old. We have own'ed it for the last 5. The BIRD system has worked without issues!

[elnatural]

Originally Posted by RustyTools

With your 2009 Camelot, I'm assuming you have the 'Medallion Message Center' (with the separate 10-button select panel). I ask because it's kinda tough at times to determine exactly what is on each coach - I have an '08 Camelot with the Medallion Center yet Happycarz also has an '08 but without it .
Anyways, assuming you do have the Medallion Center, you should have a display on the readout panel that indicates LOW/HIGH BATTERY. I've not had mine come on, except when first turning the key to start, but I'd assume it would warn you if you're losing battery charge.

BTW, x2 on the Echo Charger!

Bingo! Thanks RustyTools - the Main screen does indeed show voltage to the chassis batteries. When I started the coach up yesterday it showed a steady 13.9-14.0 volt charge.

[elnatural]

Originally Posted by vito.a

On almost every Monaco legacy coach I've checked, the Intellitec Big Boy was not working correctly. A friend had his quit less than 6 months after he purchased it new back in 2006. The dielectric grease used inside has a tendency to burn and gum up the copper contacts.

Attached below is a "How To" rebuild your Big Boy (courtesy of Mike Canter). However, don't be surprised if your Big Boy contacts burn again.

A permanent fix is to replace the Big Boy with a Blue Sea ML-ARC. PWhittle has done this on more than one coach with great success.
http://www.irv2.com/forums/f115/repl...cr-468617.html

Thanks Vito - this reminds me of the old IBM disk drives that had problems with the grease on the spindles - they called it sticktion. Turning the drives off for even a minute allowed the grease to cool & thicken, and when powering them on they refused to spin up. I'll definitely read the article you attached to your comment!

UPDATE: Question - does the BIRD stay in place if you replace BIG BOY with the Blue Sea ML-ACR?

[YC1]

Did you view the PDF I attached?

You would not have to remove the BIRD solenoid if you use something to replace it however I would because there are some large wires you could transfer to the new device.

[elnatural]

I was able to do some testing today - here is what I found. Connected to shore power:

• House batteries are at 13.5V
• Chassis batteries are at 12.9V
• Big Boy is humming - verified power to the small terminals
• On the larger positive posts I see the 13.5V on one and 12.9V on the other

This would tell me the connection isn't being made between the 2 posts within the Big Boy? I'll remove and rebuild to hopefully resolve the issue of the chassis batteries not charging.

[Happycarz]

If the Big Boy is not the same voltage on both battery lugs, but warm to touch, it is in the hold mode as stated above. It takes battery voltage to engage the contacts inside it, but only 3.5 volts to hold the contacts in place.

The way it is supposed to work is when the BIRD senses 13.3 volts for 2 1/2 minutes from alternator or the inverter/charger it will send a 12 volt signal to the Big Boy to energize it and close the contacts, tying the house and chassis battery banks together. Then reverts to the 3.5 volts.

If the engine is running, the alternator will cause the Big Boy to engage.

The Magnum inverter has a battery charger built into it. So, if the inverter is being powered by the generator or shore power when the engine is off, the BIRD senses that charge voltage for 2 1/2 minutes and tells the Big Boy to engage.

The BIRD doesn’t care which one is charging as it is monitoring both, as it has a wire to each battery bank. As long as one battery bank is charging 13.3v, the BIRD will tie both banks together.

If the house battery drops below 12.8 volts for more than about one minute and the BIRD will disengage the Big Boy, as designed. Running a heavy load on the house batteries might cause the voltage to drop. The one minute wait time, to disengage the Big Boy, is so intermittent high loads won’t cause it to disengage. But when it does drop for that prescribed time and disengages, occasionally, the float charge is just shy of the 13.3 volts to have it re-engage. The BIRD is sending 3.5 volts to the Big Boy, so it is warm from the hold in voltage, but it never received the 12 volts to close the contacts. Bummer, the chassis batteries slowly discharge.

An easy way to manually engage the Big Boy it to momentarily push the Battery Boost button on the dash. It will send 12 volts to the Big Boy, closing the contacts. The 3.5 volts will keep it engaged.

It took me a few years to figure this out. I have a tiny digital volt meter stuck to top of a chassis battery and when walking by the coach while plugged in at home, I will peek in to see the voltage. If it ever drop below the 13.3 float charge, say down to 12.7v, I push the battery boost button.

When out of the RV carport, the solar will send 2 amps to my chassis batteries, and the above is a non issue.

Several folks have added a dual volt meter to the dash. Sure make it easy to monitor both battery banks.

[elnatural]

Originally Posted by Happycarz

If the Big Boy is not the same voltage on both battery lugs, but warm to touch, it is in the hold mode as stated above. It takes battery voltage to engage the contacts inside it, but only 3.5 volts to hold the contacts in place......

I believe I'm finally understanding how the BB works thanks to all the contributions to our posting. When I measured voltage across the two small terminals it was at around 3.5 volts and as you described - in hold mode. But the voltage on the two large "+" terminals were not the same which points to the contacts within the BB are not making a good connection while in hold mode. Time to remove and clean the BB.

When I first started this thread I didn't have a clue about the BIRD and BB. Again thanks to everyone for taking the time to help a newbie out.

Jim & Brenda
Huron SD (Temporarily ) - originally from Montana.
I will retire in 2021!!

[puttin]

elnatural,


Welcome! As you can see there are a lot of fine people here. Keep posting and have fun with the new coach- it's a great one.....

[Happycarz]

Jim, go push the battery boost switch and recheck voltage at Big Boy. Just want to make sure it is fully engaged.

[rvsurfer]

You should check the voltage on your Big Boy. Measure the voltage on the top terminals one will show chassis voltage and the other side will show coach battery charging. You also can activate chassis charging by depressing your battery boost switch.

[elnatural]

With the wonderful comments left for our posting I felt for sure it was the BB. After turning off shore power, then disconnecting both chassis and house batteries and verifying there was no voltage going to the BB, I disconnected the positive leads going to the top two posts on the BB followed by removing the two smaller leads. It was pretty straight forward and took less than 10 minutes. Bringing the BB into the house I took it apart following the advice left by Mike Canter. As noted by Mike I cleaned away the old grease with GumOut Carb cleaner from the two battery posts and the plate. I then took emery cloth and shined up the plate and two posts - applied some new dielectric grease to those parts - then reassembled. I then tested the relay by applying 12V across the two small posts (you can hear the magnet raising and lowering the plate) and testing continuity across the two battery posts. So far so good.

Re-installing the BB took about 15 minutes. Once all connections were tightened I switched shore power back on and connected both the chassis & house batteries.

About 10 minutes later I tested power across both battery leads on the BB and they registered the same voltage (13.9V). Bingo!! The next morning the chassis batteries were fully charged.

This was a fun exercise in both determining what the issue might be and hearing what others had to offer for a solution. And of course following through with the recommendations and see things working again.

[96 Wideglide]

Congrats !

[poddville]

We have a 2013 monaco As was mentioned we use the digital plugin meter as was mentioned.