Xantrex Freedom HF error E03

[topdownman]

Last week while traveling back from Florida, I had something strange happen in a Walmart parking lot. We had pulled in for the evening and fired up the generator. While getting everything settled, DW noted that the 12v lights looked a little dim. I thought that strange. I hit the boost button on the dash and they went bright. Okay, something going on with the batteries.

I also noted at that time that that neither the front nor rear TVs had power. These are powered from the inverter. I went and checked the inverter and as soon as I opened the compartment door I was greeted with a beep alarm. The error code on the unit was E03 which indicates something plugged in that is pulling TOO much voltage. All that is on that circuit are my TVs and DVD player and all were turned off.

I went back inside and checked the condition of the batteries. They were low. So, I went to check the batteries and found that they had virtually boiled dry. Granted it had been a couple of weeks since they had been checked, but wow. I topped off the cells and hoped for the best. I shut down the inverter and restarted. Still had the E03 error. Finally decided to give up and check it in the morning.

Around 1:30 a.m. I was awakened by a loud alarm. My CO detected was going off indicating low battery. It's hard-wired into the motorhome. My house batteries were completely discharged. I started the engine but that didnt' change a thing. I jammed a credit card into the momentary battery boost switch and the alarm went off. So, at this point I'm thinking the only charging I'm getting is when the engine is running. I left the engine running and slept with 1 eye open for about 30 minutes, then shut down. Again, at 7:00 a.m., same thing. Started engine again.

At this point, it's almost time to hit the road, so I put on a pot of coffee and made ready. Traveled about another 5 hours on the road with no problems. Once I arrived at home, I plugged into shore power and everything seemed fine. Inverter worked as it should and it appears the batteries are charging. I let the batteries charge for about 4 hours and unplugged from shore power. TVs work and inverter shows no error. I started the generator, same thing.

The ONLY thing I did not try when in the Walmart parking lot was shutting down the generator and restarting. To be honest, I was afraid it would NOT restart due to the batteries. At this point, I can't find a thing wrong and while I'm sure this didn't help my batteries, they seem to be okay also.

Any ideas as to what went amok?

[ebksafari]

Check the condition of your batteries. If only one or two cells are bad the batteries can cause the problems you describe, as can completely dry batteries. The fact that everything is now OK does not mean that the batteries are still good. Remember, they were completely dry and the fact that now everything seems to be working does not mean the batteries are 100% OK. The key question is not how they are working for a little while (now that you have added water and recharged them) but how long they will provide sufficient power for the coach and how soon they will stop working altogether (in the sense that there will not be enough sustained juice, even if they show 12 VDC.)

[Libero]

I suspect you did not maintain the electrolyte level in the batteries and they likely got hot and the heat sensor shut down the charger. Once the batteries got low, the low voltage safety relay in the charger would not engage to reconnect to the batteries to the charger.

When you topped up the electrolyte and recharged the batteries from your alternator, and subsequently when on shore power or gen the charger worked again. Not saying you did not damage the batteries by letting them run low electrolyte so they should be checked.

Good luck, but I suspect the scenario noted above is plausible and probable.