Community Forums

Latrice · 03-11-2018, 06:19 PM

Our '16 Ventana is equipped with a residential frig and a 4 battery house battery bank (flooded). It is in storage with access to a 15 amp grounded electrical outlet. We purchased a 12 volt Power Tender Plus (Deltran) and hooked it up to the batteries.

Now we are getting ready to take a short trip and need to turn on the residential frig to cool it down. Should we turn on the generator to power the frig for the first few hours? Can the battery tender stay hooked up to power or should it be unplugged while the genny is on?

Once the frig has cooled down, our plan was to turn the genset off and let the frig draw power from the house batteries with the battery tender hooked up.

Does this sound like a good plan or am I about to do something stupid?

Tigerfan1 · 03-11-2018, 06:24 PM

Just plug your coach in to the 15 amp circuit. If you don’t turn on anything but the refer it should charge your batteries and run your refer.

Latrice · 03-11-2018, 06:48 PM

We had the 50 amp (through a series of reducers) reduced to a 15 amp plug and tried to do just as you suggested Tigerfan, but wound up with a blown GFI at the outlet and dead batteries. Talked to the storage facility manager and he said they require customers use battery tenders instead of being directly hooked up. The electrical outlet has been recently changed so it's not the outlet.

RV repair tech suggested the method in our original post but he did not inspire confidence.

Tigerfan1 · 03-11-2018, 07:33 PM

Latrice have you tried plugging in with everything off including the refer? If the coach charging system can get past bulk charging it uses less amps when on float charging after the batteries are fully charged. If the breaker still pops when you plug in with fully charged batteries then I guess your only options are what you are currently doing or a 10 amp smart battery charger which would keep up with charging you batteries and hopefully the refer. I have the same battery set up as you and I can go about a day on the house batteries with the refer on and then I fire up the generator while boondocking. If your batteries are fully charged you should be able to cool down the refer without firing up the generator. But if you are there why not run the generator. Many generator problems come from lack of use. I normally unplug when running the generator but probably don’t have to. Maybe someone else can chime in on that.

DrPhil · 03-11-2018, 08:31 PM

My storage gfi tripped all the time - especially when it rained. Had the owner swap out - still same problem. A year later that outlet was kaput. Swapped with a very old gfi, and this one works like a champ. Electrician told me the old ones were not as sensitive. Now I can run it up to nearly 20 amps (refer, charger, and engine heater) with no issue (I think the EMS is managing the charger in this circumstance).

Winemaker2 · 03-12-2018, 06:30 AM

Previous 30A MH always tripped the storage GFI.
I used 2 batty Minders on house & chassis banks and never had a problem.
Didn't even bother trying the new to us 50A MH just bought a 2-4-8 A batty minder to take care of the 8- 6V GC house bank.
I could easily be wrong but guessed the built in surge protector might be the problem as it went through the analysis of the incoming power.
Any knowledgeable EE folks out there with an informed opinion re: my guess above?

MNawman · 03-12-2018, 06:58 AM

Are your batteries 12 or 6 volt? How many amp hrs? In my Entegra I had 6 , six volt 260 ah batteries with 300 watts of solar on the roof. I would start my fridge at 6:00 pm the night before starting with 13.8 v in the bank. At 7:00 am next day I would have 12.8. Love solar!

Mark

wa8yxm · 03-12-2018, 07:11 AM

I too support the "Just plug in"
Deltran battery tenders come in many sizes. Mine can do 70 amps to jump start my car. or 20 to recharge a battery that is seriously hungry (What I needed when I bought it) or 1-2 amps which is NOT enough to keep up with a residential fridge. Nice 100 dollar unit, did the job I bought it for.

2 days later I got a new converter and now it does the job.