Community Forums

Justin Tarver · 10-20-2022, 06:11 PM

Hi all, I hope everyone is out enjoying themselves. I just picked up my motorhome from storage to get it ready for shuttling a bunch of kids to homecoming Saturday. When I got in it and turned on the batteries (I have a boat style disconnect as well as the disconnect switch) the generator wouldn’t start and the disconnect switch that triggers the solenoid wouldn’t do anything. I think the house batteries are dead and I’m charging them, but that doesn’t explain the weird part.

When I got it home I plugged it into my shore power and still nothing worked. I put a jump box on the house batteries and was able to get the disconnect switch to connect and shore power came on. To my understanding at that point the shore power should be charging the house batteries so I removed the jump box, but when I turned on the air conditioners they only ran for a couple of minutes and then turned off. I turned one back on and the fan was running but when I powered on the fridge the ac fan would stop. I know that’s a load issue on the low batteries, but why?

Should I be looking at the inverter?

Shouldn’t the shore power be charging the house batteries?

Do the house batteries have to have a charge for the coach to run on shore power? I didn’t think so.

Any advice would be appreciated!

2005 Damon Challenger 348 w/ Ford v10 and Onan 5500.

Thanks in advance,
Justin

Ray,IN · 10-20-2022, 06:32 PM

Some inverter/chargers will not activate a battery charge event until it "sees" a minimal charge in a battery. Using your standalone battery charger for 15-20 minutes should instill enough charge for the inverter/charger to recognize the battery.

Justin Tarver · 10-20-2022, 06:38 PM

Awesome, I hope that’s it. Now I just need to figure out how 2 year old Trojan batteries went all the way dead not connected to anything.

Justin Tarver · 10-20-2022, 07:34 PM

Found it. Looking at the transfer switch connections, white wire from shore power feed was cut a little short and over time had wiggled out from under the screw terminal. I pulled it back into position with some pliers and tightened the screw really well. Both air conditioners working well now.

Thanks for the help just the same!