Community Forums

jtermini30 · 01-25-2014, 05:24 PM

After the cold weather this week I went to check in the RV and discovered the house batteries were not charged. I was there the week prior and all was fine. I need to charge the house batteries. Will the Diesel engine on the chassis charge the batteries? If I use a battery charger what is the best way to charge the batteries? I noticed the batteries are connected red to black., if I use one battery and the two post from that battery to charge will it charge all the other batteries?

Bondad · 01-25-2014, 07:31 PM

Running the engine or generator or plugging into shore power should charge the batteries. If you have a positive terminal connected to a negative terminal between batteries you likely have two 6v batteries connected in series. If that's the case, do NOT hook a battery charger to one of the batteries. Hook the negative charger cable to the negative terminal that is NOT connected to the other battery and hook the positive cable to the OTHER battery positive cable that is not connected to the other battery.

The result will be charger on positive of battery one, negative of battery one connected to positive of battery two and charger on negative of battery two.

jtermini30 · 01-26-2014, 05:17 PM

Thanks for the a advice. I don't have anywhere to plug the coach in at storage so I took your advice and used the chassis diesel to charge the house battery, started the diesel generator and float charged the house batteries for 4 hours. Worked great.

SuperGewl · 01-28-2014, 05:59 AM

You should be able to Open the Chassis and House battery circuit when you are not using it by flipping the switch. This will help maintain the charge on the chassis and House batteries. When you store your MH your should do this. If you have a solar panel it will usually continue to trickle charge the House battery.

clinardhill · 11-15-2016, 01:13 PM

So what you are saying is shut batteries off during storage (both chassis and house batteries)?
I have my unit plugged into power 50 amp power during storage but it seems to require a lot of water. Should I shut off the battery switches?

wa8yxm · 11-15-2016, 04:21 PM

Question "WILL THE DIESEL ENGINE CHARGE THE BATTERIES?"

Answer: It SHOULD, but Will depends on everything working properly and the batteries not being toast from having been run down too long.

NOTE: Same answer for Gassers.. SHOULD.. Will is another issue.

SuperGewl · 11-15-2016, 10:42 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by clinardhill

So what you are saying is shut batteries off during storage (both chassis and house batteries)?
I have my unit plugged into power 50 amp power during storage but it seems to require a lot of water. Should I shut off the battery switches?

IF you have the MH plugged in then DO NOT open circuit the batteries. If you want to prolong the batteries than disconnect from shore power and then open circuit the batteries.

Cat320 · 11-17-2016, 08:08 AM

The charging systems on these coaches are all different. You should call the coach manufacturer and find out exactly how yours works. My charging system charges the house batteries and will not let the charge go through to the chassis batteries unless 13.3 volts. If the charge rate is less than that, the chassis batteries will be dead. The good news is that I control the charge rate, and can increase or decrease it.