Community Forums

**Petro** · 01-26-2008, 02:20 PM

I store my MH in an attached garage and I leave it plugged in all winter. I have been doing this for years with out a problem.

My charger started acting up. It starts charging on stage 1 (bulk) and goes to stage 2 (acceptance) and stays there until the red fault light flashes and cuts it down. On stage 2 it charges at 14.7 volts until the red light flashes and cuts it down to 13.7 volts. I just replaced all the batteries hoping it would correct the problem but it didn't.

Does anyone have any suggestion as to what is wrong?

Thanks in advance for your suggestions;

Don

**Petro** · 01-26-2008, 02:20 PM

I store my MH in an attached garage and I leave it plugged in all winter. I have been doing this for years with out a problem.

My charger started acting up. It starts charging on stage 1 (bulk) and goes to stage 2 (acceptance) and stays there until the red fault light flashes and cuts it down. On stage 2 it charges at 14.7 volts until the red light flashes and cuts it down to 13.7 volts. I just replaced all the batteries hoping it would correct the problem but it didn't.

Does anyone have any suggestion as to what is wrong?

Thanks in advance for your suggestions;

Don

RV Wizard · 01-26-2008, 04:11 PM

Don, even though you have replaced the batterie sbe sure they are all good. You could have a bad new battery. Also be sure the connections are clean and tight. Let us know if they are good and then we can try to help.

Gary RVRoamer · 01-26-2008, 04:29 PM

Hmm. 13.7V is about right for the float charge stage, so I'm not sure there is a real problem.

Is the fault light on the Freedom itself or do you have the remote panel? If remote, is it the Freedom Remote or the Link panel? I can find lots of detail on the remote panel indicators and what they mean, but zilch on the Freedom itself. Odd, because the Freedom manual is otherwise very complete.

I wonder if you have a bad connection (corrosion) on one of the cables? A high resistance connection will give the charger a false indication of what is happening and could cause it to sense an overload or maybe even overheat itself.

Another possibility is simply that the charge is not reaching the expected voltage before the timer runs out. The Freedom chargers won't leave the charger in absorption charge mode indefinitely - it will switch to float after about an hour (wet cell) or 3 hours (gel). I don't know if the fault light flashes when the timed transition occurs or not - the manual doesn't say.

**Petro** · 01-26-2008, 05:23 PM

Gary & Mike;

I thoroughly cleaned all the cable connections as I reinstalled them. I double checked them for tightness. It went nuts in December. It was good until then. The manual says with an over charge condition it will cut back automatically after the red light flashes. The manual says float should be 13.1 volts. I have the Freedom Remote Panel. The red light flashes after about 15 minutes. The inverter seams to work OK. I have 3 group 31 batteries hooked up parallel.

RV Wizard · 01-27-2008, 01:08 AM

Have you checked the acutal batteries cell by cell? Here is a trouble shooting link for your inverter: http://www.xantrex.com/web/id/275/docserve.asp
Let us know what specific cravity you are getting in each cell of you can and test charging section per manual.

Norm Payne · 01-27-2008, 04:34 PM

Another suggestion is to check the setting on the inverter panel. Make sure it is set to wet-cells and the correct size of battery bank.

**Petro** · 01-27-2008, 05:03 PM

Mike;
Thanks for the info. I printed it out. It is newer than the one that came in the MH. I will recheck the batteries however it will be a few days. The battery hold downs in my Winni are so cleverly positioned that I have to remove them to get the cap off over the cells to check for levels or specific gravity. I may have to remove the batteries to get the caps off do to tight quarters. I am busy for a couple of days.

Thanks;
Don

**Petro** · 01-29-2008, 11:08 AM

I checked the specific gravity today on the 3 coach batteries. The readings were all between 1280 & 1290. The temps went up today in the 40s. I went into the setup mode today to make sure all were OK. When it went back to charge mode it went into stage 3. I never had any LEDs flashing a code. We had just gone through temps below 0. I think it had to stay in stage 2 to keep the batteries at proper charge. It was either the temperature or going into setup mode that cleared out an error in programing.

Thanks for all your help. I sure have a better understanding of the Freedom Inverter/Charger system. When I stated that it went goofy in December, that was when our cold weather set in.

Don