Battery's Charged..but not converting

[kathleenbas]

Hi, we went away for 3 days.. 1987 Sunline Satellite... had the batteries charged and propane filled... When we plugged into the site, eventually my lights went dim.. then out! We had to have a battery charger plugged in to the shore connected to have lights inside! What are the obvious things that make the power converter not.. convert? It seemed like at home the batteries held a charge.. we go away... nope... but I really want to be able to use shore power. thanks for your help!

[quaddriver]

Actually you do have a built in 3 amp charger that is separate from the converter and when pluggin into shore power, isolates the coach batteries, runs the 12v on the converter (just a giant 12v voltage source) and charges the batteries.

could be the switching mechanism aint....it will either be solid state or a relay (gimme a pic of your power mechanism guts and I will tell you) I do not believe the schematic of the 87 unit is on this site (I also have an 87 Satellite)

[mclamp]

This same thing happened to me last summer. After flipping breakers and checking connections I finally decided to try plugging into a different outlet. I have an adapter to plug my shore power into regular 10amp outlet, When I did, everything worked. I guess there was something wrong with the outlet I was using. I would investigate this first!

[Jim-Bev-2363]

When I first go into a site I check the campground service. First I check for polarity with a polaritymeter. It is made for 15Amp, 110V house outlets but works fine in the adapter for 30Amp service as shown.


I also have a Volt-A-Chek meter to make sure some goofus didn't wire 220 into a 110 outlet. It can be used in the same 30Amp adapter. When not in use I do leave it plugged into a outlet so I can monitor power levels for times when the fridge isn't cooling like I want or the A/C isn't cooling properly.


Many times the camper problem comes from outside sources. Once I've checked my incoming services and they are operating at proper levels I will then move onto my own equipment. Especially when things werk at home but fail when away from home.

YOu didn't say if things were werking properly once you returned home.

I hope your problem was low campground current or something similar.

[Steve Collins]

To expand on Jim's post just a bit, there are two kinds of plug-in testers like in his first picture. One is for regular outlets only, and the other is for GFCI (ground fault) outlets only. In this pic, the yellow is the regular tester, and the red one is the GCFI tester.


Also in the pic is a small multimeter which can be used to check AC voltage that the outlet. It will also test 12vdc systems and can help you find shorts or opens in almost any kind of wiring.

All three testers are readily available in the electric aisle in home improvement and hardware stores. I paid about $6 for the yellow one, $11 for the red one, and $18 for the multimeter.

[Jim-Bev-2363]

[mainah]

I don’t know what you have for a converter/charger but most units that old have two circuits one to charge the battery and the other to make 12 volts for the coach. There is a relay inside that switches between shore power and battery. What it does is disconnect the battery from the converter circuit when it is plugged in then when you disconnect it switch back to the battery. What happens some times the relay “sticks” the contacts from use burn a little and stick together so the convert is unable to switch back. So if your battery is fully charged and it doesn’t work that is some thing to look at but it’s inside of the charger/converter not exactly easy to got to.