hooked up new battery, but nothing's working from it

[noralee]

just hooked up my new battery 24 series, and it doesn't seem to be working properly. the voltmeter showed power as well, so the battery should be charged.

everything works fine when plugged into to the 'house' power/extension cord. so i unplugged it and thought that everything should still work from the battery power. is this correct? or is there something i need to switch? should the regular plugs and lights still work?

thanks for any tips

 

[Gene-SUN]

The 12 volt overhead lights and anything else that is 12 volts should work from the battery when you unplug shore power, nothing to switchover. The wall outlets are 110 volts AC so they will not work.

Are the + (positive) and - (negative) cables to the battery correct?

 

[krazedave]

Hi. Unplugged from house or 120 ac your plugs in trl won't work but lights, furnace, etc should work. Check the fuses in your 12 volt supply box.

 

[GKLarson]

also check to see that your battery leads are clean

 

[GoodoleBob]

and I guess taking a look at my recent problems in this thread might be useful

http://www.sunlineclub.com/forums/f71/interior-lights-not-working-off-battery-power-15186.html

 

[noralee]

thanks! going to work on this tomorrow.

 

[noralee]

The 12 volt overhead lights and anything else that is 12 volts should work from the battery when you unplug shore power, nothing to switchover. The wall outlets are 110 volts AC so they will not work.

excuse my ignorance with the electrical system, but I thought that was what the converter was for, so that the plugs and everything would work with 12V...confusing

given that the wall plugs won't work, is that why the other plugs-the ones that look like car plugs/lighters-are in the closets? they will run from the battery? they also work when plugged into shore power. although there is one on the left side next to the fridge that has no power. the plug under the kitch sink and the 2 in the cabinet next to the front door work fine--when plugged into shore power. i'm getting the hang of the system i think but then how do folks charge there computers and such when only on battery if no wall outlets work? so many questions! so glad for this forum.

 

[Gene-SUN]

Yes, it can get confusing. The converter takes the 110 volts Alternating Current (AC) from the shore power and "converts" it down to 12 volts Direct Current (DC) which runs the 12 volt lights and charges the battery. The shore power also powers the wall outlets that look like house outlets. The converter or battery powers those round car cigarette lighter type outlets with 12 volts DC. When you unplug the shore power there is nothing powering the converter to make 12 volts so the battery just takes over and supplies 12 volts.

Now to confuse the issue, some people install "inverters" that take 12 volts DC and "invert" it back up to 110 volts AC so you can plug things into the inverter that you would plug into the house type wall outlets. Some people also install a heavy duty switch to switch ALL the 110 volt outlets to work from either shore power OR the inverter.

 

[noralee]

The converter or battery powers those round car cigarette lighter type outlets with 12 volts DC. When you unplug the shore power there is nothing powering the converter to make 12 volts so the battery just takes over and supplies 12 volts.

does this mean that the car like charger/plugs will only work when the battery is being used? or should they work all the time?

 

[noralee]

funny thing happened...i was checking out the fuses and as i was pulling the one all the way on the left out it was in so tight that it also pulled the back 'panel' (red plate-also you can sort of see at the top of the 4 fuses is a metal plate under each top of the fuse) and as i took the fuse out, all the lights came on running on battery except for the bathroom light. i replaced the fuse and it was still working. we thought that perhaps the metal plate was a connector of some sort an wasn't touching properly and when i moved the fuse/plate i reconnected whatever was disconnected. Does this sound possible or likely?? any hints on the bathroom light? ie, how do i test for one light not working from the battery?

thank you again and again for your suggestions and time.

note: another issue is that a few weeks ago i plugged in my 7plug to the TV and something shorted. i changed a bad fuse in the vehicle, but none of the running or rear lights on the camper are working anymore. my plan was to test each of the wires going from the camper to the TV to see if one of them shorted and need to be replaced. When we tested these lights before the fuse blew, they all worked except for the side red oval light on the left of the front door. but don't think these 2 things are related...