New engine battery but....? (1 Viewer)

Jul 2, 2011
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Following on from another thread about my engine battery going flat after about 5 days.

I have a new engine battery which I can try and send back if the old battery is not the problem.

the new battery is slightly more powerful than the previous one, 90 something instead of 80. I was advised for a extra £10 it was worth getting the larger one.

As far as I know there is nothing on the vehicle to charge the engine battery other then the alternator. Over the last few days the new battery has gone down about 0.1 amps per day with just the alarm on (12.7, 12.6 and today 12.5). That is what is showing on the control panel but having checked the battery in the past with a multi meter the control panel is pretty spot on.

It is going down slower than the old one but that might be because it`s a bigger battery, so does it sound about normal or does it suggest a leak somewhere and not a battery problem??

Thanks

Steve
 

hilldweller

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Plenty of people report 2 or 3 weeks only with modern vehicles and all the electronics.

Odd things like reversing cameras and radios can catch you out.

It's crap but they spell it p-r-o-g-r-e-s-s these days.
 
Mar 29, 2011
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Get a solar panel, its the only answer if its parked away from home & EHU

Dave:thumb:

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darklord

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as long as you know where they all are, is it worth removing a fuse at a time to see where the drain is, especially on "add ons".

Oh, just a question befpore all the experts appear,...what sort of alarm is it and what protection does it give you?
 

pappajohn

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that seems a bit extreme........0.1v per day.

at that rate the battery will be, technically, flat in a week or less.

you definately have a 'Phantom' drain somewhere.

my first stop would be to completely disconnect the dash radio at the plug/socket on the back.


converters are known to play with the wiring to allow the radio to stay on (bypassing the ignitions accessory position) indefinitely and if done badly it could mean up to 200ma/h (1/5th amp per hour) drain even with the radio turned off at the on/off knob/button.

i made this mistake on my car, it was draining 185ma/h (radio off)...or 31 amps per week,,,from a 65ah starter battery.
that is a totally dead battery just one week later..
 
OP
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Get a solar panel, its the only answer if its parked away from home & EHU

Dave:thumb:

It has a solar panel and is on ehu at home, solar does not charge engine battery and I have to press a button on control panel to send power to it.

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OP
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that seems a bit extreme........0.1v per day.

at that rate the battery will be, technically, flat in a week or less.

you definately have a 'Phantom' drain somewhere.

my first stop would be to completely disconnect the dash radio at the plug/socket on the back.


converters are known to play with the wiring to allow the radio to stay on (bypassing the ignitions accessory position) indefinitely and if done badly it could mean up to 200ma/h (1/5th amp per hour) drain even with the radio turned off at the on/off knob/button.

i made this mistake on my car, it was draining 185ma/h (radio off)...or 31 amps per week,,,from a 65ah starter battery.
that is a totally dead battery just one week later..

Thanks for the replies.

The radio does stay on when ignition off which might have been what knackered the first battery as I left it on once. I will try disconnecting it.

The alarm is a Sigma and i have had problems with it which were supposedly sorted a couple of weeks ago by local car alarm/aiuto electrical company. But at £42ph don`t want to just give it to them to search for this problem.

Don`t suppose there is a way to turn off the alarm completely? having said that with the old battery, it was still going down when I locked the door manually and left alarm off. Red light on dash was still flashing though so not sure if that is for the alarm or imobiliser.

Steve
 
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darklord

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:thumb:I can see you not wanting to pay the fee's, so its still a process of elimination. you can put the multi meter inline and see if there is any change as each fuse is removed. OK some fuses will feed a couple of items, but it will still be easier.
The reason I asked about your alarm, is that some have been proved to be triggered into an "armed" stae by outside sources...in one case an energy monitor in someones home, the reason for this was a badly shielded fob pick up ariel which was changed for a revised model. The people you who last looked at the alarm should know how to disable it, but they probably wont tell you, they will need to do it themselves and will advise you that if your insurance relies on the alarm, it will be void if not working.
Good luck, and keep posting:thumb:
 
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It has a solar panel and is on ehu at home, solar does not charge engine battery and I have to press a button on control panel to send power to it.

Thats a bugger, I am a newbie so I was going on what happens on my Hobby unless I have a self recharging battery, In that case the experts are right you have to play detective

Dave

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:thumb:I can see you not wanting to pay the fee's, so its still a process of elimination. you can put the multi meter inline and see if there is any change as each fuse is removed. OK some fuses will feed a couple of items, but it will still be easier.
The reason I asked about your alarm, is that some have been proved to be triggered into an "armed" stae by outside sources...in one case an energy monitor in someones home, the reason for this was a badly shielded fob pick up ariel which was changed for a revised model. The people you who last looked at the alarm should know how to disable it, but they probably wont tell you, they will need to do it themselves and will advise you that if your insurance relies on the alarm, it will be void if not working.
Good luck, and keep posting:thumb:

I have checked the alarm and when it`s off, it is off, but as I said i don`t know why the light on the dash still flashes. Because I have had problems with the alarm, caused by it being wired incorrectly (or so they told me), I am naturally leaning towards that causing the problem with the battery.

I have ordered a generator, so hopefully any drain won`t cause any major problems even if I can`t track it down. At least by going down by 0.1 a day, if I take a fuse out I should know within 24 hours whether that is the problem.

Steve
 

pappajohn

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the flashing light will be the immobiliser circuit 'telltale' part of the alarm which should still work (immobiliser auto set) with the actual alarm turned off
 

darklord

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I like simplicity, and motorhomes are not simple. With a landy, I had the engine battery totally isolated from the rest. A bank of lesiure batteries powered the winch when needed, the fridge and spots, plus some incedental chargers for phones etc, no matter what happened, I could always get home. It seems to me, that MH builders tend to make the radio go off witht he ignition, and the hab area go dead witht he engine runnign, but thats it.
I shall be looking at our new van, with a view to copying the landy system, that way, it will be easier to see how much power usage there is and how best to replenish it.......I may even explore fitting a second alternator,...but thats another story, for another post.

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Shouldn`t the habitation electrics be seperate from the engine battery?

If it is, there are less things that can be causing the drain, or have I got it all wrong?

Steve
 

pappajohn

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Shouldn`t the habitation electrics be seperate from the engine battery?

If it is, there are less things that can be causing the drain, or have I got it all wrong?

Steve
It should be seperate unless....

the split charge relay has stuck closed

the fridge relay has stuck closed.

split relay will drain both engine and hab batteries, depending what is turned on in the hab area.

fridge relay stuck on will flatten your engine battery in hours, not days
 
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Thanks, they should be OK then as hab batteries are fine.

That leaves the radio and alarm as main possibilities.

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Techno

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useful bit of kit, but why cant they provide both size connectors and be interchangable ?


profit i guess :Doh:

Because you have to remove the circuit fuse and place it in the meter for it to work so it would also need two fuse holders in parallel not just an alternative connector

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hilldweller

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A handy cheap tool for your kit boxLink Removed

What a good idea badly implemented. Why on earth two meters, why not one meter and 3 heads ?

OR, you take 3 fuses, blow them, solder 2 wires, use normal meter. You could have all 3 soldered together as long as you make sure the two not in use don't ground out.
 

pappajohn

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Because you have to remove the circuit fuse and place it in the meter for it to work so it would also need two fuse holders in parallel not just an alternative connector
Sorry mate, but you're wrong.

you simply remove the fuse and insert the meter head into the vacant fuse holder in the box which then reads the current flow through that circuit.

what i meant was, have just one meter and a pair of interchangable heads for different sized fuses.
 

pappajohn

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Because you have to remove the circuit fuse and place it in the meter for it to work so it would also need two fuse holders in parallel not just an alternative connector
my appologies Techno....i see what you mean now i looked at the pic again.

still no reason not the have two interchangable heads and one meter thpugh.

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TheBig1

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many many years! since I was a kid
from what ive been told, the immobiliser built into the canbus system on fiats takes quite a current on standby. you cant "switch this off"
 

darklord

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A dealer I would have thought, could "speak" to the alarm through tthe Body Control Unit, and therefore turn it off or alter some options, in this case though, if as you say, the alarm is fairly hungry as normal...then there would be no point.:thumb:
 

aba

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one of those briefcase type solar panels stuck in the windscreen may just put enough back into the engine battery i know it don't solve the root of the problem but will probably help.

otherwise i don't know if one of those electronic split charge relays that sense the voltage before switching would work connected to the leisure battery to feed into the engine battery whilst on hookup.

sort of wired the opposite to how it should be if you follow.

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darklord

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I can see where you are coming from, but its putting a sticking plaster over the problem. Forget about the MH, if the chassis had a van back and was used by DHL or whoever, it would have gone back under warranty. the drop needs to be found so that whatever equipment is causing it can be repaired.
The alarm may be power hungry, but surely not enough to cause this sort of drop, or every Ducato Van parked up for the bank holiday would have a flat battery come tuesday?
Hopefullyn the OP wil have been busy and can put us all out of our misery:ROFLMAO:
 
OP
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I can see where you are coming from, but its putting a sticking plaster over the problem. Forget about the MH, if the chassis had a van back and was used by DHL or whoever, it would have gone back under warranty. the drop needs to be found so that whatever equipment is causing it can be repaired.
The alarm may be power hungry, but surely not enough to cause this sort of drop, or every Ducato Van parked up for the bank holiday would have a flat battery come tuesday?
Hopefullyn the OP wil have been busy and can put us all out of our misery:ROFLMAO:

Sorry, the OP has been busy, but not sorting the problem out (mainly because i don`t know how to), still showing 12.5 today, so used multi meter on battery (well the steel thingy under the bonnet that is connected to the battery) 12.43.

Will try it again tomorrow. If it is still going down it will have to go back to the guy who sorted the alarm as that in my opinion is the most likely source.

Thanks again for all of the replies.

Steve
 

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