Battery problems

csd4t

csd4t

Joined
Aug 4, 2016
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Location
Yorkshire
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44,417
MH
Vantage Neo
Exp
Since 2003
Been sat here in the Isle of Man on EHU for almost 2 weeks now, yesterday the radio stopped working (permanently wired and switched). Last night the central locking would not work. My panel is EC325 and is showing 9.5 volts overnight it has risen to 10.1v but as soon as you try locking drops again. Panel shows 0.5a charge which I presume is the solar. I'm sure the EC is a split charger and should be giving more than 0.5a. At the moment I'm thinking the battery is goosed but is it normal to suddenly die?
I'm going to have a delve today with a multimeter hopefully just the battery and not the Sargent EC325
Any other ideas?
Vantage PCV 2009 2.3 120 X250
 
I may have misunderstood your post, but wondered perchance, whether your EHU has tripped, leaving you with no power coming into the van?

@csd4t
 
That voltage , either your battery has died , or has now had it !
If you are on EHU your charger isnt working , if you haven't been over drawing and it cant keep up .
 
Our Sargent has a switch to charge/use leisure or starter battery.

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simple answer is check the charger is powered and turned on
 
Is the radio powered from the cab battery? Maybe the charger only sends a trickle charge to the cab battery, and if you are using the radio for hours it might be taking out more than the charger is putting in.
 
Ok ehu is on, meter shows a slight increase when the EC325 is off. Should the EC charge the vehicle battery when the engine is not running? Not sure of age of battery I've had van almost 2 years and it looks to have been replaced at sometime at sometime (it's a Yuasa)
Van is used/started quite regularly and just done 3500 miles through France/Spain no problem. I have had the radio on more than normal though.
At the moment I have an external optimate charger on see what happens.
Good job we're racing here and got access to plenty of tools etc.
 
I too have the EC325 in my motorhome. The 0.5 amp is the draw being placed on your battery and is normal when everything is switched off. (0.4 on mine). The voltage reading indicates your battery is dead and is not receiving a charge. You have a solar panel fitted too and clearly something is wrong as you should be getting a much higher voltage going into your batteries from either the solar panel or the on board charger. If the charger is switched on which I assume it is and your not getting 14.2-14.4 V going into your batteries its a case of the charger has failed (Unlikely as the solar panel would also put in voltage ) I suspect the fuse protecting the leisure battery has blown. There will be one on your EC325 and their may be another by the battery itself.
 
Starter battery, not leisure batteries, they are almost new and receiving a charge. The 0.5a is a plus figure, all 12v including compressor fridge is fine.
The optimate has it back to almost 12v at the moment. I think maybe the radio has been the culprit and the EC325 is prioritising the leisure batteries ( because of the fridge/TV etc. I've found that a switch on the panel can give priority to starter or leisure and when I turn this on the voltage jumps to 14v
I'm here for a while yet so will see what happens and source a new battery if needs be.

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If your starter battery has gone down to the voltage you posted
it might not be retrievable ! and even if you get it back up , its capacity will be lowered .
 
You may be able to recover your starter battery. Place it on full charge and hopefully you will be OK in 24 hrs or so. My Autotrail automatically sense state of both batteries and charges both sets of batteries, I assume your does not and you have to do this manually. Start wacking 14 V into it if that's the case, it will drop down to 13.7 when fully charged.
 
Think you've answered your own question - the radio has goosed the battery as not enough going in 'cos you've set the switch to leisure batteries. The clue is when turned to engine battery the voltage jumps to 14.4, which is what you should see when the battery is charging.

The only question now is has the engine battery been damaged by being fully discharged. Hopefully as it has been for a very short period you may have got away with it - just leave it on charge for as long as you can.

I never use the facility to switch batteries, IMO that's for emergencies. Instead I use a Battery Master that feeds a low wattage to the engine battery from the leisure (until a certain low voltage is reached) as required. Not sure if the EC325 has that facility already built in. @PhilandMena ??
 
TerryL said:
I never use the facility to switch batteries, IMO that's for emergencies. Instead I use a Battery Master that feeds a low wattage to the engine battery from the leisure (until a certain low voltage is reached) as required. Not sure if the EC325 has that facility already built in. @PhilandMena ??
Click to expand...
I think it depends on build year Terry. I was very surprised to find out, after fitting a battery monitor a few years ago that my leisure batteries were also being charged by the alternator when the engine was started. Up to 8 amps going were going in and it might have been more depending on the leisure battery state. This was the factory set up and my EC325. (2011 build) Also it monitors and charges both sets of batteries automatically as does the Solar Panel that is connected to the factory fitted Sargent controller in the back of the EC325 PSU. I did speak to Sargent a few years ago about fitting a battery master and the advice I got was it did not work well with the Sargent system. It might be worth getting this confirmed before installing one.
 
After overnight on the optimate and a few hours this morning with the EC set to vehicle battery the van started.
Seems to be stable around 12.5v with no input and up to 13.7v with the EC
Hopefully I've resurrected it, certainly won't be leaving the radio on!!
Thanks for all input/advice now back to the racing.

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That looks good, now you know how it works you should have no further problems.

Our radio has been wired to the leisure batteries, no danger of it flattening the engine battery. Apparently it's quite simple to do (anyone?)
 

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