Hiya everyone, just a quick bit of advice, i recently bought off ebay for the grand sum of a fiver a 12v leisure charger and power supply for my van, it's got no marking it's just in a green big and heavy box with red and blue wire (240v) and a red and black wire (12v) coming out, the previous owner said it worked fine, so i wired a plug in and put a multi meter across the 2 12v wires, a constant 15v output was showing, im a bit worried to connect it to a battery incase it blow's it, i think it's basically a transformer inside the box, would i be ok installing it with a battery attatched aswell, would this lower the voltage, is it outputting 15v as there is no battery attached, hope someone can help, cheer's. Jamie
P.S Just to clarify it look's just like this but the box is green/brown, sorry but im colour blind and mix the two colour's up .
Ditto Michael's post - batteries, especially leisure ones, need very carefully-regulated supply. I personally have three chargers - one is the built-in one in our caravan(!!) the second is an old charger similar to what you have (ie four wires and a constant 15v output!) which I have had for years (given to me by a mate following a clear-out from his workshop)- I use this to power a 12v inspection lamp in the garage and to test anything I need to of 12v. The third is a Halfords top-of-the-range (not that dear either) which I have also had for years which I use occasionally to recharge the Roadster battery (that car doesn't come out often) and which I will use occasionally to top up the new leisure battery. It has the optional selector for sealed battery charging and gradually reduces the charge as the battery regains its normal self.
HTH
Pete
With no load applied (ie no lights, fridge, battery etc)your power supply voltage will be a bit high. In fact it has to be higher than the battery volyage to charge it.
Thank's for all your help everyone, i put 2 new terminal's on the battery today with a multimeter attatched and attatched the supply, flicked the switch with a bit of hope and voila!! 12.9 Volt constant on the screen, going to leave it plugged in for a few hour's on the kitchen worktop see how she goes then i can order my new Leisure battery, thank's for the help everyone :)
ok, plugged it in for several hour's and now she's topped out at 14.4v , im kinda worried about gassing, should i be or not?? Cheer's, Jamie
should be fine,a fully charged battery is 12.7 volts or more.all caravan chargers will only charge to 13.5 volts max.as ours is constant.an external charger will go over this to 14.5 but left standing will reduce by itself.
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Topic: Old 12v battery/caravan charger
