Now I consider myself an experienced caravanner but we got back from a week in Barmouth about 3 weeks ago washed cleaned and vacuumed van and put back in storage. Picked van up yesterday and battery showing 4volts. Put on electronic charger and got to 7 volts. The battery has a 2 year warranty but when I checked the receipt it was up a week ago (bummer). Anyway phoned the supplier and he said bring it in and he will swap it (nice one). The point I am making is that the battery was a Banner 110amp. No matter what I do if I leave the battery connected to the van it always drains after a few weeks. I am sure I have a leak somewhere but not sure where. Any ideas.
------------- A barman is just a pharmacist
with a limited inventory
To check your theory about having a drain, turn everything off, disconnect one of the battery connections and put an meter between the battery post and the disconnected cable, if it is draining it will show a current reading. As La La suggests it may be the charger which is faulty and draining the battery through its secondary circuit.
A lot of chargers have no blocking diode between the charger and the battery, and there is a voltage divider chain of resistors between the + and - lines that the charger uses for sensing.
It is only a very small drain, but more than enough to take a battery down over a few months.
Either pull the charger output fuse if fitted, or take the battery off and keep at home on a monthly trickle charge.
To check your theory about having a drain, turn everything off, disconnect one of the battery connections and put an meter between the battery post and the disconnected cable, if it is draining it will show a current reading. As La La suggests it may be the charger which is faulty and draining the battery through its secondary circuit.
Was just reading this to Mr La-la to see if that's what he did or if there was another way as well. He said yes you can do it that way too, but he did it like this ! ......
He took the battery off, & while the van was connected to the mains electric he tested across the terminal clamps - nothing.
As some units don't work unless they are connected to a battery (& he didn't know if the one we had did or not) he then took the whole unit out, connected it to the mains & re-connected the battery terminals to the battery again.
It was only giving a reading of around 12.1 volts - if it had been working correctly it should have been reading 13.8 as this is what it should have been charging at.
I hope that makes sense ?! Just thought I'd post this as sometimes it's helpful to have a few different ways to do things .
Quote: Originally posted by jeff juke on 28/7/2011
Are you leaving the ariel booster on,or a sterio on standby?
We have also disconnected our TV aerial (the 1 & only switch didn't make the light go off) as we'll never use TV in the caravan, & we were concerned it would be draining power.
Jeff & a few other said on a thread I posted here recently that they reckoned the booster aerial would be using a fair bit of power. If you have one & it's left on it won't be helping matters as far as I can gather.
hi guys - I have taken a voltage of my new battery and registered 13.8 volts. So I am happy to go away on Saturday to Keswich even though I am on hook up. When we get back I am going to start checking the drain. and will investigate your points as it is so frustrating not to know why this is doing it. I have a mutimeter but not sure how to check.
------------- A barman is just a pharmacist
with a limited inventory
Quote: Originally posted by Chalkie56 on 28/7/2011
hi guys - I have taken a voltage of my new battery and registered 13.8 volts. So I am happy to go away on Saturday to Keswich even though I am on hook up. When we get back I am going to start checking the drain. and will investigate your points as it is so frustrating not to know why this is doing it. I have a mutimeter but not sure how to check.
Chalkie not sure when you're back but do post again then - I'll ask my OH & post what he says. I'm sure there'll be plenty others who can explain it too though
If you leave your caravan switch on it will drain the battery because it supplys the relays with power , the switch i'm on about is the one that says Caravan Car , on mine there is a middle switch off position , you can actually hear the relays turn off . See picture http://www.1carpc.co.uk/wcdr/user/cimage/PIC-0049a.JPG
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Topic: Arrgghh Battery
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