..... well at least I think that's what you call the thing ! Having a problem with batteries being drained when connected up to our caravan. So far 2 good batteries have been drained as we discovered when all of the 12 volt stuff in the 'van stopped working fter a few weeks.
Batteries been checked & they are not the source of the problem (once charged up again with a normal battery charger they hold their charge as normal until conected to the caravan) so we have to assume the fault liews with this thing .....
Can anyone tell me where I might get another please ? I'd also be grateful to know if perhaps another compatiable type would be more reliable / better in any way.
Also wondering if anyone knows how often these go wrong. It's an older caravan, one of the last Eccles made (at Newmarket factory) before they became Stirling and were made in another factory - but atm the year escapes me.
I have one of these chargers and it does the job very well. I charge up before I go and don't usually need to charge whilst away.
Just remember to disconnect it if you're not actually connected to the electricity after charging. Mine drained the battery as I left it connected with no electric on!
We already have chargers to charge the battery up when it's removed from the caravan, it's the onboard charger that's gone ! Sorry I think maybe I didn't make it very clear.
Problem is all the time at home or away that the caravan is in use the battery wasn't getting toped up even though we were hooked up to the mains, consequently 2 different batteries in the caravan got deeply discharged
The Labcraft ones like the original pictured apparently ceased to be made long ago.
Rang up another caravan place (the man at the first one unfortunately obviously didn't really know what he was talking about re batteries) nearby & a chat wiith the man in their workshope confirmed ours wasn't working.
They had another one in stock so we bought it yesterday along with a new leisure battery. Though we could've got it off the internet more cheaply we have come-back this way if we continue having probleams, and it's comforting to know a helpful knowledgable person is at hand for consultations ! He was really helpful, explained a lot re the wiring etc too & it's good to help keep local businesses open.
Hopefully once hubby's got a minute to fit it all we'll have no more probs in that area & can be ready for another trip away soon
I understood that it was your onboard charger that was gone.
Any decent charger can replace it, and be fitted permanently in the van, you don't really need any particular one, just one that is suitable for leisure batteries and gives the appropriate amps.
We carry a 20amp output Sterling one as reserve. This is powerful enough to run the van AND charge the battery.
If our onboard one fails we can connect it into the system by plugging it into a socket and running the wires to the battery (simple explanation, it's OH who knows about all these things!). Anyway, it works fine, we had to do this once in our previous van so we know it works.
In a newish van, we probably would spend the £100-200 it would cost to get a new charger, but on our older van we would just have installed something suitable (and much cheaper) instead.
It is a good idea to carry certain spares on a trip......
light bulbs, fuses, charger, pump, ......without those most vans are useless.
Hi jennifer, from what my husband has read & been told a normal battery charger can certainly be used but not just any one....
It seems that if a charger boosts at more than 14 volts, you run the risk of fusing the 12 volt system.
Some battery chargers will only ever put a maximum of 14 volts or less at an acceptable ampage, but a lot of others - even those that trickle charge - will give boosts at higher than 12 volts if they sense that the battery requires a lot of topping up. Then you may find your whole 12v system is fused !
We do always carry spares too, belt & braces man is my hubby
The spare we carry is a fancy thing that is "intelligent" apparently. We got a 20 amp one as our van is power hungry, but quite a few of the less expensive ones (say £30-40) which have a lower output, work similarly.
Just any old car battery charger is of course NOT suitable.
Sorry jennifer I thought by decent you meant decent quality, & of course there's lots of very good quality chargers that will charge / boost at more than 14 volts & high ampage.
To be honest I thought that the `intelligent' ones are those that will `work out' if the battery is quite low & automatically then deliver a higher voltage`boost' ? If that's so, the info we got said that - for our caravan at least - that shouldn't exceed 14 volts if you want to avoid risking your 12 volt sytem getting blown !
Well, I am not that up on all these things, but we did go into it quite thoroughly at the time (about 4 years ago), and this charger was deemed to be suitable....
Haven't a clue what the thing we got the other day is ! I do remember it's 13.8 maximum voltage though, & I think 3.8amps trickle & 10 amps maximum.
God knows why I remembered that - I must be getting like the OH which is a bit worrying actually..... Ah well never mind I'm sure I'll have totally forgotten all of it in about a weeks time ....
a decent normal charger will output more than 12V, but I do not see any reason for it to "fuse" a 12V system, your car has a 12V system, but the majority of the time, in the summer at least, its running at 14.4V to fully charge the battery.
Caravan chargers do not fully charge the van battery, but charge to 80%, above 80% and the battery will gas a little bit, giving off hydrogen, which is not good as its pretty explosive.
The other main risk with a charger is that it may not shut off when the battery is full, over charging and therefore reducing the life of your batt, a caravan charger cannot overcharge, it simply isnt up to it.
Hi Tim - what I was saying was that some chargers give boosts in excess of 14 volts -
To spell it out some chargers boost a lot higher, some of the car battery `smartchargers' will give boost charges of as much as 22 volts.
Using a car battery charger that is producing 22 volts can fuse your 12volt system if you are using it at the same time.
Most built-in battery chargers/ transformers working in a caravan charge at 13.8 volts. The problem is when it goes from 13.8 volts to 22 volts quickly / in a surge & you are using some of the 12 volt system in the caravan, there is a possibility of fusing it. That's why we were advised not to buy a `smartcharger' for our caravan !
As with so many things there are I'm told very many variables. Perhaps some caravans have regulators which monitor the return - I don't know. But I do now know that not all caravans can run on any decent car battery charger without risking blowing the 12 volt system ! Ours apparently is one of them.
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Topic: On-board Charger Problem
! Having a problem with batteries being drained when connected up to our caravan. So far 2 good batteries have been drained as we discovered when all of the 12 volt stuff in the 'van stopped working fter a few weeks. 
