OK, there's been lengthy debate in many threads about the correct method of charging a leisure battery.
There has been some well informed detail on the requirements for a "special" leisure battery charger and plenty of anecdotal evidence that standard car battery chargers are also OK.
My question is this: What sort of battery chargers do caravan manufacturers fit to their vans?
I've looked at the wiring diagram of the charger in my 1996 Elddis and it does not look very sophisticated at all. Should I rip it out and replace with a more modern pulsed charger?
My caravan resides in my back garden, hard up against a brick wall. The only way I can get it in is with a mover. Thus, once in position I can't get at the battery box to remove the battery to charge it on an independant charger, so it's plugged in to the mains via the hook up lead all the time.
I have had my present 110AH leisure battery since March 2003 and transferred it to my new van last year.We have a mover fitted to the van and this is used to park our van at home etc etc.
We always leave it in the van and use the van charger.Throughout the time the van is at home we leave it connected to the mains via a plug in timer that is set to come on every day for one hour
We have never had a problem with the battery and I would suggest in spite of all the "expert" evidence the on board charger keeps the battery fully charged. I believe if this was not the case the 10-12 minutes we use the mover for on our depatures from home would soon exhaust the battery if it was in a poor state of charge.
I can not understand why some one wants to change a perfectly good charger,surely the ones fitted by the manufacturer have been researched by them to do the job,if its fautly and out of warrenty OK change it,but why replace one that works and does the job its fitted for ?????????
------------- Think this year is to follow old meet friends for 2014.
If you cant do someone a good turn,don`t do them a bad one,its nice to be nice you know,and little things mean much more later in life.
Pete.
The manufactures don't fit battery chargers, they fit 12 volt power sources set at 13.8 volts which have a secondary use to keep the battery at a fairly high state of charge.
The reason is fully charging produces more gas than charging to about 85% so safer, least this was the reasoning when the rules were set. Today more modern electronics can get round this problem easily and cheaply but rules is rules for the time being.
Lastly though, the common 12 amp output at 13.8v power source can be used without a battery, you can't do this if it was set at 14.4v or 14.8v that a proper charger would be
Gary,I use my van for every day use,so I presume the alternator keeps my liesure batterys topped up,so when on site with EHU,dose it charge through the Zig unit,or the power source you mentioned,when ever I test my batterys they are allways showing around 13.4,and have nevr gone lower than about 12.8,sorry but I am a little confused with this.
------------- Think this year is to follow old meet friends for 2014.
If you cant do someone a good turn,don`t do them a bad one,its nice to be nice you know,and little things mean much more later in life.
Pete.
First for Zig read power source although some older Zig units did have a manual switch to turn them into what might be called proper battery chargers.
A battery needs 14.4 to 14.8 volts to charge to 100% of it's capacity,when it reaches this voltage a modern battery charger automatically switches back to 13.8v, this is known correctly as 'Float' charge but more commonly as 'Maintanance' charge because it maintains a high state of charge without chance of damage and very little gassing.
Older models though didn't automatically switch and you had to manually switch off or switch over to 13.8v. So back to the old Zigs, AKA 'battery cookers' because if you forgot to switch off the higher voltage would cook and destroy a battery. This all led to manufactures choosing to fit 'chargers' best suited for the overall job and 13.8 volts was picked as a good all round solution.
Since the early 90's electronics have moved on but not sadly the caravan industry!! I think though things should change soon and proper all round power sources with full battery charging capabilities fitted as standard.
A battery in good condition should see it's voltage rise back up to 12.8v when left unused for a while, however to get a true reading of it's state of charge you need to measure the voltage while things are switched on and it's under load, 12.8v like this is fully charged, 12.2v considered fully discharged.
Your alternator could well do a good job of charging the battery, if that is the full alternator voltage is getting to it, more often though it's less and often very much less.
thanx Gary for the help with the water system last month! got it working
can anyone help with my battery charging problem?
we bought a new leasure battery for our early 90s coachman, 5days into our holiday the battery ran flat, there is no amp meter in the van only a unit by the door which holds fuses, pump and light switch and a on off switch for 240v( this fuse keeps blowing) . There are only 2 wires coming off the battery, does this mean there is no charger in the can??
Hi Gary thanks for the info,I took my battery off and charged it overnight,on a 8 amp car charger,but it was only reading 6 amps when it started charging and when I checked it the next day the charging had gone right down to less than 1 amp,I put it back on the van and it was reading 13.8 volts so as you said,I put some lights on 4 twin tube fluorescent lights 8 whatt tubes so total is 64 whatts,checked the battery again and the reading was 13.6 volts with lights on,I left them all on for for about 4 hours,then checked it again 13.4 volts,after a total of over six hours of the lights being on the reading was stil 13.2 volts so do you think these are nomal or abnormal readings,thanks again Pete.
------------- Think this year is to follow old meet friends for 2014.
If you cant do someone a good turn,don`t do them a bad one,its nice to be nice you know,and little things mean much more later in life.
Pete.
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Topic: On board battery chargers
