What is draining my batteries?

[Ryan Wright]

On 5/15/07, krminyl@... wrote:
>
> Any way you can run a drop cord to your battery charger, and just keep it
> plugged in? You don't have to run everything off the 50a cord if everything
is
> turned off...all you really need is a 110v extension cord, unplug your
> battery charger/s from the coach circuit, and plug it into the extension
cord.

Yup. I just did that last night - at least now my batteries should
stay charged. Had to run two 12 gauge cords off two different circuits
from the garage. I have a pair of "WFCO 75 amp power connectors" for
chargers and they draw a solid 13-14 amps each when charging. I
suppose I could have only plugged one in, now that I think about it,
but I don't know if they are configured to both charge both banks, or
one charger per bank, or what, so I plugged 'em both in.

> As for the drain, the alarm causes a draw, along with the radio, LED's on
> your monitor panel, overhead LED segment clocks and timers.

Oh, I figured that, but I can't imagine these things even combined
draw enough to drain these batteries. Unless they're of a really poor
design, the clocks and LED panels should only draw a small fraction of
an amp each. Something else must be draining here - I'm going to track
it down as soon as I get the coach up by my house where I can work on
it more easily.

> If your optima
> batteries have been discharged a few times, they might be toast...take them
to
> an auto parts store, alternator rebuild shop, or anywhere else where they can
> load-test the batteries.

Good idea. I think you may be right about the Optimas being toast.
Having used Optimas in my DeLorean for a couple of years due to the
sealed design (the battery compartment is inside the passenger
compartment), I know for a fact they don't handle being discharged.
They seem incredibly fragile in that respect.

> Your coach came with deep-cycle 6v golf cart
> batteries (I think) which can sustain a full discharge many times with
harming the
> cells permanently. If your batteries are ruined, I'd recommend re-wiring it
> back to it's original 6v configuration. If you leave your coach for longer
> than a few days, and everything is shut off electrically, I'd also consider
> some kind of battery disconnect switch, that removes the battery 12v circuit
> completely from the coach (when located at the batteries, you won't even
have
> to kill the master or electronic master switch...just shut off the batteries
> completely).

Good call all around. I may take your advice and replace 'em with 6
volt units even if the Optimas aren't toast. I have a brand new high
amp battery disconnect switch here, too, which I'll install when I
replace the batteries and re-wire.

-Ryan