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05 /19/ 26, 6:26pm

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Subject: electrical short? Author: Tom Ray [ Next Thread | Previous Thread | Next Message | Previous Message ] Date Posted: 09/ 4/ 01, 3:43pm Ok all you BB wizards out there, I've got one for ya! Went bird hunting in South Texas over the h-day and woke up Monday morning @ 1:30am with my telephone, cb going crazy, lights in coach wouldn't work, etc. Went outside to see if the RV park had lost power, nope. Walked around the bird and saw that one of the halogen back up lights was barely glowing, docking lights and one driving light were doing same thing. Batteries were dead even though I was hooked up with 50amp service. Both batt chargers hot as a pistol. After daylight, some friends and I installed new batteries and had someone in coach flip the master on & off as we looked & listened inside & outside coach. Two relays above couch were engaging, one above bed and one behind the dash panel was engaging. As we started disconnecting the control wires to the relays one by one, the lights started going out. That is, all except the indicator lights on the dash showing that the backup lights and docking lights were on, but the switches were in the off position. Now, to this ignorant old man, this means I have a hot supply going to ground and backfeeding these control relays through their grounds? If that is indeed what is happening, Question is where the devil do you start looking for the culprit? Wondered if any of you guys had ever had such an experience and had found the problem to be any specific piece of equipment. Thanks for any help you can forward. Made it home without any further problems by leaving all the relays/solenoids disconnected. Alternator brought the new batts up to speed and everything seems to work(except of course the aforementioned disconnected equip.) Tom '82FC [ Next Thread | Previous Thread | Next Message | Previous Message ]

Replies:

[> Subject: Re: electrical short? Author: Bob Dilks [ Edit | View ] Date Posted: 09/ 6/ 01, 12:11pm Tom: As to the phone and cb working while "turned off", that has to be covered by the paranormal. Obviously you were visited by the spirits of South Texas. The rest is explainable. During the night someone accidentally hit the Security Light switch (generally located in the bedroom) which turns on the halogen backup lights, landing lights and front driving lights. This explains why these lights were "on" while their dash switches were "off". Next, your chargers were hot as pistols because they have degraded over time and could keep up with the relentless DC demand. Chargers are really converters first and chargers second. What this means is that they convert AC to DC first to meet the DC demand and then if there is any current left over, they charge the batteries. In your case, the chargers could not meet the DC demand which resulted in the third aspect, which was the DC demand drained the batteries to the point they were depleted. By disconnecting the relays which were excited by the signal from the Security Light switch, you in effect "turned off" the Security Light switch by eliminating the signal at the relay. You still need to find the switch in the bedroom dash and toggle it "off". [ Post a Reply to This Message ]

[> [> Subject: Re: electrical short? Author: Tom Ray [ Edit | View ] Date Posted: 09/ 6/ 01, 1:17pm Thanks for your reply Bob, After finding the security lights/docking lights glowing, the first thing I looked at was the bedroom switch. It was off. You have given me an idea though ------- the bedroom switch could be fried and making continuous contact. Would that be great, or what?!! Thanks for the input, I'll check it out and advise. Tom [ Post a Reply to This Message ]

[> Subject: Re: electrical short? Author: Bob Dilks [ Edit | View ] Date Posted: 09/ 6/ 01, 1:10pm Tom: While you had a spooky experience, I no longer believe the noise you heard was paranormal, or the phone, or the cb. What you should have heard, and probably did hear, was the "Low Battery" alarm going off. It is located on the monitor panel and, no pun intended, sounds like it woke you. All in all your coach worked as designed. Had you been awake at the time and had the presence of mind to check the gauges, which none of us do in an emergency, you would have noticed the DC discharging exceeded the DC charging which would lead to a battery failure. While you still wouldn't have had a clue as to the reason for the draw, it would have told you your chargers were no longer up to the task. A typical PDI (pre delivery inspection) procedure for a coach is to turn on all the lights and see if the chargers can keep up with the demand by watching the gauges, if not, it points to faulty or inadequate chargers. [ Post a Reply to This Message ]