Batteries and electric hookups!

[mariesnowgoose]

Engine battery on camper was dead as a dodo when we came to start it this morning, Neil tells me it was only reading 2 volts.
(It's an old Autosleeper executive, btw)

We've got it on charge now and it's up to 9 volts and still climbing.
Thing is, what has caused it to suddenly go flat overnight?! Its been running fine lately

So I'd been checking the Carver fanmaster 4000 gas (and mains electric) fire yesterday to make sure it worked.
Tried it on 240 mains electric as a fan heater with the hookup and it seemed to be working fine.

I then switched off the 240 supply to the van - control unit for 240v mains is in the back of the wardrobe - I'm always paranoid about using the electrics correctly and do things one step at a time, double checking along the way...

Then went to switch on the 12v supply on the main control panel above the hab door and checked that the heater also works fine independently on gas, which it did. (The instruction manual for the Carver says you need the 12v switched on to fire up the heater when using it with gas).

However - when I came back into the house the house fuse box had been tripped
The only thing that could have suddenly caused this was the electric hookup when I was firing up the carver heater... ?

Whatever, I think we need a competent carver gas engineer to give it all the once over.
Been looking up one or two engineers in our area who are qualified for caravan and LPG equipment servicing , will see if any of them know what they're on about and can give it a safety check/service.

This shouldn't have anything to do with the engine battery though, should it...?

It it's not one bl**dy thing it's another! ☹

 

[davef]

Batteries can very suddenly die -probably from internally shorting. Some years back we had a mainland shopping trip stopping and starting all day, stopped at the ferry cabin to hand over tickets, went to restart the engine....and absolutely nothing - battery completely dead. Had to be towed on and off the ferry and bump started the other side and able to drive home being a basic diesel engine not requiring electric. Or off course you may have a short in the van electrics somewhere. If you have a multimeter set it to amps and put inline from 1 battery terminal to the battery lead with other battery lead connected. If everything is off there should only be milliamps drawn for clock etc. - if more then start removing fuses till you find the faulty circuit.
The house circuit breaker tripping if due to the connection to the van needs someone competent with electrics to check out.

 

[RV2MAX]

If it was reading that low probably done serious harm to battery , if it wasn't u/s before etc

 

[Markd]

I had a battery run completely flat when I first got my motorhome as i thought the solar was dual circuit and the alarm eventually took it down to 3V.
Chargers wouldn't touch it so I jumped it to my car and after a while I attached a charger and it picked up.
4 years (and a dual channel charger!) later the battery is still really good.
I ran a health check meter on it recently a d got a clean bill of health!!
So all may not be lost but you will need to find out what is drawing it down.
A process of elimination probably but it might cure itself - you never know.

 

[Phantom]

I found my starter battery completely flat one day. It was very odd because the solar keeps the hab batts charged and a battery master sends a trickle to the starter battery. I never did find out what had happened and just bought a new one. The old one charged up fine and held good voltage.

 

[Markd]

Battery could have died suddenly - I had one fail while I was in a supermarket.
It had been fine all day and I drove 4 miles to a supermarket - when I came out 45 minutes later it wouldn't start!
Just wouldn't turn car over - called breakdown and got jump started. I drove home (20 minutes) and put on charger overnight but it still wouldn't start car on morning.