peterjl Posted June 6, 2007 Share Posted June 6, 2007 Hi We have a 13 month old Hobby on a tranny base purchased through Brownhills May 2006 and covered 10600 miles - last long journey April 3000 miles and last short jouney 150 round trip 15/5 to Brownhills Swindon for 1st years hab service. Hab service showed a faulty 12v plug where power not getting through and they are supposed to have ordered a replacement under warranty. Went into van yesterday to find Hab battery completely flat - would not even put up the green LED on the 12v on/off switch - couldn't find anything obvious switched on. Put on charge overnight 8pm to 7am - seems to be holding ok when i checked at 7pm - the control panel showing 3 green lights still Now this motorhome has been left a few weeks at a time before (i usually take for a drive every 3 or 4 weeks when not in use) and the battery has been ok. Can't get hold of anyone at Brownhills Swindon (they appear to be in a complete mess with several key members of staff left)- spoke to service at Newark who say can't look at it until July - also indicated that a habitation battery could discharge itself in 3 weeks! My questions are:- 1)Is a year old battery likely to discharge itself in 3 weeks with no obvious load and no history of going flat that quickly 2) would the 11 hours of being plugged into mains fully charged it - three green lights show on power board so it seems to be saying it has but it doesn't seem long to me. 3)I am conscious that the battery may have been damaged by the 100% discharge it seems to have suffered - it that probable or just possible? I will watch monitor the green lights and perhaps put a load on it ( inside lights) over the weekend. I'm off to France in 2 weeks so i'm a bit miffed with Brownhills at present. I wrote to MD re lack of service at Swindon et al in desperation. Thoughts/ideas/suggestions would be appreciated. Peter Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
chas Posted June 6, 2007 Share Posted June 6, 2007 Hi Peter- I will not comment on Brownhills standard of "service". I would take the battery to a supplier who can check out the cells and general condition of the battery, and if there is any dought get a new one before you depart for France, if it packs up over there you will pay premium prices. Good Luck. chas Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Brian Kirby Posted June 7, 2007 Share Posted June 7, 2007 To try to answer: I think it very unlikely a 13 month old battery would discharge itself in three weeks. Assuming the problem is not one of bad connections giving false/misleading indications, this points to a cause within the motorhome 12V system. Something is drawing current, and so has flattened the battrey. Short term, my only suggestion would be to get a multimeter, or just a clamp on consumption meter (probably Maplins for either), and check what current is being drawn when you think everything is off, with mains disconnected. I think the Hobbys have a combined charger/fuseboard similar to many other German made vans. Start with the battery as fully charged as possible. If you have the handbook, check the 12V fuse functions and pull that feeding the 12V power circuit. If the draw on the battery shows 0A, put the fuse back and look again at the reading. If it has gone up, it is probably the faulty socket Brownhills identified that is shorting. Pull the fuse again, remove the socket, check and make safe the wiring, and re-test. If the reading now doesn't rise, you've probably fixed the fault. If it does rise, remove fuse and disconnect the socket totally, make the wiring safe and re-test. If the reading now doesn't rise the fault is in the socket, which will have to be replaced. If the reading rises again, the fault will lie in the wiring between the fuse and the socket. That may be difficult to trace and will almost certainly require the services of someone who knows their way around the 12V wiring.If all the above fail, you'll have to pull all those fuses feeding the internal 12V circuits (fridge, fridge light, lighting, power etc etc) , until the draw in the battery is 0A. (If it isn't, the problem may lie in the charging relay which I believe is inside the magic control box, and I can't offer any further help with that!) Assuming 12V = 0A therefore, try inserting each fuse, one at a time, and checking whether the reading has changed. At each stage, switch on any permanently connected appliance/s (fridge, lights etc) briefly, and check the reading again. Then switch off again, and move to the next fuse. Note any odd readings, such as the reading rising when power is reinstated to 12V sockets with nothing plugged in. Somewhere down the line you should find the circuit responsible. If reinstating 12V to the fridge causes around 8-10A to flow, it is almost certainly the relay that has failed. Assuming you find the circuit where the fault lies, you will have to see what is on that circuit and check each item individually.There isn't much point in worrying about what has happened to the battery until the system fault has been fixed. You'll need the battery connected to do the tests, and can replace it afterwards if it seems to have been damaged, which is possible. However, a good battery retailer should be able to test its condition quite quickly and simply.Good luck! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
peterjl Posted June 7, 2007 Author Share Posted June 7, 2007 Many thanks for the detailed reply - i will print off and keep in MH. In meantime my letter to Brownhills prompted a telephone call to my mobile at 1pm and my van is booked in at 8.30 Wednesday. Fingerscrossed it all gets sorted. As i said your advise is sound and could by very useful if problems when i'm away - think i'll visit Maplins. regards Peter Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
peterjl Posted June 7, 2007 Author Share Posted June 7, 2007 Many thanks for the detailed reply - i will print off and keep in MH. In meantime my letter to Brownhills prompted a telephone call to my mobile at 1pm and my van is booked in at 8.30 Wednesday. Fingerscrossed it all gets sorted. As i said your advise is sound and could by very useful if problems when i'm away - think i'll visit Maplins. regards Peter Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Derek Uzzell Posted June 7, 2007 Share Posted June 7, 2007 Peter: The standard habitation-battery on a Transit-based Hobby is an 80Ah gel battery. This type of battery has a design capability of maintaining its 'at rest' state of charge for long periods and the one on my July 2005 Hobby T-600 FC has proved capable of doing this. So, to try to answer your questions: 1. In normal circumstances a fully-charged battery (gel or 'wet' type) in good condition and with no load placed on it should not discharge significantly within a 3 week period. 2. Depends what you define as "fully charged". The instructions for the CBE CB-516 battery-charger used on my Hobby (and presumably on yours) indicate an extended charging period when the charger is in gel-battery mode before 100% charge-state is attained and the charger enters stand-by status. However, if you've got 3 green LEDs on the control-panel's charge-scale after 11 hours of charging, then that indicates a respectable chunk of charge even if the battery is not up to 100%. 3. Assuming that the battery itself isn't faulty and the cause of it discharging is external to it, then I'd guess it won't have been harmed. The ability to survive 'deep discharge' is another claimed attribute of a gel battery. As you probably know, the habitation battery is located inaccessibly beneath the cab passenger seat alongside the CBE control/fuse-box and separate charger. What makes the battery inaccessible is the seat-swivel mechanism above it, but what you may not be aware of is what a swine it can be to remove the seat + swivel if you do need to reach the battery. This is due to the type of fastenings used and Hobby apparently employing gorillas in their factory to tighten them up! I'm afraid that gel batteries are unpleasantly expensive whether you buy them in the UK or abroad. Unless you've got a duff battery, an external load has flattened it. My T-600 FC has an illuminated hanging-rail in the wardrobe (a Hobby speciality) and the operating-switch arrangement originally allowed this to stay lit even when the wardrobe door was closed. Left unmodified, this would soon have flattened the habitation battery. The hanging-rail light is controlled via the habitation electrical control panel's main switch, but there are certain items that bypass this. The Dometic fridge, unless switched to the fully-OFF position, places a continuous small load on the battery to run its electronics (or a much bigger load if the fridge has a 'frame heater' for its freezer compartment and this has been accidentally left ON). The Truma heater's 'safety' drain-valve also requires 12V power when in the closed position, but would take an awful long time to flatten the battery. As Brian advises, a methodical approach is needed to try to identify what's pulling down the battery's charge state - but that's Brownhills' responsibility now. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
peterjl Posted June 8, 2007 Author Share Posted June 8, 2007 Hi Many thanks Derek. On the whole I am very pleased with the Hobby - in its first 12 months we managed about 9 weeks away and 10500 miles (i have an understanding employer) so this was a shock. Brownhill have booked me in for Wednesday morning so i am trusting them to do the necessary. Regards Peter Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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