78 Westy 2nd battery is not charged w/city power pluged in

[Joconab]

Hello,

I finally got my 78 Westy Deluxe running and took it camping at a RV Park w/city power. The brand new deep cycle battery was run down after the whole day of use. I did not noticed this until the indicator light dimmed out and died the next day. Apparently, the city power was not charging the battery when it was plugged in and the fridge ran it to the ground. I set the switch panel above the fridge correctly to "Refrigerator on & city power on." Also I notice that with that setting the "fridge-on" indicator light was not on until the dial was turn to the right to set a charging time. The 2nd batter got its charged on the drive home so I am glad the stock system works when engine is running.
I tried searching the forum and found only one thing close to my problem but it was in reverse; i.e. the 2nd battery is not being charged when driving.
Is there a bad relay or something? Please help.

[onion456]

well, sounds like something's not hooked up right? the dial should only set the charging time of the battery. also im pretty sure my 'fridge on' light will come on any time the fridge is on... regardless of power used.

i recently rebuilt my charging circuit, and have considered doing a write-up... i'd be interested to know what youve got installed for charging. note that the way ive got it going (which i think is pretty much stock?), you have a choice when connected to shore power- either charge the battery OR run the fridge. you dont get both. also.. when you are running the fridge from shore power, you are actually using your 12v charging circuit- converting 120v to 12v and using the 12v to run the fridge.

i hope youre ok at troubleshooting? i dont feel like theres a lot i can do to help you, other than to say: get in there with your meter, measure voltages, trace wires, figure out where theyre going/coming from and what they are supposed to do. you will have 120 coming in... figure out how it is supposed to convert it to 12v, then route it appropriately.

if you (or anyone else) wants to take some pictures of thier stock charging system, and its similar to what i just built, then i will take some time and do a good write-up =)
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'76 Sage Green Westy 2.0 FI
'76 Creamsicle 7-passenger 2.0 CS FI
'85 Tan Westy

[germansupplyscott]

the house battery does not get charged from city power automatically.

the only way to charge it is to turn the timer switch, then the converter will pass 120V converted to 12V to the house, for a specific length of time. in my experience the converters do not work very well as battery chargers because they have zero regulation in the power delivery. a real charger is able to apply different amounts of power depending on the condition of the battery, but the converter simply applies full power at all times.
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SL

[Joconab]

you have a choice when connected to shore power- either charge the battery OR run the fridge. you dont get both.


Thanks for the info. My bus is a very well taken cared of vehicle. Everything is working and looking good, Zero rust, with the exception of a few wear item such as: fading of curtains, fading of front seats and of course, now, the malfunctioning of the city power charger/fridge. The panel is very much stock and I guess I will have to go in to do my trouble shoots and I will take pictures to show how everything was put together.

[germansupplyscott]

[Joconab]

Scott,
Thanks for the link. If you are right about the original charger being bad and the replacement is a plug and play item. This will eliminate my troubles of trouble shooting the system. I am going to book mark the link and buy it sometime soon.
Thanks again,

[mad.macs]

There is a fuse inside the converter, under the cover. It's a 20A Glass fuse as I remember. It blew on mine.

Being a 20A fuse means it can only charge the house battery at 20A Max.
Check the output voltage of that converter too after you get it installed. I think mine was putting out over 16V, so I stopped using it. Not sure what my new radio would think of that. In my case the radio does run off the house battery.

I just looked at the specs on the charger that German supply is selling.
30A charger. Looks like it has a manual selection for Float 13.6V/Rapid 14.2Vcharging. You might be able to rig up the timer to control the Rapid charging feature. The unit will accept the IQ unit (+$66) that will automatically control the charging for you.

I do wish it had a remote panel that would give charging rates and output voltage. There are some that do have this feature for the marine industry, but they were relatively expensive.

[squagle]

I am thinking about picking up the 30Amp Converter as we have the exact issue. Could the 30Amp converter be used as a plug and play replacement to the factory 15amp converter? I would wire it up using the 13.6v leg. My main concern would be on the wire gauge that I believe is 14.

Could the factory wire (and timer) handle the 30Amp converter using the 13.6v output?

[72camper]