Right. I’ve been putting this off for a while but as it now affects my Dometic fridge and we’re looking to go on a trip to Europe this summer I need to tackle this. Been putting it off because electrics (and plumbing for that matter) are like the Dark Arts to me! So please bear with and excuse and incorrect technical references.
Some background:
My van is a ‘17 former PV T6 T28 ‘Covid conversion’ from a ‘professional converter’ that I bought Oct 21 from the original owner of it who had had it 1 year post-conversion. So I have no real history or relationship with how the conversion was done and what systems went in. It’s not a bad van and no major issues to date but I started to see a few corners had been cut - so it looked much better on the surface than under the covers.
I could see the previous owner potentially had a few electrical problems as he’d replaced the 1st (new) leisure battery inside a year. He’d also struggled with the fridge doing odd things so had put in a new rectifier just before I bought it. I still got those well known issues (orange flashing light when switching over from EHU to LB) but generally sorted by removing and replacing the 10a fuse in the CBE unit.
First revelation was that despite having an EHU point at the back of the van - there was in fact no LB charger onboard. So it served only to provide power to the 240v sockets when in hook up. The only way of charging the LB was via the Sterling B2B system (BB1230). So I suspect the LB had been left to run low and may have been affected. I’ve continued to plod on with that existing LB and a Halfords smart charger but it does seem (via the BT2 BMS devices recommended here) to drain to low levels over a period of 4-5 days. So I’m trying to work out if there is a parasitic drain and what might be causing it OR whether in fact the LB is knackered. Or both…
This is brought to a head by the fridge now, even with a ‘fully charged’ LB starting to “cough” and not fire the compressor. So blue lights are all on, no orange warnings, but not actually firing. I think this might be to do with either wiring (I’ll send pictures of the birds nest I’ve found under the drivers seat) affecting load to fridge OR simply the battery not having enough oomph to fire the fridge.
So - I need to work out what’s going on with the fridge. And determine whether I need a new LB.
Any help, ideas, further questions all gratefully received! Laying hooks for @Dellmassive but any input at all would be great.
Battery monitor screen grabs below - to show last Saturdays journey from a fully charged LB, then left unplugged since then, with a couple of short trips. (Thinking the fridge might be draining the LB as there is no isolation switch, this week for the first time I’ve removed the 10a fuse. ). Too early to tell but I do think the charge fall off might be better than it was previously.
Some background:
My van is a ‘17 former PV T6 T28 ‘Covid conversion’ from a ‘professional converter’ that I bought Oct 21 from the original owner of it who had had it 1 year post-conversion. So I have no real history or relationship with how the conversion was done and what systems went in. It’s not a bad van and no major issues to date but I started to see a few corners had been cut - so it looked much better on the surface than under the covers.
I could see the previous owner potentially had a few electrical problems as he’d replaced the 1st (new) leisure battery inside a year. He’d also struggled with the fridge doing odd things so had put in a new rectifier just before I bought it. I still got those well known issues (orange flashing light when switching over from EHU to LB) but generally sorted by removing and replacing the 10a fuse in the CBE unit.
First revelation was that despite having an EHU point at the back of the van - there was in fact no LB charger onboard. So it served only to provide power to the 240v sockets when in hook up. The only way of charging the LB was via the Sterling B2B system (BB1230). So I suspect the LB had been left to run low and may have been affected. I’ve continued to plod on with that existing LB and a Halfords smart charger but it does seem (via the BT2 BMS devices recommended here) to drain to low levels over a period of 4-5 days. So I’m trying to work out if there is a parasitic drain and what might be causing it OR whether in fact the LB is knackered. Or both…
This is brought to a head by the fridge now, even with a ‘fully charged’ LB starting to “cough” and not fire the compressor. So blue lights are all on, no orange warnings, but not actually firing. I think this might be to do with either wiring (I’ll send pictures of the birds nest I’ve found under the drivers seat) affecting load to fridge OR simply the battery not having enough oomph to fire the fridge.
So - I need to work out what’s going on with the fridge. And determine whether I need a new LB.
Any help, ideas, further questions all gratefully received! Laying hooks for @Dellmassive but any input at all would be great.
Battery monitor screen grabs below - to show last Saturdays journey from a fully charged LB, then left unplugged since then, with a couple of short trips. (Thinking the fridge might be draining the LB as there is no isolation switch, this week for the first time I’ve removed the 10a fuse. ). Too early to tell but I do think the charge fall off might be better than it was previously.
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