Charging house batteries
2017 forest river forester 3051. Parked in front of my house and the house batteries are low. What's the best way to charge them? Nothing is on in the rv. It's just sitting there. Turn on the ...
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It's been plugged into the house on 15amp for about 48 hours and the voltage dropped from about 11 down to 8.6. Yes, the battery switch is on.
If the voltage is that low, then the battery is completely dead, and you are probably going to have to replace it. But, first you need to figure out your problem.
Nothing in the RV is on, so I can't figure out where it's draining from.
As I mentioned in a previous post, there are parasitic drains--alarms, radios, and maybe your jacks. These are on all the time, some may even be on when your battery switch is off. In the case of alarms this is a safety feature.
When I turn on the chassis engine and let it idle, the voltage jumps to around 13.3, so I hope that will charge it up to 12v and then I can use the house power line to maintain it.
With an 8 volt battery that could take all day. Idling your engine like that is not good for it. Are you plugged into shore power yet? If not you need to do so. Then you also need to check the voltage at the house battery to see if your converter is charging it. It should be reading 14v or more at the start. If it is an automatic charger it will taper off the voltage to about 13.2-13.6 when the battery is fully charged which may take all day.
If you are not seeing 14v+ when you plug into shore power, then you have a problem. Either your converter does not have a charger, or it is not connected, or it is not working.
