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dad4papa2's avatar
dad4papa2
Explorer
Jun 24, 2020

No 12v power to Motorhome?

Hey folks I have a question about the 12 volt system on my 96 Damon Intruder.
I have shore power and Generator Power and everthing works ok, however when I Unplug and not run the Generator my 12V system does nothing.
I will say that my batteries do need replaced but I set up my Charger and put a good charge on the batteries and still no 12v system working at all.

A few years ago I put an Xantrex converter in place of the old 6300 magnetek and absolutely loved it. Not once did my batteries overcharge and boil them out!!!
Question is When I plug into shore power I used to be able to hear the converter fan kick in when the batteries needed a bit of charge and now I can not get it to kick on at all.
Where do I start??
I have tested all the fuses inside the Mh and all the breakers and they seem to be working fine.

I put a volt meter on what I believe is the wires coming back from the batteries and get a wierd 30v??

On the control board itself should I be able to find a 120v power to the board and then a 12 to 14 volt going to the battery section??

Hope this makes since.

I did check the little disconect switch in the battery compartment and it seems to be fine.

thanks for any input, as I'm now at a loss!!
Dad
  • opnspaces Yes I was plugged in and the last post I made was both figures of plugged in and when I flipped off the Main breaker.

    The contol board I am referring to is the little board that has all the fuses that control the 12v lights and fans etc when no shore or gen power turned on.

    and no to solar. don't have that!

    Dad
  • Well i went back out and run my meter checks again.
    With Shore power plugged in the Pos bat and neg bat terminals on the control board show 13.61 Volts (thats the White and green one in the top section of the converter on the right side.)
    With the power off they show .30 volts. I must have had my meter set wrong.
    When I test them at the battery terminals on the Battery I get 12.39 v.
    I think I will check all grounds and go from there.
    Any suggestions is great!!!
    Dad
  • dad4papa2 wrote:
    When I plug into shore power I used to be able to hear the converter fan kick in when the batteries needed a bit of charge and now I can not get it to kick on at all.

    On the control board itself should I be able to find a 120v power to the board and then a 12 to 14 volt going to the battery section??

    Hope this makes since.

    It makes no since.

    Sounds like the converter is not working. That's easy to check with a voltmeter. Make SURE the batteries are good by measuring their resting voltage with no charging on them for at least 10 minutes.

    I don't know what control board you're talking about.
  • Are you plugged in or is the generator running when you read 30v? Do you have solar?
  • Agree, 30 VDC makes no sense. Even if the 12 VDC batteries are wired in series instead of parallel like they should be, that would suggest that each battery is at 15 VDC???

    12 VDC batteries at rest will not exceed 13 VDC each. And, no 12 VDC charger would be able to charge to 30 VDC unless badly malfunctioning.
  • As an after thought I have two wires on the control board that is labled Bat Pos and the Other as Bat Neg. I put my meter on these and it shows 30V. ?? Why this is as I have 2 12 volt system for house batteries.
    Dad

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