My Starcraft 2007 came with a battery gauge. It never seemed very accurate, but now it is dead. I put my portable voltage meter on the back and the voltage read fine.Shall I try to replace it with an identical meter (there are no dealers near me), or replace it with something more useful?

IMO this meter has no useful function for we operators to use it... It is simply a GO-NO GO display...I would remove it and replace with something more useful. Maybe a TRIMETRIC RV-2025RV or something along that line. Even a simple DIGITAL DC VOLTAGE meter would be better to have... I like the idea of the TRIMETRIC RV-2025RV unit having a settable DC VOLTAGE alarm setting. This will alert you when the batteries being monitored when camping OFF GRID are failing off on DC VOLTAGE...My 2008 Starcraft OFF-ROAD POPUP trailer has one of those too... I think it still works haha...That three meter panel shown here replaces the 12VDC monitor for me...An Alarm like the TRIMETRIC RV2025RV unit provides would be most helpful for me here haha...Just sayingRoy Ken

I got a meter like THIS from ebay a couple of years ago. I cut a hole in my gauge panel and wired the meter through a miniature momentary-contact pushbutton switch. Press the button, see the voltage.These are super cheap but read very close to my Fluke multimeter.

There is only one way to know with some assurance what the SOC state of charge of you battery(s) are and that is with a battery monitor, and currently it is the Bogart Trimetric or the Vectron. I chose the latter because of ease of set up and use.

I mounted a freebie Harbor Freight VOM beside the original panel and hard wired it behind the panel. It cost nothing and now I can see the actual voltage rather than worthless idiot lights.

Or you could do it the South Of The Border way...Connect two wires, one to each post. Bare an inch on the ends...Strike the two together.If a big blue arc results the wires glow and your skin blisters..."You're good to go"

Replacing my battery guage | Good Sam Community

Almot
Explorer III
Apr 18, 2016
MEXICOWANDERER wrote:
It must change. The meter is a DROK unit.

How does it know the %? if this is just a prorated scale from 12=50% to 12.6=100%, for both open circuit and under load, flooded/gel/AGM - hey, who cares, right?
dougster
Explorer
Apr 19, 2016
MEXICOWANDERER wrote:
Or you could do it the South Of The Border way...

Connect two wires, one to each post. Bare an inch on the ends...

Strike the two together.

If a big blue arc results the wires glow and your skin blisters...

"You're good to go"

I kind of did that by mistake--everything works, except the meter itself.
MEXICOWANDERER
Explorer
Apr 19, 2016
Back in the eighties I visited a storage garage in Van Nuys where they were making FOX branded meters. From the circuit boards on up. The traces were globby threads and they had two workers assigned to troubleshoot and repair new boards that didn't work. Their power supply was set at 13.0 volts and meters that measured one decimal point over or under were "good". I noticed several that reached 13.0 the slumped or jumped two or three tenths. Some tiny capacitor smoke. I left shaking my head.
time2roll
Nomad
Apr 19, 2016
And for all you techies, a pic of my battery monitor.
dougster
Explorer
Apr 19, 2016
Here is what I ended up buying. Seems easy enough--mounts in same hole, two wires to hook up.
dougster
Explorer
Apr 19, 2016
Here is what I would like to have, but not sure I would know how to hook it up. Where would I run the wires labeled "load?"
dougster
Explorer
Apr 19, 2016
I'll try to make those pictures smaller next time.
MEXICOWANDERER
Explorer
Apr 19, 2016
Still cant get over that 66-lead central processor in the Drok meter.
Harvey51
Explorer
Apr 19, 2016
dougster wrote:
Here is what I would like to have, but not sure I would know how to hook it up. Where would I run the wires labeled "load?"

That monitor goes between the battery and what the battery was connected to. All current out of the battery must flow through it to be measured. Unhook the battery leads and connect them to the "load" side instead. Connect the "power" side to the battery.
Almot
Explorer III
Apr 19, 2016
dougster wrote:
Here is what I ended up buying.

As long as it measures better than those +/- 0.2V meters that Mex described.

If it doesn't read the 4th digit, the chances of the 3rd one being correct are... (fill the blanks with whatever your imagination would suggest).