Small electrical problelm

Regulator set points are lower because modern under-hood temperatures are higher, and not because of some new profound wizardry in battery design. One way to thwart this is to ensure a good solid voltage supply to the camper then fit a DROK 600-watt DC to DC booster alongside the battery and set it to 14.6 volts.

If a person was a marathon driver coast to coast the voltage would have to be tweaked downward.

As the regulator approaches the magic "Dropout Voltage" of around 1.3 volts differential between incoming and outgoing signal the booster drops out of circuit and the alternator regulator takes over at a lower voltage. The DROK has an integral 20-amp ATO fuse that is easily replaceable.

You need to take a ride with someone in back who can measure the voltage at the house battery while you are driving.

Battery charging voltages from the alternator are much lower these days than they used to be. 13.8V is not uncommon. If there is any loss in the wiring, you just are NOT going to get high enough voltage at your house battery.


Does your camper have a good built in charger ? The simple answer may be to run a low power (300-500W) AC inverter off of the engine battery (use #10 wire with a fuse close to the battery) and feed the camper ! Pay extra for a pure sine wave inverter.

Moved to Tech Issues forum from DIY.

Did it ever work?

autiger74 wrote:
I need your help. My wife and I just completed driving and camping the Blue Ridge Parkway in a Ford truck and Lance 861 truck camper.
My problem is that when driving the truck, the batteries on the camper were not recharging. I need hints on where to start looking.

Thanks,

Is this a new problem or something that just started? New Truck used truck?

Check that the connections are snug at the pigtail. Also take a piece of fine emery cloth and clean the contacts occasionally.

A very useful tool that you will have for all your RV needs is to purchase a male and female seven pin connector set and wire each end with one foot long pigtails of the right color. If you can't find the right color wires, put numbers and purpose onto masking tape and get as many right colors as you can.

Then, you can put the correct one into your truck and use a meter to determine what wires work, or you can feed power into the RV from a jumper cable that connects to the correct one for your RV, and see what works in the RV.

It's something that you will be able to use for all your RV uses throughout your life and really cuts down the process of trying to hold meter leads onto screws because you use electrical jumpers with alligator clips to connect your meter to the wires.

Yes, I had to install a relay and IIRR a fuse under the hood to enable the charge line in my F150. The parts were in a plastic bag in the glove box.

Does your truck have the included breaker in the under-hood electrical box? Some trucks require the owner to install that breaker to enable the 12V charging line to be operational?
A good first step would be to put a meter on the pin of the trailer connector to see if you have 12V back there. Ford will need to have the key turned to the "Run" position or engine running to send 12V to that pin.

Pin #4-Black connects to trailer for charging--diagram

There is different equipment used for charging the battery. I would guess that some one did it correctly and installed either a fuse or circuit breaker on the charge system It could be blown or needs to reset.
On relay based system it could have a relay that has failed.
On diode based charge system, the unit has failed.
Factory installed tow packages have a fuse.
Fuse and relay on some Fords is under the hood driver's side wheel well