1985 Ford Citation Excella RV With Ford 460

[Newfie4ever]

Hi first time here, hoping someone might be able to help.
I have purchased an old 1986 Ford Citation RV. It was in great shape and the price was right. Anyway I am having trouble getting the 12 volts from the deep cycle battery working. As long as I am plugged into sore power everything works. As soon as I try the 12 volts for the lights and pump for boon docking it does not work.
I don't know much about the setup but I have good electrical background so I can do everything myself.
I have attached some pictures I took of the motor and wiring around it. If someone can point me in the right direction that would be great.
The deep cycle battery is fully charged and new so its not the battery. Also has 14.5 volts on the battery when RV is started.

Thanks

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[ronfisherman]

Newfie4ever wrote:
First off, thanks for all the help on this. I haven't had time to try any of the things you have suggested yet as work as been a priority right now.
I will get to it soon tho.
The larger box next to the resettable fuses on the far right of picture 128, does anyone know what it is?

Thanks

Horn relay?

[Newfie4ever]

First off, thanks for all the help on this. I haven't had time to try any of the things you have suggested yet as work as been a priority right now.
I will get to it soon tho.
The larger box next to the resettable fuses on the far right of picture 128, does anyone know what it is?

Thanks

[DrewE]

Could be the auto-reset circuit breaker, as rvsmith mentioned.

It could be a bad connection or wire, as well. I think your best angle of attack may be to figure out what the various wires going to the battery end up going off to, and how things are wired up. That may be easier said than done.

This isn't what is causing your difficulties, but do please take care of that bad section on the positive lead of the chassis battery as soon as you can. That looks like a bad short circuit waiting to happen, and also looks somewhat corroded. A proper fix, of course, is to cut off the bad bit and attach the good wire to the battery clamp (or a replacement battery clamp if needed). Failing that, wrapping the bad bit well in some electrical tape would at least make it safer against accidental shorts.

[rvsmith88]

Replace the resettable fuse In pic DSC0128 they are corroded. One is the fuse 40-amp for the house battery

[regis101]

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[Golden_HVAC]

Hi,

Do you have a converter someplace? Normally it will have a relay to disconnect the coach battery from the 12 volt appliances while plugged into 120 volt power. It sounds like this relay is not transferring back to the coach battery.

You stated that the engine and coach battery under the hood have power - 14.5 volts with the engine running. With the 120 volt unplugged, then the relay should 'drop out' and transfer the coach loads (lights ect) to the coach battery.

Most of the time there will be a fuse panel for the coach wiring. Behind that or perhaps in the same area is the 'converter'. It was a few years later that manufactures started putting in battery chargers, and stopped installing converters. (around 1992 for many of them, by 1997 for all the rest, because battery chargers are less expensive and more reliable than the older converters).

What you might want to do is bypass the old converter altogether. You can do this by connecting the input wire from the coach battery to the fuse panel. Then install a modern battery charger, and disconnect the power to the old converter. This will solve the problems of the converter 'charge circuit' from undercharging the battery with low input voltage, or overcharging when you have to much voltage, or are plugged in for more than a few days.

The 'problem' with bypassing the relay inside the converter and leaving the coach battery connected all the time is that a converter does not have a voltage regulator inside it. It will put out say 15 volts when you are connected to a 120 volt shore power, and perhaps 11 volts when connected to 105 volts input. So it might overcharge your coach battery, and boil out all the water, or might not charge it properly at all. You would have to plug in and measure the voltage at your fuses to know what it is putting out for sure. In my 1972 camper, the converter put out around 15 volts, and this will burn out the lights in a few weeks, while running 13 volts or less, my 1997 motorhome has most of it's original light bulbs, even though I have lived in it full time over 8 years!

Check out prices here for a new converter/battery charger. 45 amps is plenty for most uses. Bestconverter.com

Good luck,

Fred.

[Vulcan_Rider]

And independent RV service shop might be able to point you to the battery disconnect switch, maybe even for free.

On my model, with the bat. disc. switch OFF, it disconnects the battery from EVERYTHING......including charging from the engine and charging on shore power but yours might work a little differently.

[j-d]

Easiest thing to look for is a House Battery Disconnect. Usually a continuous duty (latching) solenoid, usually near the house battery, operated by a switch in a convenient (and maybe unfamiliar to you) switch inside the coach.
Your house battery is charging off the alternator thanks to a Battery Isolator that lets the alternator do that but doesn't let DC draw from the house run the chassis battery down. Probably a Start Assist Button that uses House Battery to jump start the Chassis. So there are probably 3 or 4 solenoids including the one that powers the Starter.

Welcome! Pretty Coach! I tried to link your pix to this page but couldn't get it to work.