House Batteries not working?

D.E.Bishop wrote:

I also found that LPI who owns the Kwikee name has produced and placed on their website, the manuals for Kwikee steps. There is a manual for, Kwikee #890 Electric Step, Owner's Manual (Winnebago).

There was absolutely nothing in there about Winnebago's practice of wiring the steps in their own way. The text and illustrations all show the motor circuit connected to the House Battery(ies). I also noticed the CYA statement about warranty and injury is gone from the preamble and only the injury warning is used in mid-text.

Although the Kwikee manual shows the wiring to a 12v battery, there is nothing specifically stating that it is the house battery rather than the chassis battery other than showing a battery disconnect switch, but many coaches have switches for both house and chassis battery.

My 2004 Itasca (Winnebago) has the steps wired to the chassis battery. That makes sense for a couple of reasons; first, it eliminates the possibility of driving off with the steps extended, just as CharlesinGA said. Second, from a safety standpoint you cannot "fall" out of the MH if you have turned your house batteries off; opening the door WILL extend the steps. That seems to fall more in line with a CYA type of installation.

Now, the odd thing is that my Winnebago wiring diagram shows the steps wired to the house battery, but I believe that is a mistake on Winnebago's wiring diagram. Here's why:
There are 2 bus bars, one from the house battery and one from the chassis battery. The house bus bar is shown powering the steps and the chassis panel, while the chassis bus bar is shown powering the house breaker panel(s). In reality, those are (logically) reversed; the house bus bar powers the house breaker panel(s) and the chassis bus bar powers the chassis breaker panel and the steps.