Couple of concerns I noticed over the weekend

[bcarroll]

I took my 1 yr old Dutchment 275BHS camping over the weekend, first time without any hookups, and a couple of issued came up...
First of all my battery did not make it thru the weekend. I had plugged in my trailer about a week before we left so it should have been at a full charge.
I have electronic tongue and stabilizer jacks, and after leveling, stablizing and unhooking, I checked the battery charge and it was down to 2/3 charge. First night we did not use the lights, only the water pump. 2nd night we used lights too, maybe about an hour of one or two light fixtures, and the next day the battery showed less than 1/3 charge. I took it to an auto store to get it checked and they said they would have to charge it for an hour to even test it as it showed 0 volts. They charged it, and told me it is a good battery, and that it is now fully charged(after an hour...?). Took it back, re-connected it, and in the morning the battery showed 1/3 charge.
Don't batteries last longer than a night or two?

Second thing...my water pump would run for 5-10 mins after all faucets were turned off, I got to just turning it off when done. When I turned it on again it would start running right away. The water would spit and sputter out of the faucets.

Third thing ...my hot water would come out of the cold tap. This did not happen before when hooked up to water.

What might be going on?

[bmupton]

aarond76 wrote:
For your water issue:
You have air in the system. Hot water tank was empty and full of air. When you turn the pump on the first thing that happens is the pump fills the hot water heater. In doing so you pressurize the air in tbe top of the hot water heater. Then when you open a cold water faucet the hot water back-flows out of the inlet side of the hot water heater and out the cold side of the faucet. You may have noticed the pump did not come on right away when you opened the faucet like it normally does. Once the pressure drops low enough in the hotwater heater the pump comes back on and fills the hot water heater back up again. Open the hot side of the faucet until all the air is out of the system and this problem will go away.

It could also be the bypass valves for winterizing being in the wrong position. Mine has more than two valves, and there's one that will allow the hot and cold water to mix.

I'd check those valves as well.

[JN_B]

You didn't mention if the furnace is being used? We can last 3 days w/o charging if we don't use our furnace, but the youngins usually don't sleep that good when it's cold. So we're lucky to last 24 hours.

[the_happiestcam]

Water pump is draining your battery. If they are set too high, they can keep trying to run and you might not even hear it as it tries to get to the last PSI.

[CincyGus]

aarond76 wrote:
For your water issue:
You have air in the system. Hot water tank was empty and full of air. When you turn the pump on the first thing that happens is the pump fills the hot water heater. In doing so you pressurize the air in tbe top of the hot water heater. Then when you open a cold water faucet the hot water back-flows out of the inlet side of the hot water heater and out the cold side of the faucet. You may have noticed the pump did not come on right away when you opened the faucet like it normally does. Once the pressure drops low enough in the hotwater heater the pump comes back on and fills the hot water heater back up again. Open the hot side of the faucet until all the air is out of the system and this problem will go away.

With your battery issue:
Your described usage should not have drained a battery over a weekend. And like you guessed, they certainly could not recharge it from dead in an hour. I question if the battery is any good.

Agree with both of these.

How the dealer winterized should be obvious based on if you had any "pink stuff" come out or in the sinks and tubs when you turned on the water (If you had not flushed it prior to the trip).

If not, they likely blew it out with air and opened the low point drains. Thats one thing I would go back and check. Make sure that the low point drains all are firmly closed and your not missing a cap. But I believe aarond76 hit it on the head. Empty hot water tank filling up is the reason for your pump running a while, double check the faucets are closed (including the outside shower or any hose hookups).

There are a lot of little draws (carbon monoxide detectors, LP leaf dectors, smoke alarms, radio, different circuit boards) that draw a bit that can discharge a small battery like a group 24 over just a couple days without any other use. My camper came with a group 24 and if I didn't leave it plugged in, the battery was low enough that the lights would barely flicker in just 4 days after parking it at home.

Some other things to do besides adding the extra battery:

Put in a cutoff switch on the battery or disconnect a cable once you return home.

Switch to LED light bulbs instead of the ones that came standard. Use about 10%-15% the amount of juice.

I upgraded to a single group 29 battery and LED's and can go 4 days without really trying to save or skrimp on battery power. GOing to switch to 2 group 27's when this one dies in a few years.

[hmknightnc]

bcarroll wrote:
I had my fridge on gas, not auto, and used lights sparingly. The only other thing that uses juice, that I know of, is the water pump.
I bought a 2nd grp 24 12v marine battery with the intention to wire in paralell(haven't do so yet).
I must admit, electicity scares me so I don't know much about it...not sure if I don't know much about it because it scares me or the other way 'round.
I would eventually like to get solar panels and eliminate the problem(for the most part anyways).

For the usage you describe putting that 2nd GP24 in service should make it so you can go a 3 night weekend. Just get good battery cable and attach Pos to Pos and Neg to Neg. Then hook trailer positive connection to positive on one battery and negative on the other battery to balance thier loads/use.

For long weekends adding additional 100 to 200 Watts solar with a good controller to the 2 GP24s will end your battery issues and ensure the batterys are fully topped up ready to go after being in storage as well as make the batterys last several years.

[aarond76]

For your water issue:
You have air in the system. Hot water tank was empty and full of air. When you turn the pump on the first thing that happens is the pump fills the hot water heater. In doing so you pressurize the air in tbe top of the hot water heater. Then when you open a cold water faucet the hot water back-flows out of the inlet side of the hot water heater and out the cold side of the faucet. You may have noticed the pump did not come on right away when you opened the faucet like it normally does. Once the pressure drops low enough in the hotwater heater the pump comes back on and fills the hot water heater back up again. Open the hot side of the faucet until all the air is out of the system and this problem will go away.

With your battery issue:
Your described usage should not have drained a battery over a weekend. And like you guessed, they certainly could not recharge it from dead in an hour. I question if the battery is any good.

[bcarroll]

I had my fridge on gas, not auto, and used lights sparingly. The only other thing that uses juice, that I know of, is the water pump.
I bought a 2nd grp 24 12v marine battery with the intention to wire in paralell(haven't do so yet).
I must admit, electicity scares me so I don't know much about it...not sure if I don't know much about it because it scares me or the other way 'round.
I would eventually like to get solar panels and eliminate the problem(for the most part anyways).

[I_am_still_wayn]

If you have an outside shower, check to be sure the individual hot and cold knobs are turned off, not just turned off at the shower head. That will cause hot water to come oujt the cold side.

[Lowsuv]

the best camping we do is without hookups
we do not have solar or a generator
we have a circle of camping friends that prefer to camp without hookups
the unwritten code is no generators are allowed .
we have all graduated to diesel pickups which have 2 batteries .
we park our trailer .
turn our pickup around .
hook up heavy duty jumper cables from the 2 diesel batteries to the 2 trailer batteries .
our rig gets driven every second or third day.
when we return we reattach the jumpers immediately .
the 4 batteries equalize some what .
we do not try to charge the trailer batteries from the pickup anymore .
just running from 4 batteries does the trick
we have a regular group 9 day campout each year .
this method has been working for about 15 years .
i have chosen to replace my duramax batteries with Exide EDGE AGM batteries . my system worked fine on the stock GM batteries however .
when i return the trailer to the storage shed , i always disconnect my fully charged RV batteries from the RV system .
that has proven to extend the life of the RV batteries .
i have 12 volt RV batts.
when i need new ones i will get 2 costco GC2 golf cart 6 volters , to wire in series .

[hmknightnc]

It really depends on your electrical systems and the battery size/condition. With today's modern electronics it is not surprising your battery only made it 2 days. As an example on my FW (prior to battery bank upgrade and solar) if I left the battery carrying hotel loads with fridge on auto/propane it would get low enough in voltage at day3 to shutdown the fridge. This is with no lights/pumps/other stuff. Turns out my FW draws a little less 20 AH in day just carrying that load. With a standard GP24 marine battery rated at 80 AH then 3 days would definitely kill it

Make sure your fridge door heater is off, TV amplifier is off, and minimize lights to maximize time on battery. Good rule of thumb is one battery per night but again that is just estimating.

Also that 1 hour recharge by the auto place didn't really charge the battery. If it was as low as you indicated (and you have the standard WFCO) it will take at least 40 contineous hours to recharge that battery and potentially longer.

[skipnchar]

The ONLY time you can get an accurate reading of battery state of charge is when there has been NO drain placed on the batteries and NO current put back in them, for a fairly lengthy period of time. If you check them WITH a drain on them you will ALWAYS get a lower reading than their state. If you check them with current being put INTO them you will get a reading of their SURFACE charge which will show a higher state of charge than you actually have. If you're INTERESTED i knowing how your batteries are doing forget the useless wall mount system and use a volt meeter ONLY when it's appropriate and consistent with getting an accurate reading. For what it's worth though, you can NEVER measure your battery staying power by a TIME factor, it will always depend on how much POWER you remove from them and how well charged they were before beginning to use them.

Good luck / Skip

[Terryallan]

I'm sure the jacks, and stabilizers use a good bit of battery. You can minmize that by leaving the 7 pin hooked to the TV with the engine running while you level. That way, you are using the power from the TV to run the jack, and stabs, and saving the battery. Should make your battery last a little longer.

[bcarroll]

PenMan wrote:
Depending on how much you use it, a good battery will probably last a weekend without charging. Use a digital volt meter to check your battery instead of the trailer's gauges. Your converter/charger in the trailer is probably not bringing it to a full charge.

It sounds like you have a lot of air in your water system. Did you fill your fresh water tank? Did you open your valve on the inlet to the hot water heater and close the bypass valve? I'm guessing that you blew the water lines out with air to winterize (I do that too with no problems). You probably just need to open each faucet in the trailer and let the pump run water through it until it stops the spitting. If the pump still runs after you are sure you have completely filled all your water lines it is time to start looking for leaks or problems with the pump (for example the pressure switch). Hope this helps.

Before we left I filled the fresh water tank.
I had the dealer winterize at the end of last season so not sure how they winterized it.
We went camping last month so I did open the inlet valve and outlet valve to the water heater, and closed the bypass valve at that time.
I figure I may be sucking air somewhere in the pipes but not sure how to check or fix that.

[PenMan]

Depending on how much you use it, a good battery will probably last a weekend without charging. Use a digital volt meter to check your battery instead of the trailer's gauges. Your converter/charger in the trailer is probably not bringing it to a full charge.

It sounds like you have a lot of air in your water system. Did you fill your fresh water tank? Did you open your valve on the inlet to the hot water heater and close the bypass valve? I'm guessing that you blew the water lines out with air to winterize (I do that too with no problems). You probably just need to open each faucet in the trailer and let the pump run water through it until it stops the spitting. If the pump still runs after you are sure you have completely filled all your water lines it is time to start looking for leaks or problems with the pump (for example the pressure switch). Hope this helps.