Re: Hab electrics defaulting to vehicle battery

by Dave Brown Tue Mar 10, 2015 10:56 am

Quick update from me.

Had the van on EHU for a couple of weeks and despite being fully topped up at the start was showing only 48% capacity at the end of the period. Took it away for a few days to Wareham Forest (well worth the effort) and it raised to 50% while on EHU and the van being "in use".

The good news however, is that that we had no other electrical problems whatever - that's a first. Now wondering if it wasn't something to do with the way Mercedes wired out the central locking when that went. As that failed the night before our Spain / Portugal trip most of the problems we had were during that holiday. Last week was the first real trip out since then and since the central locking issue was fixed.

Still a bit concerned about the battery issues though so will keep an eye on that one and report any issues / findings.

All the best

Dave brown

by artheytrate Tue Mar 10, 2015 6:30 pm

Hi Pete and Dave, I don't think you have any problem with your charging system, when I bought my new Broadway last March I had the same problem, and what it was the EC480 had not been set up correctly. You can do this by going on the sergeant website and it explains all.

What you have to do is press any of the top or bottom buttons to the right of the EC480 until the Auto Sleeper logo appears, then press the top and bottom buttons symutaniously and a program comes up you can scroll through this and set the panel up.

you will find that the charge hasn't been set to 100% and mine wasn't even set for the right battery, now I've fitted an extra battery I had to set mine to 210 amps.
Since I set mine up it's brilliant.

John.

by Maasai Warrior Thu Mar 12, 2015 9:56 am

Hi John

I have been reading the threads with great interest, as we have been having small issues with the EC480 on a Broadway EB purchased new March 2014. From your comments it sounds fairly straight forward to set up the panel. I am surprised that it wasn't set up correctly in the new van. Whose responsibility is it to do this - Autosleepers or Sargent?

Pete

by Peter Brown Thu Mar 12, 2015 10:01 am

I'd have thought it would be part of the dealers PDI.

Peter

by artheytrate Thu Mar 12, 2015 10:42 am

My dealer was useless they didn't fill in any paperwork with the van at all.

John.

by Pete Taylor Thu Mar 12, 2015 2:04 pm

artheytrate wrote:My dealer was useless they didn't fill in any paperwork with the van at all.

John.

My dealer was worse than useless- I have three blank copies of the PDI: Customer, Dealer and A-S copies!

by Peter Brown Thu Mar 12, 2015 2:15 pm

I have to admit that it was a few weeks after delivery before I checked my tyre pressures and found that they were still set as it was delivered to AS as a chassis cab. All different pressures and about 20 psi less than they should have been. It didn't affect the handling noticeably but they would have overheated badly if I'd done a long run like that.

Peter

by Jaytee Thu Mar 12, 2015 6:00 pm

Being totally paranoid about any other 'engineers' working on my MH I always do a bit of a look around before it goes in for the hab check or a service and I then notice exactly what they disturb. Quite a few sigs on the sheet and I know they have not been there. Classic is the rear steadies. From new they were as dry as a bone and had never seen grease. So I greased them. Last hab check, signed for but not touched and they did need a grease. Despair shrugg

Sorry

by ScribesWtr Sat Apr 18, 2015 9:55 pm

"On several occasions when away it was noticed that the "active" battery was the vehicle batterydespite the fact that the change over switch hadn't been toggled."

I picked up my demo 2014 Broadway EB in March 2015 and have experienced exactly the same problems as you describe. This despite the MH being on EHU as well as being used on green field sites. I have a dealer fitted 85AH solar panel upgrade which appears to be producing a good charge while off mains.

The MH has been back to the dealer three times now but they say they have been unable to replicate the problem. I have even provided photographic evidence of the control panel displays including the low vehicle battery warning. Having got the MH back home after the third dealer visit on Thursday, the automatic switch from leisure to vehicle battery has occurred twice. While at home, the MH is connected to EHU and the Truma heating set to 10 degrees C to avoid the interior, water etc getting too cold and the water system freezing if the temperature suddenly drops.

I am quite amazed that with problems such as this being reported for sometime now that my dealer appears to be unaware of the problem and be in possession of a permanent fix!

by Peter Brown Sun Apr 19, 2015 6:02 am

Geoff Kidd wrote:Hi Dave, we travelled from New Zealand and purchased a new Winchcombe June 2014. We spent three great months in both UK and France and then shipped the vehicle back home. We also experienced the same electrical issues as you have experienced. While over there we took it to the dealer and he disconnected the solar panel checking all electrical circuits. They said all was well and no fault found. From that day on everything has been fine and no further battery draining has taken place. A week or so later we were passing the factory so called in for a chat and explained what had happened. We were told that a couple of other vehicles had experienced the same issue and the problem was the way the solar panel had been plugged into the system. By disconnecting the solar to do the check and reconnecting they had fixed the problem without realizing it- may be worth a try. Back home now we can spend the night off power with the leisure battery still holding 96% of charge in the morning.

Cheers

Geoff

A reminder of a previous post in this thread, I suggest you ring Sargent to discuss your symptoms.

Peter

by ScribesWtr Mon Apr 20, 2015 7:28 pm

Thanks for your suggestion Peter.

I did phone Sargent Technical Department this morning but the chap I spoke to insisted that my leisure battery must have discharged below a serviceable level before the ECU automatically switched to the vehicle battery. I pointed out that this was not the case but he didn't want to believe me. Both batteries were registering 13.7/13.8 volts and the MH was connected to ECU during and following the switch occurring.

I'll have to find out how my solar panel is connected to the system and try the unplug and re-connect solution if the problem continues. I'll give Auto-Sleepers a call to see if they can give me any more suggestions. Presumably, the suggestion here is that the connection wires have been crossed?

I'll post any progress here.

by artheytrate Mon Apr 20, 2015 9:06 pm

Hi ScribesWtr my 2014 Broadway EB was also giving the low vehicle alarm quite regularly, and I read somewhere that Peugeot have a different setting in the EC480 than Fiat do and it was advised to set the EC480 to the Fiat setting. If you go into the settings and scroll through you will find the Fiat setting, since doing this with my Broadway everything as worked as normal and in the last 11 months I haven't had the low vehicle battery alarm at all.

John.

by ScribesWtr Mon Apr 20, 2015 10:04 pm

Thanks for your suggestion John.

In fact, this seems to tie in with the other thread I have been posting to over the last few days regarding the battery capacity indicator. It seems increasingly likely that this is all part of the initial configuration of the ECU at the dealership.

See: https://www.autosleeper-ownersforum.com/t13519-battery-capacity-indicator#113651

Alan

Hab electrics defaulting to vehicle battery