EC 480 control panel

Having recently got a kingham l have perhaps been watching the control panel more than usual and noticed that when on hook up and the leisure battery selected, there were times when the system reverted to the vehicle battery.
Spoke to Sargent and when used with the EC500 power supply unit, the system will automatically scroll between the batteries, usually on a 4 hour cycle. You can use the advanced settings to override this and take control manually, but who would want to?
Have noticed that although manual states that when on hook up the system automatically defaults to the leisure battery, this is not particularly swift,can be over 2 hours. Apologies if this has all been discussed before

We have a Kingham but can’t say I have studied the battery usage, as long as it’s plugged in I’ve been happy.  Not sure we have ever stayed anywhere without EHU

I really don't think it is a problem when on hookup, it just keeps both batteries topped up.

However, I find an issue when you leave a site with EHU and go to a site without EHU. In this case you have to be careful when switching on the EC480/500 to ensure leisure is selected.

This is because if vehicle is selected when you switched the panel off and come off EHU (leaving a site), then when you switch back on it will still have vehicle selected and hence you will be (unwittingly) discharging the vehicle battery instead of the leisure battery.
(This is assuming you don't shutdown the EC500. Does anyone? I just use the power button on the EC480 panel.)
If that makes sense.
This causes my OCD to constantly check which battery is selected when I'm not on EHU.

In general the fact that you can end up with a flat vehicle battery (if your not careful) is a downside of the system IMHO.
On the plus side it allows you to run the habitation from the vehicle battery which can be useful in some circumstances (though limited I think).

I am no authority on this, but I would have thought that the system would not allow the vehicle battery to support the habitation electrics in anyway other than using the car radio and that should go off after a short while to protect the discharge. (we have a separate radio). I would have thought the vehicle battery is the most important part of the whole system and must be protected. There should only be a one way automatic route in the system i.e. for the charging of the vehicle battery and not a discharge when on EHU or only using solar panels, after all you can’t live with a flat vehicle battery but you can exist temporarily, with a flat habitation battery in IMHO. I know the vehicle battery will eventually discharge as it is running small tasks in the background. 

 If my thoughts on all of this are wrong then please correct me, so I too can be on my guard.

Pete

AutoSleepy_Don wrote:...This is because if vehicle is selected when you switched the panel off and come off EHU (leaving a site), then when you switch back on it will still have vehicle selected and hence you will be (unwittingly) discharging the vehicle battery instead of the leisure battery....

This. 

I think it was the second time we'd spent a night without EHU that we were rudely awoken pre-dawn by the panel sounding a battery low warning for the vehicle battery.

It's now part of the set up routine, whether on EHU or not, to check which battery is selected when we power on the control panel.

Paranoid? Me?

Tommy.