Marquis “can’t test solar today”

I bought the Duetto from a family run business and the Rienza from a caravan dealer. Both used and older build quality.
The Duetto was bought meany miles from us and were happy to let me find a repairer local and reimburse the costs.
The Rienza I had to take it back to them for repairs. They were hopeless so I gave up and payed for the minor repairs myself. 
The idea of buying new and having build quality and warranty issues is not something I would want. Yes you would get a smart looking new motorhome but it would be a constant worry. It would take the pleasure out of ownership.

Another example. Habitation check and Marquis found serious damp issue. Undertook work under warranty. Next habitation check - found serious damp issue - we will discus with warranty to get authorisation to undertake work. Didn't here anything and then we went into lockdown. Once out of lockdown they said no longer in warranty will cost £2000+. But the dampness was in the same area that was allegedly repaired and within 12 months it was still damp. Yes they agreed it is in the same area and their work is covered for 12 months but time has passed and it is now outside warranty period, regardless of time constraint caused by CV19.

RoyatPB wrote:Another example. Habitation check and Marquis found serious damp issue. Undertook work under warranty. Next habitation check - found serious damp issue - we will discus with warranty to get authorisation to undertake work. Didn't here anything and then we went into lockdown. Once out of lockdown they said no longer in warranty will cost £2000+. But the dampness was in the same area that was allegedly repaired and within 12 months it was still damp. Yes they agreed it is in the same area and their work is covered for 12 months but time has passed and it is now outside warranty period, regardless of time constraint caused by CV19.

Have you damp tested it yourself? It might be worth it.

Hi V8olic, I had the same issue but with my Broadway with my EC328 reading somewhere between 0.2 and -3.3, and honestly didn't trust them to fix it and it's a 300 mile round trip to Marquis for me.  

But, if you fancy having a go at it yourself, I actually found my problem it wasn't that difficult.  I done a lot of research here and on youtube.

I started with this wonderful little Watt Meter purchase for under £15 - https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B01M05Q1U4/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_search_asin_title?ie=UTF8&psc=1 of course you can do a similar test with a multimeter to check the solar is actually working.

Traced the cable from the roof, mines went into the plastic wire ducting in the wardrobe, it had a snap off front plate for easy access, the solar wire then connected via a spade connector to the solar connecting lead into the EC328.  With a couple of spade connector joins and put the watt meter in the middle immediately showed me the solar panels were working fine, so I worked on the possibility that it was the solar cable. Sometimes if I wiggled it around the Watt meter would bounce into life. 

Bought one from Sargent for under £15 - https://sargentltd.co.uk/shop/product/EC328solarlead/126 then replaced that by opening the main wooden cable duct in the corner of the wardrobe and just following existing cable route and everything immediately started working.

So cost for me was £30 and a few hours research, has worked perfectly since then.  Maybe I got lucky, but there's lots of great info on here if you fancy trying it yourself.

j8snl wrote:Hi V8olic, I had the same issue but with my Broadway with my EC328 reading somewhere between 0.2 and -3.3, and honestly didn't trust them to fix it and it's a 300 mile round trip to Marquis for me.  

But, if you fancy having a go at it yourself, I actually found my problem it wasn't that difficult.  I done a lot of research here and on youtube.

I started with this wonderful little Watt Meter purchase for under £15 - https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B01M05Q1U4/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_search_asin_title?ie=UTF8&psc=1 of course you can do a similar test with a multimeter to check the solar is actually working.

Traced the cable from the roof, mines went into the plastic wire ducting in the wardrobe, it had a snap off front plate for easy access, the solar wire then connected via a spade connector to the solar connecting lead into the EC328.  With a couple of spade connector joins and put the watt meter in the middle immediately showed me the solar panels were working fine, so I worked on the possibility that it was the solar cable. Sometimes if I wiggled it around the Watt meter would bounce into life. 

Bought one from Sargent for under £15 - https://sargentltd.co.uk/shop/product/EC328solarlead/126 then replaced that by opening the main wooden cable duct in the corner of the wardrobe and just following existing cable route and everything immediately started working.

So cost for me was £30 and a few hours research, has worked perfectly since then.  Maybe I got lucky, but there's lots of great info on here if you fancy trying it yourself.

Thanks, on mine I think the solar controller and wiring are probably inaccessible, being behind the EC700 power supply which is almost at at floor level underneath the oven. I don’t fancy messing with that really, in case something else goes wrong! On the Sargent website it says there is a minimum of 8 weeks lead time to get another one of those, if it turns out to be a faulty PSU.

You know what, I can’t help but think to a degree that neither the dealers or AS care that much sometimes and someday this will be to the detriment of their business. They need to sort this all out it’s very poor and leaves an open door for other manufacturers to get in. I’d love to own and wholeheartedly recommend buying new but it’s a bitter sweet experience for sure that has a huge margin for improvement. They might get away with it this year tho as they have covid and demand on their side but they should be looking at it as an opportunity to please customers, expand their businesses and knock it out of the park, not turn people away or put them off. Reputation eventually brings businesses down, it’s bonkers, I don’t get it.

I've just been in my Symbol to check the charging and it's indicating 1amp and it's overcast outside so they are talking rubbish about needing a sunny day.

I had the same problem when I collected mine last August.  I spoke to one of the service guys at the dealer, SMC at Newark, and he suggested I check one of the fuses situated in the right-side bed box immediately behind the driver's seat. Sure enough the 20amp fuse marked battery was blown. Replacing this solved the problem. I'm not suggesting this will solve your problem but it's worth checking.

It's clear that the PDI's are not done properly - I wad also unable to get the heater working on gas. The demo on collection was rushed where  these problems could have been found.

It’s been my experience that PDI means Pretty Darned Incompetent. 

I can't remember the exact figures but some years ago I got a contract to supply Rover with reversing sensors. Their acceptable failure rate made me gasp: One warranty claim in 10,000 units: acceptable. One warranty claim in 1000 units: official investigation launched, fault found and measures must be taken to prevent recurrence before any more orders are placed. One claim in 100 units: contract cancelled.
Any car manufacturer with the volume of warranty claims experienced in the motorhome industry would be out of business in a month.
Does anyone reading this apart from me have experience of German built motorhomes? I mean motorhomes built by Germans in Germany, not a German company building in BongoBongo land? I would always buy a German built motorhome in future. The quality I have experienced knocks spots of anything British.

I do not want to be rude, but have you put a meter across the battery terminals and checked what voltage you are getting under day and night time conditions.

Maybe a call to Sargent also, as I am not up to scratch with the EC700 system to check it is set up correctly for solar charging. 

Just a thought.
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Richard

gassygassy wrote:I can't remember the exact figures but some years ago I got a contract to supply Rover with reversing sensors. Their acceptable failure rate made me gasp: One warranty claim in 10,000 units: acceptable. One warranty claim in 1000 units: official investigation launched, fault found and measures must be taken to prevent recurrence before any more orders are placed. One claim in 100 units: contract cancelled.
Any car manufacturer with the volume of warranty claims experienced in the motorhome industry would be out of business in a month.
Does anyone reading this apart from me have experience of German built motorhomes? I mean motorhomes built by Germans in Germany, not a German company building in BongoBongo land? I would always buy a German built motorhome in future. The quality I have experienced knocks spots of anything British.

Maybe a bit of a sweeping statement, I could quote my neighbour's Burstner with the drop down bed,,, did just that and wouldn't go back up or my sons Hymer Group van where the toilet fell through the floor.
Seems to me poor build quality comes with the territory not just British territory either.  Plenty of forums like Fun and Facts where owners of differing makes and Countries of origin are all reporting the same type of problems unfortunately.
Think most of these vans suffer poor build quality and it is getting worse with so much redundancy built in and modern electronics which are impossible to fix.

It was indeed the electric bed that was the problem with my Rapido. Or to be exactly precise, the fact that the assembly worker must have noticed, but couldn't be bothered to fix, a pin on the 8 way plug and socket that was feeding the electric bed was not pushed home properly. After I found and rectified that I thought 'at last, we can use it'. Next thing we knew, the long shaft along one side of the bed fell out of its bearing at one end and that corner of the bed collapsed. A dealer told me that Bailey have stopped fitting them, and I will never have another one.
Returning to the Marquis part of the thread, I do have to say that at least Brownhills did take the van back to try to fix it three times, and they came to my house to collect it which incurred a total of 350 miles (in my camper - which they replenished the diesel in ) coming with two men in a car, driving my camper and their car back to base and returning it to me without me having to shout very loudly except on one telephone conversation.

When I worked in the automotive industry, our target failure rate was six sigma, or just over 3 defects per million!  We had many processes that hit this, so the individual parts that we (and others) supplied were as near perfect as made no difference.  Yet the fully assembled vehicles had a much higher failure rate.

Add that to the poor PDI and handover that many experience, and I’m not surprised that there are failures.  Although I suspect that the failure rate is perhaps not as high as we think, as forums etc give a massively skewed report.

I pulled the vehicle and leisure battery fuses quickly just to check they were intact, and half an hour later got a call from Sargent about a low voltage warning. Currently leisure battery is 11.9V and vehicle 12V, but I’m not sure what the threshold is.

gassygassy wrote:
Returning to the Marquis part of the thread, I do have to say that at least Brownhills did take the van back to try to fix it three times, and they came to my house to collect it which incurred a total of 350 miles (in my camper - which they replenished the diesel in ) coming with two men in a car, driving my camper and their car back to base and returning it to me without me having to shout very loudly except on one telephone conversation.

Just as a few motorhome users ruin the reputation of all,  it is the same with large dealerships. I bought an ex demonstration Bessacarr E795 from Brownhills in Newark a few years back and it came complete with a full cassette of excrement. They had swopped the hab door for a different that didn't match, denied doing it until I showed them the photo pf the original one!! They fitted roof bars out of line so the cross bars  were too narrow at the back, the service was awful. Vowing never to go near Brownhills again I went to Swindon for Rapido and they couldn't have been better.

The same with Marquis, Plymouth branch have given me first class service but another not so. This was a few years ago and it may be different now.

The only analogy I can draw is like when your local pub gets a new chef or change of staff, it was great the last time you went but absolutely rubbish now. Takes 5 minutes to get a bad reputation and ages to get a good one!

v8oholic wrote:Took my van in today for a pre-booked warranty issue with solar charging having never worked. Bear in mind this was booked nearly two months ago. Only to be fobbed off with the excuse that they can’t test it “because it’s not sunny enough”. And despite both batteries being at only 12.2V, “perhaps it is charging but just not showing up on the control panel”. Really? Beyond ridiculous! Unbelievable, frankly.

Did you speak to a manager before you left, or was it just a tired and bored ‘mechanic’ who had had enough of working that day.

Rolyan wrote:

v8oholic wrote:Took my van in today for a pre-booked warranty issue with solar charging having never worked. Bear in mind this was booked nearly two months ago. Only to be fobbed off with the excuse that they can’t test it “because it’s not sunny enough”. And despite both batteries being at only 12.2V, “perhaps it is charging but just not showing up on the control panel”. Really? Beyond ridiculous! Unbelievable, frankly.

Did you speak to a manager before you left, or was it just a tired and bored ‘mechanic’ who had had enough of working that day.

It was 9 am, there was no sign of the service manager that I could see.

v8oholic wrote:I pulled the vehicle and leisure battery fuses quickly just to check they were intact, and half an hour later got a call from Sargent about a low voltage warning. Currently leisure battery is 11.9V and vehicle 12V, but I’m not sure what the threshold is.

Those readings seem very low to me.

I assume you have connected the van to EHU while on your drive to see if they show charging?
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Richard

rgermain wrote:

v8oholic wrote:I pulled the vehicle and leisure battery fuses quickly just to check they were intact, and half an hour later got a call from Sargent about a low voltage warning. Currently leisure battery is 11.9V and vehicle 12V, but I’m not sure what the threshold is.

Those readings seem very low to me.

I assume you have connected the van to EHU while on your drive to see if they show charging?
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Richard

Agree they seem below the norm, my leisure battery usually rests at about 12.7v ad the engine about 12.5v. Plugged in of course they both jump well above 13v

rgermain wrote:

v8oholic wrote:I pulled the vehicle and leisure battery fuses quickly just to check they were intact, and half an hour later got a call from Sargent about a low voltage warning. Currently leisure battery is 11.9V and vehicle 12V, but I’m not sure what the threshold is.

Those readings seem very low to me.

I assume you have connected the van to EHU while on your drive to see if they show charging?
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Richard

It has been on EHU before and charges fine. I am trying to prove to Marquis that is is not working on solar. There’s no point turning up with both batteries at 12.9V and have them tell me it’s “probably” working again.

So force them to do this test, it'll be irrespective of battery voltage and will simply test the panel, first disconnect panel from solar controller (it won't worry about being open circuit):-

I've just had delivery of my solar panel and tested it as follows (Procedure from Photonic Universe, who didn't supply this one)
Multimeter on 200vdc, connect to both panel wires...26.5vdc, data sheet says 26.4 open circuit so OK there.
Multimeter on 10Amps, connect to both wires, this measures short circuit current, 0.85A. Very cloudy and dull day, panel horizontal, so more or less what I'd expect.

So, all Marquis had to do was disconnect it from the solar controller and do exactly as above. If it showed a voltage close to the open cct voltage, and any form of output, then its working, and, it'll work better when sunnier!! Not exactly rocket science.

Sargent give great technical support so I’m sure if they called Sargent they’d advise them how to test it. You could ring sargent yourself to see what they say, and then advise the dealer so they don’t get away with the lazy fob off

It’s a lovely sunny day, I’ve phoned the service manager, and he agreed I can take it in at 10:30 this morning. Let’s see how Round 2 goes!

I don't suppose they will let you in the workshop to see what they are doing, so how about sticking your phone on 'video record' and hiding it just peeking out of a corner cupboard pointing in the direction of where the panel wiring meets the habitation wiring?
Probably too late now, you are there already.

They tested the panel in isolation, and at the controller end of the wiring. Panel appears within specification, most of the time, but not all the time. Controller is behaving as if the battery is in poor condition, but it’s only a few months old and they also tested the battery, and of course it’s fine. All test results are being sent over to Sargent technical for them to decide what to replace first. Reading between the lines, I think they believe it ought to be working, and are reluctant to replace either panel or controller first, in case it doesn’t fix it. I asked them if they could park another van text to it and connect their panel to my van, and vice versa, to see if it would shed any light on things, but they declined. So now it’s over to Sargent to make a decision.