1988 Winnebago Elandan: house batteries not charging from mains

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JohnMrit

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Have a 1988 Winnebago Elandan here.

Got it hooked up to AC. {With all the dash switches off} The square lights work, but the flourescent light in the kitchen and the range hood, don't seem to work unless I turn on the accessory battery switch on the dash.

I checked the voltage of the house battery behind the passenger (I hooked up the two as the priors were dead, cleaned the corroded contacts etc, and see how they are hooked in parallel) and it's 11.75 volts. It charges from the alternator when I put the engine on {have not run it since parking it and plugging into AC} and switch the battery mode to 'Dual' on the dash.

The panel where the AC breakers are, talks about an optional house battery charging system, but it may not be optional, a label made for any RV the unit might be installed in by the subcontractor. The label mentions A,B,C,D, but is a horrible explanation I thought made in Korea and badly translated - the label says Illinois or something (maybe they subcontracted the label to an overseas company har har), as A,B,C & D on the left, relate to nothing on the diagram.

We got a collection of manuals from the prior owner. The manual for the RV appears as an Itasca manual, with a drawing of an RV resembling this one. Unfortunately it is only the cover of the manual: the rest is missing.

Chevy P30 454, 37k miles. Drives well and has new tires. The longtime owners, an older couple, took good care of it. When they passed and it moved to their daughter, she loaned it out to her nephew. By the time we got it, the roof leaked and there was water damage so we had to pull down the fabric and foam, and some layers of the veneer in places. And in a few places the cabinets sank.

I was going to use drywall anchors in the ceiling to reattach the cabinets. The kind that look like large screws that would anchor into the foam above. The plywood veneer would probably move aside in those areas, as there is only one layer of it left. Anyone try to replace this stuff?

 

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Hi John, and welcome to the forum! Working on an older RV is fun, eh? I'm not exactly sure what you're asking, but if you plan on keeping those batteries, you should have them load-tested to see if theyll hold a charge. Who knows how old the are, and 11.7 volts is basically a dead battery. A fully charged 12 volt battery should indicate about 12.7 volts (sometimes 12.6).

There will be a device (somewhere) in the RV called a Converter. It's probably near your electrical panel. It does two things, it provides 12 volts to your house circuits (lights etc.) and it charges your house-battery(s), but the RV must be plugged into shore-power, or the generator must be running for the charger to work.

Make sure you track down and patch all the leaks before doing a lot of interior repairs. That's a lot of work. Good luck!

Kev
 
Hi John and welcome.  Good advice from Kev.  Here's a link to your operator manual.  You can call Winnebago Owner Relations and ask them for assistance with understanding your electrical, plumbing, etc system.
 
The converter part of your distribution panel is probably not working. You may want to upgrade the converter if it is not charging the house batteries. Have you tried to charge the house batteries with an automotive battery charger? You may want to do that to see if they will take a charge. Here's a link on how to do an upgrade.
http://home.earthlink.net/~whemme/

While yours isn't the same, it is very close and can be upgraded the same way.
 

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