Battery Disconnect troubles?????

[nologo]

Hello all. I picked up my Hurricane RV from a local dealer where I was needing a few things done,which didn't work out very well they are no good, going somewhere else. Anyway my problem is, I was about 5 miles from the dealer going about 25mph in a construction zone when they entire RV shutdown. The engine, gauges, no power steering, no power brakes, everything. Scared the **** out of me. I pulled over put it in park and turned the dead ignition off. I looked at the battery disconnects
(there's 2, 1 for the driving battery and all, the 2nd for generator and all) The driving battery disconnect was off and the other was on. I flipped the driving disconnect on and everything was good after that all the way to my home. I don't know what caused it and I'm planning a trip for New Years but now I'm worried what happened and what would happen at 70mph. Please help with any thoughts. Thanks for reading. Happy Holidays

 

[Ned]

If the chassis battery disconnect was off, how did you start the RV in the first place?

 

[nologo]

I turned both of them on before leaving the dealer and the one went out on its own. Don't know why but it did. Very strange I know. I don't know if this is what caused the problem I'm just going with the obvious.

 

[Ned]

Disconnect switches are usually large, manually operated switches, either rotary or a knife switch on the battery itself.  What type of disconnect do you have?

 

[nologo]

They are located in a small cabinet above the door with lights to indicate on or no light for off.  They are not actually on the battery or near the battery, maybe they are not what I thought they were, I'm a newbie to RV's (2yrs) and still learning. When off I have no power in the RV at all. I can't turn anything on in the RV including any of the lights, headlights, nothing. Flip the front one on and I have power to the cockpit, back one on and I have power to the RV and the gen.  They are an up down toggle switch (like what you would see on a console of a boat) I hope this makes sense.

 

[Ned]

Those switches actuate a solenoid that connects/disconnects the battery.  I would guess that someone or something hit the switch and toggled it off.  Did you store anything up there, like a flashlight, that could have hit the switch?

 

[nologo]

No, nothing in the that area. Its a small cabinet kinda like a big glove box and I always leave it totally empty because of the switches. It was strange to me when it happened and now I'm very concerned about my next trip.

 

[Shayne]

I have a door like that with my switches above my entrance door. It is possible that the switch was not properly attached to the wires (worth checking) and a bump could shut it down.  Not very probable but possible.  Also the switch itself could be weak.  Once when switching ours on  I must not have pushed it hard enough and my genset fired and then wouldn't start  then nothing.  Touched the switch again and it fired right up and all was fine.  Hasn't happened since and When switching  I'm a little more careful.  JUst for what it's worth.  Good Luck

 

[Ned]

Is the switch a positive toggle, push one way for on, other for off, or is it a push on/push off type switch?  If the latter, then it's quite possible something caused it to toggle and a bad connection could be the problem.

 

[John From Detroit]

It is possible he has a short in the control lines for said solenoid

My rig the chassis battery has no disconnect.  The house battteries do, and the solenoid is stuck in disconnect

(I have bypassed)  intella-switch  One of these days I'll snag the model and visit the web site

Oh, anyone know the web site?

 

[Jim Dick]

You may be experiencing a thermal overload at the solenoid. I don't know if it has a thermal shutdown but some devices do.

 

[nologo]

Its a push up for on and push down for off switch.

 

[Ned]

You turned the switch to on, then when you lost power, was the switch off or did you toggle it off and on to reenergize the solenoid?

 

[nologo]

It was on, then loss of power. I checked it and the indicator light was off so I toggled down to off and then back up to turn on, light went on and power came back. It has never happened before and didn't happen again for the rest of my 45 minute drive.

 

[Shayne]

Somewhere along the line must be aloose connection, bad ground, even perhaps some corrosion, or bad switch.  Would require some checking and be time consuming.  Possibly even  two or more of the afore mentioned.  Just an odd situation.

 

[Ned]

Something caused the solenoid to drop out.  Could be any of the suggested reasons, loose connection, overheating, intermittent short.  I would inspect as much of the wiring from the switch to the solenoid and from the battery to the solenoid as you can, checking all connections to see that they're tight, and any possible shorting.  I doubt that it would be overheating unless you had an unusually large DC (unlikely on the chassis battery) load or it was very hot out.

 

[John From Detroit]

It is possible he has a short in the control lines for said solenoid

My rig the chassis battery has no disconnect.  The house battteries do, and the solenoid is stuck in disconnect

(I have bypassed)  intella-switch  One of these days I'll snag the model and visit the web site

Oh, anyone know the web site?

Thought I'd update you on mine.. Found the problem.  The "Battery Control Center" was working perfectly

The blasted remote control switch was bad.  I've used an old trick to  clean it (remove power by pulling the plug at the remote's end of the cable and operate the switch a couple of hunderd times, thus cleaning the self cleaning contacts) but it worked when I tested it a few minutes ago.    Total cost of repair $0.00 (I tink I'll ask for reembursment) labor < 1 hr)