Battery usage / Bipap machine usage

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cdpearcy

Member
Joined
Apr 5, 2016
Posts
5
Will the house batteries in our 2000 Monaco Dynasty with the inverter turned on run a CPAP machine all night without draining the engine batteries for the vehicle
 
cdpearcy said:
Will the house batteries in our 2000 Monaco Dynasty with the inverter turned on run a CPAP machine all night without draining the engine batteries for the vehicle

I believe you'll be OK  but if you're at home, go camping in your driveway for one night and see. Or take it to a Walmart and stay in it for one night.
Oh, and welcome back to the forum.
You had a post 2 years ago with a engine problem. You never got back to us with the outcome.
 
Thank you so much for your recommendation! I will do that today!

Very sorry for not getting back and posting results a couple of years ago with our issue. We were quite panicked!! ... that was our first  real trip  in our motorhome... And being almost 1,200 miles away from home... ? We did however find a repair shop open on that Saturday.... and they spent hours fixing the problem.... and no further issues.  We traded it in this past March for a 2000 Monaco Dynasty diesel pusher.  Leaving in 2 days for another trip back to the same areas (MO, IL, IN, OH, PA, NY, VT, NH, ME).  This will be our first big trip in this one... It's been in the shop since about a month after we bought it until a few weeks ago.

We -SO VERY MUCH- appreciate this forum and how quick replies, answers are made!

All of you seasoned & knowledgeable RVers are invaluable to us novices! Thank you thank you!!
 
To add to what Ren? said: It should not drain the engine batteries, the two systems are isolated from each other except when the engine is running. BUT you will be using the house battery system. It will depend on several factors such as will you be plugged in. If so, not a problem. If not, it will depend on your battery state and the number of batteries you have. Many users have advised that using the humidifier function (if equipped) on these units will drain the batteries more quickly. Does your particular unit have a 12V function?? (IE has a black box plugged into the wall and the output of that box may be 12V.) Some are 12V and can be run directly off the RV 12V system and not require an inverter, the result may be that it is not as hard on the batteries.

Ren?'s suggestion to try it out at home is excellent!! Remember, on the road you may or may not be plugged in so take that into account when testing.
 
We tested the Bipap machine while here at home....let it run 7 hrs (using only the inverter) and only saw the battery level decrease by 1/4. 

Great recommendations to try this....(we have 4 pretty large batteries tho the hubby says ?)
 
Great to hear that. It will help others I'm sure.
 
One thing though, I'm not sure if you are damaging your batteries by letting them run down by 1/4. If the batteries was charged to 13 volts before starting and you let them run down to 9 volts, that may not be good. Others can respond.

I was wondering, is your BPAP a 12 volt machine? If it is, I wonder if it would use less voltage from the batteries if you plugged it directly into a 12 volt outlet and not running a inverter. My CPAP machine is 12 volt and I could plug it into a 12 volt outlet I have in our bedroom.
 
The very most you should let that battery bank go down is about 50-60% of the total ampere-hours available.  Any more will result in a shorter life for the batteries. That would correspond to about 12.2-12.3V as read using a voltmeter. 12.6V is a fully charged battery, any more represents either a battery under charge (ie the charger's voltage) or a surface charge shortly after a charger is removed
 
One thing though, I'm not sure if you are damaging your batteries by letting them run down by 1/4. If the batteries was charged to 13 volts before starting and you let them run down to 9 volts, that may not be good. Others can respond.

Perhaps I misread this, Rene, but I have the impression the OP is reading the 4 (or maybe 5)-position readout for the battery, not the voltage, so I'd read that as taking it down by roughly 25% of the charge, not the voltage. Obviously, if it were voltage, that would be pretty much dead, and the CPAP wouldn't still be running at the end.
 
Larry N. said:
Perhaps I misread this, Rene, but I have the impression the OP is reading the 4 (or maybe 5)-position readout for the battery, not the voltage, so I'd read that as taking it down by roughly 25% of the charge, not the voltage. Obviously, if it were voltage, that would be pretty much dead, and the CPAP wouldn't still be running at the end.

I see what you're saying. They were probably reading the battery indicator on the control panel. You're probably right. Maybe the poster should elaborate as to where they got the 1/4.
 
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