Battery Charging Protocol - Motor Homes

[winner]

This post directed to motor home owners

In the manual for our 1987 345 MH, it is indicated that the Engine Battery is only charged by the engine when running and by the Generator,, whereas the Coach Batteries are charged by Univolt when hooked up to ll0 current or by the Generator, when running. Is this borne out by actual experience in your motor homes. We wonder is we are properly interpreting the manual, Info will be appreciated.

[ALANSD]

I believe that is correct. I run my generator occasionally to charge all the batteries, and use a charger when stored for long periods to keep the house batteries up.

[ViewRVs]

I second the motion...BUT......that is only true IF your generator feeds back 12v to the engine battery. Not all of them do. My Kohler 7k does. Otherwise, only the alternator is charging the engine battery.

This set-up is all the more reason to make sure that only the necessary things are connected to the engine battery.

On my first outing, my engine battery died. I was unaware of the boost switch and ended up calling for roadside assistance. From then on, I carry a battery charger with start power even though I could use the boost switch.

[PeterH-350LE]

Originally posted by winner
This post directed to motor home owners

In the manual for our 1987 345 MH, it is indicated that the Engine Battery is only charged by the engine when running and by the Generator,, whereas the Coach Batteries are charged by Univolt when hooked up to ll0 current or by the Generator, when running. Is this borne out by actual experience in your motor homes. We wonder is we are properly interpreting the manual, Info will be appreciated.

AND the coach batteries also get charged when the engine is running.
The reason why the above is important to consider is:
IF you think you have an univolt that tends overcharge your coach batteries AND IF you are driving all day with your generator on (110V to univolt), you may want to consider unplugging the univolt during that time.

[wb13798]

my motor home the starting battery only gets charged when the big momma is running. the coach batterys get charged also and when the generator is running providing power to the charging system . i dont have a univolt but a intella power. i got up one sunday morning and the motor battery was dead. something had been left on all weekend and drained the battery. i have a jumper that is about two foot long to jump from the house batterys . i got on the road by jumping to house batterys. but when i got home the battery was still not up to a full charge . i put a trickle charge on it for a few days and it came up to a full charge. 12.65vdc. as with all airstreams this year it work s this way next year they do something else. lol
al

[winner]

Many thanks for the multiple responses to our post. I'll try to address each.
We do not run our generator while traveling - only when camped at a location without 110 which we can plug into.
Our coach batteries are being properly charged anytime we are motoring and when we are hooked up to 110, or when the generator is running.
When running our engine battery and coach batteries are properly charged with no problems.
However. on a recent ocassion because of a faulty connenctor, our engine battery was too low to start the engine NOR could we start the generator - thereby we learned that the starting charge for th generator is solely from the engine battery, and if our engine battery was low - no generator (We did not think of cabling across the coach batteries - glad to hear of that). When we went to the factory, we had the boost charge button serviced(it was not prefiously working).
We think this is a design defect - We would like for the generator to be started with either engine battery or coach batteries, but apparently the manual is correct. We are very happy to have the comment which informed us about being able to start the generator if the engine batterys dead , and now that we have a working booster button in the glove compartment we can boost the engine batttery asnd get the vehicle started dso the engtine alt can charge everything up.
Thanks again for all the responses

[ALANSD]

also- do most of you guys have a switch or button thast enables you to use the house batteries to boost the starting power of your coach (car) battery? Mine is on the dash.