Battery Disconnect Warning & Generator Question

[Cgjfer]

Hi,
Has anyone run into this issue: We have a new Classic 30' Airstream and when we power up our travel trailer for a day, including the refrigerator - and charge while we're traveling, but we end up with our battery disconnect warning on and the main cabin without battery enough to power the main control panel on the inside of the door.

Also, when drydocking with a small generator - any suggestions on size of generator for hairdryer usage?

Thanks kindly,
C

[n2916s]

Most hair dryers are 1200 - 1500 watts. If you shed all other AC loads like the air conditioner, the converter, microwave and the refrigerator (if you have the compressor type). Your basic Honda (or whatever brand) 2200 watt generator will do just fine.

[uncle_bob]

Hi

Welcome !!!!

Charging the trailer battery while towing is iffy at best. The voltage drop through the wiring is such that not much current gets to the trailer batteries. If you have lithium's the stock charge wire is not going to help at all. Did you get the lithium upgrade?

Even "way back in the old days (2017)" the Classic was a bit of a burden on the stock lead acid batteries. Solar plus AGM's quickly became the way to go. I would *guess* you have solar. Is this correct?

Charging lead acid batteries to "full" can take a long time. The only way to be sure they are topped off is to run on shore power for 24 hours. Yes, that's quite a wile. You should be able to charge in 8 hours or so. It does depend a bit on how low your batteries are.

Lead acid's run from around 12.6V (full) down to 12V (stop using / half full) at normal temperatures. If it's really hot or very cold those voltages will shift by as much as half a volt.

Battery disconnects / flashing lights / beeping propane detectors normally are going to do their thing down below 11V. Your batteries are well past the stop using point by then. This is not good for the batteries.

Quick hints for battery use:

1) Never run the inverter. If you do, run it briefly and then shut it off.

2) You have a use/store switch and a full disconnect. Understand how each one works and what they do. Based on other threads running the full disconnect on "manual" may be a good idea.

3) If you have a compressor fridge, it pulls a bit of power. That plus the normal drain of all the Classic stuff can get you up to a fairly substantial drain even with nothing else turned on. You very much want to turn off lights, fans, .... when they aren't in use.

4) Unless you are on shore power or a generator, put away the hair dryer, forget about the electric coffee machine, leave the crock pot on the floor of the wardrobe. Running them on the stock lead acid batteries .... nope.

5) Watching TV on battery power is tempting. That inverter is gobbling power while you do. The TV it's self gobbles power. A couple DVD's in the evening is probably more than the battery will be happy with ( on top of all the other stuff).

Yes, this list goes on and on and on ....

So:

1) Do you have solar? If so is it factory or dealer installed?

2) Do you have the lithium upgrade?

3) What do your battery voltages look like?

Fun !!!

Bob

[Cgjfer]

Thanks for the tip!

[Cgjfer]

Hi Bob,

Thanks for the advice! We do have Solar. We don't have the battery upgrade. We do charge for a day and then load our cold and frozen food in the fridge before we leave for about a 3 -4 hour drive. Any tips on how folks keep their food until they arrive to plug into a generator to run the fridge? We have a Honda EU2000i.

[uncle_bob]

Originally Posted by Cgjfer

Hi Bob,

Thanks for the advice! We do have Solar. We don't have the battery upgrade. We do charge for a day and then load our cold and frozen food in the fridge before we leave for about a 3 -4 hour drive. Any tips on how folks keep their food until they arrive to plug into a generator to run the fridge? We have a Honda EU2000i.

Hi

Do you have a compressor fridge or an ammonia based absorption fridge? If you need to run it for a day to get cold, one would *guess* it is an absorption fridge.

The absorption fridge runs on shore power or on propane for fuel. It needs 12V DC for the control board. Because of the need for 12V, you can't go into "store" mode once you load up for a trip. You are in "use" mode the whole way. The fridge can be set to "auto" and it should switch to propane by its self.

The usual setup for propane applies to all of this. You need to have a tank with propane in it. The selector needs to be pointing at that bottle. The valve on the bottle needs to be opened. You need to run the stovetop long enough to verify that all the air is out of the propane lines.

With solar you should be able to keep up with normal 12V drains as you rumble down a typical road. Yes, getting stuck in a tunnel for 4 hours would not help . Depending on which solar controller you have (Victron or something else) you may be able to see what has gone charge wise while you are on the road.

The lead acid batteries (even the AGM's) on a Classic will keep you going for about a day and a half to two days with normal usage of this and that. That assumes they are fully charged to start. We upgraded to lithiums long before AS had a factory option to do so.

Fun !!!!

Bob