[Dick]

Let me add to Tom’s post, not to boost his battery sales, but to make your enjoyment of the coach much greater.

Yes, get the best batteries you can, and so far my experience has been Lifeline for the house and AC Delco 1150 for the chassis. (that is my experience only) Then treat them properly. By that I mean keep the house powered up and the inverters used to maintain the batteries at all times. To the maximum extent if you dry camp make every effort to begin the recharge at a 12.2 volt state of charge. If your auto-start is not adjustable and occurs at a much lower voltage consider manually initiating the generator start. The life of the batteries is directly impacted by the depth of discharge with significantly greater battery life resulting in recharging at 50% rather than 80 or 90% depth of discharge.

Make sure your chassis batteries do not have any phantom loads and if needed due to long storage recharge them using a three stage charger every couple of months. Monitor their rate of charge and if you insist on keeping a maintenance charge on at all times use only a multi-stage “smart” charger.

Establish replacement dates based on the calendar and try not to end up replacing batteries when they fail. You may save a few bucks getting every last hour of life from batteries, but sometimes battery issues can create other issues or put you in the position of having to spend serious money for replacements when on the road. You can create your own schedule but I swap my batteries out every five years for the Lifelines and AC Delco batteries listed above and while I may be wasting a little money doing that I have peace of mind and no surprises when on the road. If you do choose to stretch battery life, at the very least determine how you are going to work around a failed battery if one does present problems such as the one pictured above.

[Archived]

We purchased 10 Lifelines from Tom last year, 4 for the chassis and 6 8ds for the house. These were to replace 8 year old Lifelines that had performed great but we were starting to see issues with the chassis batteries. Very much worth the replacement.

Tom & Karen Hamrick

[Archived]

how much for 4d

[Steve]

4DA is 488.75 and 4DL is 494.50.

[Gary]

Two quick questions:

One: I leave my inverters clicked off from the monitor board while hooked up in the warehouse to 120 V…and turn them on at the monitor board when we travel without the generator running… they have perfomed well and no battery problems…

Two: yesterday, the invertor monitor on the “head board” showed a battery condition while hooked up of 11.15 … then, while driving, the monitor displayed 13.5 and after driving while reconnected to the 120 V, it displayed 11.5 again. I noted some residue on a positive cable on the engine batteries and cleaned them all. While running, the alternator dash monitor shows a charge rate of 13.15 V (estimate) and verified by the monitor reading on the head board. When I pushed the chassis monitor condition check button, it showed a condition of 26V for the house batteries and then 12V on the domestic battery condition button.

What do you think? Do these readings seem abourt correct? The house batteries are 60 months old.exactly and the engine batteries are about two years old.

Thanks for the thoughts…

Pres

[Bernie]

I’m
not quite clear on what you’re asking Pres, but the house should be
around 13.3 on float charge and when you unhook the shore power, they
should be 12.8 or close to that. If that voltage falls off in a short
period of time, then it’s time for batteries. Bulk/Absorption charge
for the house should be about 14.3. If you have LIfelines, there is a
white 2 letter round sticker that has the date codes. I can tell you
the manufacturer date if you e-mail me.

Chassis
charge rates off the alternator should be around 13.8 and resting in
the middle 12’s depending on what load is present.

[Dave]

Got it…. I believe I will go back with only four house batteries instead of eight… I do not see the need for eight… I am always hooked up, on invert for the ice box and microwave or have the generator running….

Thank you. I will see what condition the batteries appear to be in at this time…

Pres

[Dick]

Mike,

Your batteries were fresh from Lifeline maybe 2 weeks old, but I haven’t a clue why there were no stickers.

As to the price, you can’t compare drop shipped batteries that I provide to a service facility like Jeff’s. If I had shop overhead, payroll, insurance, etc. they wouldn’t be 488.75.

[Archived]

There are no date codes on the ones I just got in also…there is a sticker with the serial number only..no one removes date code stickers..

[Archived]

It is funny to me that Lifeline frequently changes the way they date/serial the batteries. Some years they have had a 4-digit alphabet code literally stamped into the upper part of the case, some years they just have a serial number and you have to call Lifeline to find out the manufacture date. Some years they have had a sticker for date coding. It would be nice if they would make up their minds and stick with one method or another, and preferable the stamped in date coding via an alpha-numeric would be ideal to me.

[Karl]

Ben,

Jeff forgot to jump back on here and tell us he needs glasses. His batteries have the date code stickers, I’ve ordered him readers from the drug store.

Also, the branded date codes you mentioned were discontinued in 2008 in favor of the round white sticker with two letters. I’ve not seen any batteries without the date codes.