[Archived]

I saw your other post and responded over there. What happens to the voltage at the batteries when you engage the starter? Does it drop dramatically when you put a load on it?

Solenoid bad?

I’m not much help at this point other than to call Prevost or DD.

[Archived]

You have a solenoid (R4) in the rear junction box that Prevost engages to send power to the Bendix solenoid on the starter and let the starter crank the engine.

[Per]

Trying to remotely start at rear, the starter still engages and disengages the same as using the ignition switch. Could a battery be bad and not giving it the full power it needs. I’m at a loss for solutions and stuck at The US SPACE CENTER campground 😒😒

[Archived]

The post above from Prevost Service is a very good point to begin you search. While cranking see if that relay is opening. If there is any doubt, jump between the two terminals to eliminate the possibility of bad contacts being the issue.

[Peter]

I tried switching r23 with r9 and had the same results. I’m removing the batteries now to get them load tested. I’m hoping that there is a bad cell and is causing the problem. Fingers crossed…..

[Archived]

All of us are pulling for you and Kathy!

[Archived]

I got money on the solenoid , put new updated starter in and all will be good , I bet ,it will have the old heavy one in it

[Archived]

How much of a wager Peter? If Dick had wagered he’d be the wiener (victor) any who, the chassis batteries were Baaaaaaaad. Replaced all four and it started first crank. Yay!!!!!!

Thanks to everyone for your input. This sight is the bomb

[Doug]

Well glad I lost and you are on the road again , batteries or new starter just about cost the same , but glad you got it fixed ,hard to help over the Internet but once in awhile it works out , Good job Dick dues are free this month!!!!!

[Brian]

Coach Net sent a guy out here that had a repair truck that scared me when he opened it up (i.e.) stuff everywhere and no complete set of anything. He was here 4 hrs with his motley helper and I felt neither was fully competent to to do the job. They had no battery tester to load the batteries, so I called someone else to do that test @ $85 for the service call and 1 hr. labor so $200 and 15 mins later the batteries were deemed bad. I had another camper take me to Napa where that guy only had 2 batteries and one of those tested bad right off the shelf. Finally went to O’Reilly got the 4 batteries and now I’m happy…I think I’ll have a drink of Blanton’s and call it a night….

[Dan]

I’ve had the battery problem and your situation sounded like my battery problem. Peter doesn’t keep his batteries or coaches long enough to experience a bad battery.

Sorry to hear about the CoachNet guy.

Any idea how old your batteries were?? All bad or just one or two?

[Archived]

I actually keep a small battery load tester on the coach. Glad you are back up and runnning!

[Archived]

The batteries were 3 years old, I think the charger could have been the culprit. With it sitting a large portion of the time , I believe with the older charger not sensing the charge level, it probably burned the batteries. That will be taken care of…

[Peter]

Not probably, for sure. Unless it was a “smart” charger it fried the batteries.

This has been said before but I will repeat it. Your chassis batteries should be able to go for several months before you need to recharge them. If they don’t last that long and still have enough power to start the coach there is a problem that needs to be fixed. Keeping a charger on chassis batteries is masking problems and is no different than taking aspirin for a brain tumor.

If however you feel the need to leave a charger on your chassis batteries all the time, at least take time to periodically check the health of the chassis batteries by turning off the charger for a day or so, and measuring the voltage after 24 hours. Healthy batteries are likely to still show a voltage of 12.6 (25.2) to 12.8 (25.6) volts. If not you either have a heavy load that should not be on the batteries or worse you have an issue with the batteries.

The house batteries are the opposite. They need the inverters charging them all the time because our coaches have phantom loads on the house side that are going to drain the batteries. Inverters are excellent chargers because they not only will maintain the batteries using “float” voltages, if the batteries are drained they will go into the 3 charging modes.

[Brian]

We had Jeff Rowe zero out our 1999 Liberty even before I drive the coach. When he went through the coach, he made it a point to tell me that the original Liberty installed battery charger was a “boat anchor”, I should use it ONLY to charge dead batteries, and that if I left it “on” for any length of time it would destroy our new batteries. Needless to say I heeded his advice. The vintage battery charger is NO long in the coach and sits on a shelf in the garage.

Back in the day (1990’s) these now boat anchors were likely state of the art chargers. Massive, probably put out tons of 24volt amps. Perfect for a converter to install on the ceiling of the curb side engine bay above the coach batteries to recharge coach batteries after the coach owner left the coach key “on” after parking the bus. Great idea by the converters.

But they were “dumb” chargers. They were apparently “ON” full blast when they were plugged into 120volt and would blast the batteries.

Now we have “smart chargers” like that Mariner/Guest chargers that have been recommended on this web site that have (I think) three different levels of charging and senses the level of charging that the batteries need at any given time.

If the owner of an older coach with an old technology chassis battery charger were to ask my opinion about what they should do with their old technology charger … my advance would be simple: (1) get that boat anchor out of your coach and (2) install a modern Guest/Mariner smart charger (or equivalent).