Charging House Battery

Seattle · 11-19-2011, 08:52 PM

I went out today to plug the van in and charge both house and van batteries like I do when the van is not driven often. Once plugged in, my inverter/charger volts moved upward very quickly and within one minute indicated the house battery was full and went into "float" charge mode. This has never happened, generally it takes many hours after the batteries (house & van) are combined before I get a full reading on my charger/invertor. My fix was to turn a light on in the van, with that draw on the house battery, the ramp-up to full was more gradual and in a time frame more normal to my van. Any ideas? Do you think my house battery is toast?

**daveb** · 11-20-2011, 02:12 AM

First what is the type charger?
Does it have a volt meter on the charger?
What kind of separator is in the van?
Is there a second volt gauge on board?

The vehicle starts OK? You might want to try starting the van with the separator's ground off and see if it still starts.

With the ground still off, You'll have to do a load test...turn something with a heavy draw on, check the voltage and see if it stays low without a charge.
Some chargers will not charge a dead AGM battery and go into a "check battery" state. By adding a load they will start to charge in a more normal fashion.

But maybe there is nothing wrong. I have a 4D battery sitting on the floor in my garage and it will hold a full charge for over a month or two. When I set the charge it goes to full W/I a minute and kicks off.

Problem is that it could be several situations causing this and W/O seeing it....
Good luck and get back with us... somebody will connect with the right answer.

Dave.

Ford_6L_E350 · 11-20-2011, 10:52 AM

It could be as simple as a mildly corroded battery terminal. They can give high resistance and will not accept a charge, and then suddenly the corrosion breaks down and it acts normal.

Mike

Seattle · 11-20-2011, 01:15 PM

Thanks for the help Dave and Mike.

I have a Xantrex Freedom HP 1800 inverter/charger and a Blue Sea 7610 battery seperator. I do have a second volt meter that measures the house batteries and the van started just fine. 12.5 cold volts (prior to start) which quickly increased to 14.2 when started. The seperator worked and began charging the house battery this morning.

I will check the connections on the house battery, I think it is a 2010 battery (house) so should have some life left.

Thanks again for the responses.

Justin

**daveb** · 11-21-2011, 01:32 AM

The idea is to test each system without the other system helping via the separator. Sounds like you have a newer system with what you posted. If you can lock out the separator that will help you figure out what the problem is. Intermittent connections can cause a host of problems that can spin the best troubleshooters. Other than pulling all the battery connections and tracing all the wiring, the best thing is to divide and concur. Test each system on its own and go from there.

Once you get more info on whats going on, post back.

Good luck.