Battery Shot already?

[stevensmith2859]

My Battery is a year old and It wont hold a charge anymore, I have to plug it into shore power or to the truck even to get the tongue jack to raise or lower the tongue....Shouldn't they last more than a year?

[SuicideSaints]

Did you leave it connected all winter? How was it stored? Did you put it on a maintainer while on storage?

If you left it connected it would certainly be dead by now and if it is completely discharged now it could have been damaged. If it was left out in the cold and uncharged and unmaintained further damage may have occurred. If it is dead it would need a condition charge and then use a volt meter to test it.

[stevensmith2859]

I left it in the camper all winter, my own fault. So its looking like I will need a new battery. Even after having it plugged into shore power, its wont hold a charge....It is what it is, my own fault.

[SuicideSaints]

If you have a good external multi stage charger I would try that before scraping it. Maybe even buy one if you dont have one and use as a maintainer for next winter.

[Joe_GA]

Does it have electrolyte in it? If you haven't maintained it by adding distilled water as needed, it could be dead. Also, charging a battery with low electrolyte is a hydrogen bomb waiting to explode.

[shughey00]

It is nice to have a good battery charger..one that can recover deeply discharged batteries. The tricklecharger in the converter won't be able to recover them usually.

Probably the best $90.00 investment to have..a good smart charger with the different recovery rates and voltages. If the battery is deeply discharged it takes a higher voltage to reverse the sulfating in the battery.

Now if the battery was extremely discharged then sometimes nothing will reverse it BUT it is fairly new and usually the bad happens to older batteries where this happens over and over. Then the sulfate deposits on the plates is such a hard crust you just can't reverse the damage.

I fully recovered a deep cycle battery in my Lance camper when the dealer left the battery on for 2 months and drained it near dead. But it was a fairly new battery.

[bikendan]

Originally Posted by stevensmith2859

I left it in the camper all winter, my own fault. So its looking like I will need a new battery. Even after having it plugged into shore power, its wont hold a charge....It is what it is, my own fault.

You should never leave a trailer(with battery)stored without it being plugged into shore power or use a battery disconnect switch.
If you don't have one, you need to install one.

I left mine stored, without shore power, for 4 months.
Because I have a disconnect switch, the batteries were still nearly fully charged when I picked it up.

[Joe_GA]

Originally Posted by shughey00

It is nice to have a good battery charger..one that can recover deeply discharged batteries. The tricklecharger in the converter won't be able to recover them usually.

Probably the best $90.00 investment to have..a good smart charger with the different recovery rates and voltages.

While a good battery charger is a great idea, there's more to converters than most people know. I replaced the crummy WFCO converter with a Progressive Dynamics converter. It uses a 4 stage charger. It will pull a good 20 amps AC if the batteries are in need of a lot of charging.
Read here:
Best Converter Charger for an RV - Smart VS. Dumb

[stevensmith2859]

I actually took it out of my camper this past weekend, it seriously had about zero water in it. Added some water and I'm going to put it on a charger to see if I can bring it back to life. My own fault for what its worth, but maybe its time for a battery disconnect switch....

[jgourlie]

If you get a battery tender/minder and stick it on the battery, it should revive it in a week or two.

[kcmusa]

Originally Posted by stevensmith2859

I actually took it out of my camper this past weekend, it seriously had about zero water in it. Added some water and I'm going to put it on a charger to see if I can bring it back to life. My own fault for what its worth, but maybe its time for a battery disconnect switch....

Distilled water!

[Hugeez]

Originally Posted by bikendan

You should never leave a trailer(with battery)stored without it being plugged into shore power or use a battery disconnect switch.
If you don't have one, you need to install one.

I left mine stored, without shore power, for 4 months.
Because I have a disconnect switch, the batteries were still nearly fully charged when I picked it up.

I guess I will have to install a disconnect after my battery. As far as I know, everything is off inside the TT but I've noticed that the battery is dead within about 3 days when I have it in storage. I take it out during winter storage and put it on a tender but leave it on the TT between trips, unfortunately only about one long weekend a month.

[bikendan]

Modern RVs have numerous parasitic power drains.
That's why your battery is dead in a few days.