Europa Quality Control

[gremlin]

Tried again after tightening everything and nothing was loose. Still can reproduce the problem. I've been talking to Enduro Power and they think it might be the BMS shutting down especially since something connected directly to the battery is rebooting too that makes sense to me. They asked me to try one other thing, which I did with no improvement, so I believe we're now looking to swap the batteries.

[TridentDynamax]

I have a 22 Europa with the standard batteries it came with. Ive owned it for about 7 months now, and there hasn't been one single time I've taken it on a trip and not had some sort of electrical failure. The batteries die for no reason, the I/C controller always shows different readings (Brian said the dealer installed this?), battery disconnect switch has stopped working twice, grab handle lights replaced twice, power recliners randomly loose power and wont function (have to reset whole system), tank sensors backwards, hot water is cold water, tv switch box isn't wired to bedroom tv, furnace sometimes says "overamp power draw" and doesn't work. I'm afraid to take it out now, and trying to figure out how to get rid of it.

[bclemens]

Originally Posted by TridentDynamax

I have a 22 Europa with the standard batteries it came with. Ive owned it for about 7 months now, and there hasn't been one single time I've taken it on a trip and not had some sort of electrical failure. The batteries die for no reason, the I/C controller always shows different readings (Brian said the dealer installed this?), battery disconnect switch has stopped working twice, grab handle lights replaced twice, power recliners randomly loose power and wont function (have to reset whole system), tank sensors backwards, hot water is cold water, tv switch box isn't wired to bedroom tv, furnace sometimes says "overamp power draw" and doesn't work. I'm afraid to take it out now, and trying to figure out how to get rid of it.

There is a lot to unpack here so bear with me. A few general notes. If you are boondocking/dry camping with the Europa, it will not work. Most users go from power pole to power pole. Dealers are often trying to sell what they have in stock and not what the customer needs. One battery with a residential refer will not make it. Also, I see many people say "well I have solar". Solar literally offsets the parasitic loads and that is it, unless you a decent amount. If you are trying to camp, without power....it will last a few hours at best. Low voltage is the cause of 90% of RV issues (from what I see).


1. "The batteries die for no reason." There is always a reason. They are either bad or you are drawing more power than you are putting in. The key is identifying which that is. One battery will not last long at all if you are using the inverter and residential fridge.

2. "The I/C controller always shows different readings." I'm not sure what you mean by this? It does show two different battery banks. Chassis and House. I would need to see a screen shot to properly identify what you mean.

3. "Brian said the dealer installed this." Which Brian? This Brian Clemens, or Bryan Knight in service? We installed the Inverter/Charger, unless the dealer made some modification...again, without context, I am not sure what this means.

4. "Battery Disconnect has stopped working Twice". I am also not sure what this means. There can be up to (4) battery disconnects.
A: The chassis one by the seat: this only disconnects the chassis battery for storage
B: The red switch by the door. That only disconnects the inside stuff (lights, 12V appliances. it is a quick way to turn everything off that runs on the Firefly if you are leaving for a bit. If you re plugged in...the I/C will still charge the batteries and operate.
C:Red Marine Dial in the battery Bay. This disconnects the house batteries
D: Red Marine dial with lighter gauge wire in the battery bay: this disconnects solar (not all models got this, I think they do today)
When you say "the battery disconnect failed", what do you mean? If the batteries still died...that is possible, it does not mean it failed. There are parasitic loads, there are small draws on the battery that can still draw with the batteries disconnected.

5."Grab Handle light failed twice": while it may seem like electrical, this is not. We were getting a supply of grab handles in, where they supplier was tearing the gasket to install the LED light. The top is torn, so water pours ini and corrodes the LED. If the dealer just installed another bad handle...it will happen again. We have them corrected now...and we have several customer here that have swapped them on their own. Its literally 4 screws. If you search for grab handle on her there is more detail. https://www.forestriverforums.com/fo...up-257538.html

6. Power Recliners: again, related, but not really caused by Dynamax. If you search this forum (or if dealers reach out to us) there is a fix for this. https://www.forestriverforums.com/fo...ng-245750.html

7. "Tank Sensors Wired Backwards" This should be easily corrected by swapping wires at the G12 (Firefly board. schematic is in the Firefly manual)

8. "Hot water is cold water." Do you mean you are not getting hot water, or hot and cold are reversed?

9. "TV Switch box is not wired to bedroom." This is likely just a loose connection...but what exactly are you trying to do? There is a video on this.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_X1mjzq-oGQ&t=241s

Since this video we have gone to HDMI over CAT6. Sometimes it could be as simple as a bad CAT6 to HDMI adaptor at the TV.

10. "Furnace sometimes says overamp draw". The furnace does not have a display, so is this something that is showing up on the I/C or the Firefly screen when the furnace is running. Do you mean the actual furnace or the heat pump?

PS. I have no idea your level of electrical/RV knowledge, so please bear with the questions. As I often say, "I don't know what you don't know", so I have to start at the basics. I can't tell you how many times I spend hours helping troubleshoot something, only at the end, for them to tell me of a modification that was made that was not mentioned. Or that they were plugged into a 15A outlet and not what it was meant for....50A.

[gremlin]

So the hot water one I do have a question there, the tech that did my walkthrough told me the switch on the on demand water heater one direction was Electric and the other was Propane. On my unit they're both labeled On, and nothing else with off in the middle. I tried to figure it out by listening but both positions I could hear propane. Then I read the manual and it indicated to me that there was no difference at all between the settings, so I decided that he was wrong, and that was odd, but okay.

Then I watched Brian's video and found out that the up position is "ECO" and the down position is "COMFORT" and that in ECO it'll take a several (maybe 10-20) seconds for hotwater to show up, but in COMFORT it'll be near instant. I know I was having issues with thinking the water took a while to get hot, so I'll bet it was is ECO mode, and I'll try out COMFORT on the next trip.

I also confess I'm very disappointed with the things that were wrong, especially the pipes leaking, but I'm hoping it'll all be sorted. I'm really hopeful that my electrical issues are the BMS in the battery now, it makes sense to me as I can't in my brain figure out any other way the Victron would get reset since it's connected directly to the battery, unless something outside is shorting the batteries and the BMS is shutting htem down to protect them and then going back. If that's the case I know I'll have a long diagnosis on my hands, and it'll be interesting to see if Dynamax will help with that since it won't have been caused by my changing the batteries.

[bclemens]

Originally Posted by TridentDynamax

I have a 22 Europa with the standard batteries it came with. Ive owned it for about 7 months now, and there hasn't been one single time I've taken it on a trip and not had some sort of electrical failure. The batteries die for no reason, the I/C controller always shows different readings (Brian said the dealer installed this?), battery disconnect switch has stopped working twice, grab handle lights replaced twice, power recliners randomly loose power and wont function (have to reset whole system), tank sensors backwards, hot water is cold water, tv switch box isn't wired to bedroom tv, furnace sometimes says "overamp power draw" and doesn't work. I'm afraid to take it out now, and trying to figure out how to get rid of it.

Hopefully you come back....these seem to be simple items to correct, once we get additional info.