Jump to content

Battery Terminal Switch, Sparks, & secondary battery not charging


mgrijalva

Recommended Posts

Do not trust wire colors. They may be correct, but 30 plus years of people adding and modifying, its not worth the risk.

30 seconds with a Volt Ohm meter will generally resolve if its safe to hook up a wire to a particular;or terminal or connection..

The meter. Rather than attempt to learn basic electricity in two paragraphs. start out reading voltage only.This will get you thru the majority of troubleshooting techniques.

On the meter, the black probe should plug into the (-) lead and the red probe plug in to the (+) lead.

Place the meter in the Volts DC when measuring 12 volts.

Generally, the black lead will be touched on ground, the truck chassis, or battery (-)

and the Red lead will be placed at the point you want to measure.

Practice reading on the truck battery.

Electricity 101-

When I teach electricity to older people, I like to use "water" as an analogy, since most adults have experience with water.

Volts is equivalent to "pressure" (Thats exactly what it is, how much pressure is being applied to make electrons move)

Amps is equivalent to water flow, How much water is moving thru a pipe or hose.

Resistance is exactly that, something resisting the flow of the water, could be a small diameter pipe, could be a valve opened a little, could be the hose pinched over.

Power (watts) this is a "quantity" i.e. how much water is in a bucket, or could be capacity, how much water the bucket can hold, or could be capability, how long does it take to fill the bucket thru a 1/2 inch hose when the spicket is turned on full..

John Mc

88 Dolphin 4 Auto

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Place the meter in the Volts DC when measuring 12 volts.

Volts is equivalent to "pressure" (Thats exactly what it is, how much pressure is being applied to make electrons move)

Electricity to an extent is still a mystery. It has never been proven which way it flows (thus the Electron Theory competing with the Hole Theory). When semi-conductors came into common use at the household level - an accepted standard had to be adopted to avoid confusion in wiring schematics. So, we say that electron flow is positive to negative although it has yet to be proven. That's why we have "theories" and not "laws" about it. I'm not even sure what good a "law" is anyway since several of them have been disproven (e.g.Newton's Law of Gravity).

To complicate the issue of using cheaper volt-meters in RVs, most cannot read AC voltage from an modified-wave inverter. So, to a person new at it - don't be distressed when your brand new DC to AC inverter is supposed to put out 115 volts AC and your new voltmeter says it's only putting 85 volts VAC. Since the vast majority of inverters kicking around ARE modified wave, and most homeowner type voltmeters do not read voltage proper for such an inverter - it can get a bit perplexing. There are at least three different ways of reading voltage with three different type voltmeters. Most inverters require a voltmeter that works by RMS (root-mean-square) method and you won't get that in cheap meter. Cheapest I know of costs around $75. The little digital mulitmeters like Harbor Freight sells for $5 are great for many things and at that price - virtually disposable. Won't read inverter output voltage though. My only portable meter that reads RMS voltage is an Extech "True RMS" model 470. When I got it 3-4 years ago it was the cheapest RMS meter on the market at $85. I see some places now getting $150 for it.

Maybe this is getting to trivial now - but I assume many RV people own inverters and this is a useful thing to know on that subject.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

In my dolphin black is positive and power to 12 volts, aand red is ground. Blue is land line charging.

I destroyed a battery that way. Connecting red to positive

.

It worked too when the engine was not running. For a while.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

JD - I was taught that electrons flowed from negative to positive. Most people probably don't care, as no-one ever gets a bucket of electrons and dumps them into a battery. :-)

John Mc

88 Dolphin 4 Auto

Link to comment
Share on other sites

JD - I was taught that electrons flowed from negative to positive. Most people probably don't care, as no-one ever gets a bucket of electrons and dumps them into a battery. :-)

John Mc

88 Dolphin 4 Auto

Unless there has been some huge breakthrough-discovery recently, nobody knows for sure which way electrons flow. The "Electron Theory" guesses it's positive to negative, and the "Hole Theory" guesses negative to positive. Depending on which theory was most relied on had something to do with have a positive ground or negtative ground system. Neither theory has ever been proven or disproven. This wasn't a huge issue until semiconductors like transistors came into common use (late 1950s maybe?). Then things needed to get standardized since a transistorized device can only work one way. Negative ground then became the standard except in some military and marine use.

What we have is observed behavior and we give the aspects of it names. We also assume electricity will keep doing what we've seen it beore - and in the real world - so far-so good. To standardize electric components, diagrams and schematics - showing positive flowing towards negative is what is used.

I have no idea if the conventional flow of electricity as we normal people see it - has ever been disproven. Newton's gravity was (but not in motorhomes). Photon flow (light as we know it) has been challenged. Graviton existence has never been verified. I think I've read that electricity has proven NOT to do as it does normally at the sub-atomic particle level - but I can't say for sure. Can't say I'm even interested.

When it comes to what we see and use everyday - I think it's safe to say positive flows to negative.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I believe you have that backwards, Its widely accepted that Electrons flow from negative to positive, and in semiconductor theory (PN junctions) holes flow positive to negative (at which time the hole is filled with an electron.)

Anyway, as I said, Most people don't care unless they are designing electronic circuits. ( I've been doing this for 40 years). Just don't hook the Positive and Negatives togther, else the electrons turn to smoke. :-)

Do a quick Google search, "Electron Flow"

John Mc

88 Dolphin 4 Auto

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I believe you have that backwards, Its widely accepted that Electrons flow from negative to positive, and in semiconductor theory (PN junctions) holes flow positive to negative (at which time the hole is filled with an electron.)

Anyway, as I said, Most people don't care unless they are designing electronic circuits. ( I've been doing this for 40 years). Just don't hook the Positive and Negatives togther, else the electrons turn to smoke. :-)

Do a quick Google search, "Electron Flow"

John Mc

88 Dolphin 4 Auto

Electrical current in the real world is usually assumed to travel in the opposite direction of electron flow. So it depends if discussing where we think the little electrons are going, or where the magical current is going. At my level - working on equipment I can actually see - it doesn't matter. So call it electron flow, or the fuctional opposite - current flow. Years back - different schools of theory predicted different types of corrosion depending if the battery terminal marked NEG or the one marked POS was hooked up to a common chassis ground (not always the same as true earth/ground. To get technical, the Electron Theory promotes actual flow. The Hole Theory does not - at least not in the conventional sense. I've read it in total many times ad nausem I'm not interested in a Google search and latest take on it.

If you hook up an ammeter in your Toyota - with the alternator hooked to the ammeter terminal with the negative terminal, and then the ammeter terminal marked positive going to the positive terminal of the battery - when charging the needle would swing towards the battery (higher voltage to lower voltage). When it comes to a workind definition of positive and negative - "positive" is more then a "negative." Hook a rectifier/diode with the arrow pointing out the direction of current flow - it will indicate positive flowing towards negative and it has been marked with a basis on the Electron Theory.

When someone actually shows me an electron scurrying down a wire, or a "graviton" holding me down to earth, or a bunch of manic little photons jumping out of my flashlight- I'll stick to what I can see. I ask this though. If . . . according the Einstein's Special Theory of Relativety - the speed of light cannot exceed 186,000 (give-or-take) MPH, what happens when I'm driving my Toyota at 60 MPH and then turn on the headlights? What speed is the light coming out of the headlights going? 186,000 MPH plus 60 MPH? That's a rhetorical question. I've alway heards many answers to it.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

JD, Obviously you and I attended different electronic schools and were taught just the opposite!! I can't see electrons, but knowing basic physics and chemistry, I understand why and how electrons jump from one atom to another, and therefore "flow".

HOLD THE PRESSES - While googling current flow thru a diode, I discover that every drawing I see, its noted that current flow is just the opposite of what I've been saying, drawing, and teaching for years. I need to reconcile this!!!!! I don't think its a symantics issue, I've been using the term "Current Flow" in the same context as "Electron Flow". This is very troubling as this is my understanding and I've built an entire lifetime of experience on this premise.

(I'm not going to loose sleep over this, but I'll work on reconciling this)

I can't speak about "graviton", not in my area of expertise

The one perplexing problem, why do they charge me for electrons, I sent them all back!!

John Mc

88 Dolphin 4 Auto

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Just did a google on "Electron Flow". My sanity has been partially restored. :-)

Electrons do indeed flow from negative charge to positive charge (Had me scared for a minute, I was about to undo every bit of physics that I understood)

So that still leads to the disparity on the word "Current Flow", if current is not electrons, then what is it?? I'll report back later. Good find JD :-)

John Mc

88 Dolphin 4 Auto

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Never mind holes and positive earth.

Some thoughts of a practical nature. Charging batteries in parallel will eventually result in one battery getting the juice and the other slowly losing capacity.

I've been using one of these. http://www.ebay.com/...es_Gear&vxp=mtr About once a month when driving I will charge the batteries one at a time, ensuring that both are peaked. Normally it stays in the both position.

One other thing I've hooked the isolator up different. The house batteries are hooked to the alternator terminal and the starter battery to the switched side. This way the house batteries get max charge voltage and are really full. The engine starts so easily that truck battery doesn't miss the .5v loss.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Back in the day we were taught that electrons carry a negative charge, so the negative point was so called because it had a surplus of electrons relative to the opposing side, so electrons flow from "negative to "positive".

All was fine with this till solid state arrived on the scene, when we were told current flows against the arrow on a schematic showing a diode and inside the PNP/NPN junction "holes" flow. Well if the electrons flow the holes move, but not because they are moving only themselves, the electron movement causes new holes to be formed, either way it seems the same to me. You can explain how a transistor works either way, no problem with tubes. :)

I guess it all boils down to what you are calling the negative side, if you want to say electrons flow from a surplus point to a definciency point you could say the surplus side was "positive" ???

BTW a previous post I made, don't remember where it was, I said my 91 Dolphin had #4 wiring from battery to relay to coach battery. This was an error on my part the correct size is #8 wire, according to the labeling on the battery wire. Sure is a tight fit in those #8 lugs I bought, but SORRY to mislead, my bad.

vanman

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Never mind holes and positive earth.

Some thoughts of a practical nature. Charging batteries in parallel will eventually result in one battery getting the juice and the other slowly losing capacity.

I've been using one of these. http://www.ebay.com/...es_Gear&vxp=mtr About once a month when driving I will charge the batteries one at a time, ensuring that both are peaked. Normally it stays in the both position.

One other thing I've hooked the isolator up different. The house batteries are hooked to the alternator terminal and the starter battery to the switched side. This way the house batteries get max charge voltage and are really full. The engine starts so easily that truck battery doesn't miss the .5v loss.

An automotive alternator cannot not fully charge a deep-cycle battery no matter how you hook it up. 95% charge in a best-case situation. An automotive-type regulator has a fixed profile for cranking batteries. No way around that unless you install a custom regulator . . or . . . install a deep cycle battery charger that runs off the alternator. In marine use such a device is called a "battery to battery" charger. Some rigs even have dual alternators. A rectifier based isolator makes things worse due to the inherent voltage drop. With a relay, there is NO drop.

About series-parallel battery connections. With proper maintenance, they do not suffer at all. I've got a 48 volt battery bank at my farm and a 12 volt battery bank at an off-grid home. Both banks have series and parallel connections with many 6 volt batteries. My batteries have all aged the same. No early failures. Back when I was a heavy equipment and diesel mechanic -just about all the equipment used dual 12 volt batteries in parallel. So do my two Chevy diesel trucks and also my Ford diesel truck. Never with any has one battery in a pair suffered an early failure. My 1983 diesel plow truck has two Walmart (Johnson Controls) 12 volt batteries in parallel that are now 8 years old and still work fine (although I'm sure will crap out any day now).

Granted that large battery banks need to be checked for uneven cells and equalized once in awhile. Never had that problem in a 2 battery parallel bank.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I think you've got things backwards. That breaker has nothing to do with energizing the relay.

Terminals #2 and #3 are on the charge-side (alternator side) of the circuit breaker. When the relay energized, flow of power is FROM #2 and #3 and through that circuit breaker and on to the AUX battery. My point is the circuit breaker has nothihg to do with energizing that relay. You could remove it and the relay would still enerize if wired and working properly. Nobody really knows where or how electric power flows but . . .to dicuss it we use the Electron Theory. I.e. higher voltage always flows to lower voltage. So -with your Toyota when it is NOT running. If all is wired correct - your cranking battery has the same voltage as your RV battery. Let's say they are both charged and 12.7 volts. At that circuit breaker - when the relay is NOT enerized, terminal #4 will read 12.7 volts because it's getting power from the RV battery. If the breaker is good, terminals #3 and #2 will also read 12.7 volts from that RV/AUX battery. At this time, nothing is coming from the other direction (the relay). When you turn the key on, and the relay turns "on", then . . . the cranking battery is connected to the RV/AUX battery via that relay and breaker. If you turned the key on and both batteries were fully charged, there would be no current flow. If you turned the key on, and the RV/AUX battery was low - then power from the higher voltage cranking battery would flow on to the lower voltage RV/AUX battery until they were both equal. So, the cranking battery would discharge, and the RV/AUX battery would charge a bit. Then when you start the engine, the alternator raises the system voltage to 14 volts and that power flows to both batteries until both are fully charged..

yes, i get things backwards, especially when it sounds scary. That multimeter really intimidated me. I didn't get a new relay because the previous one was always hot because of a short somewhere. This is an indicator that unless i find the source of the short, the latest new relay will burn out too. i figured.....So i charged the aux battery at autozone: the relay stopped overworking. No more noise. The lights flickers very sporadically now.

I took off as is. Spend my first real night 'camping' in the middle of nowhere. 9Mile Canyon, Utah. Now I know why people become addicted to motorhomes.

I also found out i get more mileage if traveling slow.

post-6311-0-26399100-1354207485_thumb.jp

post-6311-0-98864600-1354207543_thumb.jp

Link to comment
Share on other sites

yes, i get things backwards, especially when it sounds scary. That multimeter really intimidated me. I didn't get a new relay because the previous one was always hot because of a short somewhere. This is an indicator that unless i find the source of the short, the latest new relay will burn out too. i figured.....So i charged the aux battery at autozone: the relay stopped overworking. No more noise. The lights flickers very sporadically now.

I took off as is. Spend my first real night 'camping' in the middle of nowhere. 9Mile Canyon, Utah. Now I know why people become addicted to motorhomes.

I also found out i get more mileage if traveling slow.

I don't believe you've got any kind of short heating up your relay. It is rated for at least 80 amps and more likely over 100 amps of continuous duty. You would have to have "short" or excess current draw of well over 100 amps to heat up that relay. If you had something like that, your wires would of melted by now. 10 gauge wire will start to melt at 40-50 amps.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I don't beleive you've got any kind of short heating up your relay. It is rated for at least 80 amps and more likely over 100 amps of continuous duty. You would have to have "short" or excess current draw of well over 100 amps to heat up that relay. If you had something like that, your wires would of melted by now. 10 gauge wire will start to melt at 40-50 amps.

Let add that if that relay is an intermittent type made for use with starter motors, lift-gates., diesel glow plugs, etc. then it will get hot when left on too long - even if there is NO load on it.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 4 years later...
On 11/24/2012 at 11:50 AM, zero said:

I have no idea what relay/solenoid you have now? By the way, in this discussion "relay" and "solenoid" are the same thing. Get your hands on a $5-$10 digital multimeter and do some checks on it unless you already know what it is. Relays are either rated for "intermittent" use or "continuous" use. You need one rated for "continuous" use. A "continuous" use relay draws much less power to turn itself "on." "Intermittent" relays like often used on car and boat starter motors can draw 4-8 amps just to get "turned on." Relays rated "continuous" use draw 1/2 amp to 3 amps. If you have a cheap VOM, digital multimeter, ohm meter - etc. you can check your relay two different ways. To check by amperage draw - hook a amp-meter in-line with the little wire that goes to the small terminal on your relay. Turn your key "on" and see how many amps are flowing to it. A $5 digital multimeter from Harbor Freight has a 10-amp amp-meter built into it. To check by resistance - put your multimeter on the low ohm scale. Touch one lead to the small terminal on your relay and the other to any known good metal ground on your truck - or the can of the relay. An "intermittent" relay is likely to read 3 to 6 ohms. A "continuous" relay will read 8-15 ohms.

Your relay is the self-grounding type. That means it gets negative power from your battery via the metal ground of the truck. If there is corrosion where it contacts the truck - it might not be well grounded and might click on and off.

There is a lot to say about relays and I don't want to write a long boring essay. Most relays I see around, regardless of brand name are made by the same 2-3 companies. Ametek is one of the most prolific makers. Last I checked they make relays for Cole Heresee, Prestolite, Terkonsha, etc. Just about any continous relay is rated for 250,000 duty cycles or "on and offs."

The main attributes are this.

#1 - self grounding with one small post, or wire-grounded with two small posts.

#2 - intermittent use or continuous use

#3 - amp carry capacity. You ought to have something well about your alternator max charge capacity. I use 100 amp minimum

#4 - voltage - in this case, 12 volts that will work in a range from 9 to 16 volts

#5 - quality of contacts. Standard is copper and the longer lived and more pricey is silver

That is for a standard "on" or "off" relay/solenoid.

To make things more complicated, there are relays with "brains." They cost $150 instead of $15-$25. A relay with a "brain" sense voltage on the cranking battery and makes sure it is fully charged before allowing any charge current to go to the RV aux. battery. NAPA 782-1774 is one example and knowing NAPA, it is overpriced and can be found elsewhere for half the price.

The same basic Ametek relay that you need will sell from some places for $15 and others for $75. Those prices have nothing to do with quality.

A good basic low-draw, copper contact Ametek realy is SAS4208. Often for sale for $20 if you shop around. Same as: Prestolite: 15-139, 15-296, 15-342, 15-345, SAS-4208, SBC-4201, SBC-4201D, SBC-4201E

Johnson Electric: 5117540, SO51175 Cole Hersee 24106 24106BX

$22 on Ebay: http://www.ebay.com/itm/New-Solenoid-SAS-4208-15-139-15-296-15-342-Prestolite-7-1019-/270992721151

$36.50 from Texas Industrial: http://www.texasindustrialelectric.com/relays.asp

$25 from BargainBoats: http://www.bargainboatparts.com/searchcust.aspx?SearchTerm=sas-4208

$10 from DSI: http://dsi1998.com/partBreakdown.php?partId=110782&ref=home

If you want a low-draw, continious relay that uses a ground wire - these #s apply: AC Delco 1114218, Presolite 15-132, 15-133, 15-236, 15-311, SAS-4201, SAS-4202, SAS-4213, SAS-5213

jde or zero!

 

Because of this https://www.ghacks.net/2017/06/30/photobucket-now-charges-399-for-third-party-hosted-images/

your images in this thread are not visible. Would you mind posting them here by attaching them to a reply instead of the photobucket links? thanks.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

19 minutes ago, linda s said:

He is not on this site anymore

Linda S

well this applies equally to everyone then. If you have photobucketed then perhaps best to at least download your images. Even if you dont want to repost them here.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I agree completely. My friend Gail restores Toyota motorhomes and I have always gone to her photobucket site to show others how things are supposed to look. Now I have to ask her to send me a new link every time or I can't see them. Super pain

Linda S

Link to comment
Share on other sites

6 hours ago, linda s said:

I agree completely. My friend Gail restores Toyota motorhomes and I have always gone to her photobucket site to show others how things are supposed to look. Now I have to ask her to send me a new link every time or I can't see them. Super pain

Linda S

Photo bucket has really went into the black water tank.  I am glad I have all my photos on disk.  Not as convenient to find or post, at least I am not being held hostage by them!

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Join the conversation

You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.

Guest
Reply to this topic...

×   Pasted as rich text.   Paste as plain text instead

  Only 75 emoji are allowed.

×   Your link has been automatically embedded.   Display as a link instead

×   Your previous content has been restored.   Clear editor

×   You cannot paste images directly. Upload or insert images from URL.

×
×
  • Create New...