11 replies to this topic

[Walldiver]

Hi all,
Picked up my new Hawk from FWC 2 weeks ago. I had the Aux Battery System W/ Separator installed. I added a second battery as soon as I got home, both batteries are 100 amp Lifelines. When I wired the 2 batteries in parallel, I noticed that FWC had installed a inline 30 amp fuse on the ground wire. This does not make sense to me. I also installed a Xantrex Truecharge2 40 amp charger, running 6 AWG power wire directly to one of the batteries with a inline 80 amp breaker. I ran the ground wire to the ground buss. I installed a Xantrex Linklite battery gage connecting it directly to battery bank and ground buss. I did not alter any of FWC wiring.

I took the Hawk out for the first time this weekend for 4 days and got the following results:

The battery bank was at 72 percent. Which I thought was great until I tried to start my truck and the battery was dead.

I tryed to charge my bank with my 1000 watt inverter and the charger would intermittenly charge at 40 amps in the 3 stage mode.

I tryed to make a pot of coffee on a DC coffee maker which is rated at 800 watts. Is it possible for a 400 watt converter to operate this coffee maker utilizing my battery bank?

Has anyone else found this inline fuse ground line in your FWC? Is it possible that who did the wiring in my FWC messed up the wiring elsewhere and has created these problems that I have mentioned above?

[Stan@FourWheel]

Hello Walldiver

Can you send me a personal message to ... stan@fourwh.com

I just need your name and then I can look up your camper order.

I read and re-read through the post and have a few questions on some of the items you mentioned ?

I would be glad to walk you though it the best I can, or Terry in our service department can help talk you throught it as well.

Our camper wiring is really simple.

Black Camper Wire would be the Negative -

White Camper Wire would be the Positive +

Or if you see a thick Red Camper Wire in the battery compartment, that would be the Positive +

Having an in-line fuse on a potitive or a negative wire won't cause any of the electrical problems you were mentioning.

Thanks for any additional information.



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[Walldiver]

Hello Walldiver

Can you send me a personal message to ... stan@fourwh.com

I just need your name and then I can look up your camper order.

I read and re-read through the post and have a few questions on some of the items you mentioned ?

I would be glad to walk you though it the best I can, or Terry in our service department can help talk you throught it as well.

Our camper wiring is really simple.

Black Camper Wire would be the Negative -

White Camper Wire would be the Positive +

Or if you see a thick Red Camper Wire in the battery compartment, that would be the Positive +

Having an in-line fuse on a potitive or a negative wire won't cause any of the electrical problems you were mentioning.

Thanks for any additional information.



.

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Stan,
I did not have the user's manual for the IBS DBR included with the package of manuals that came with the camper and it is not on the FWC website. I downloaded it from the IBS site and now I am able to read the LED Status Indication. When I wired the Truecharge2 charger, I plugged the DC power cord into the DC socket that was avaible in the back of the cabinets next to the Refridgerator that the fridge is connected to. Charging thru the 120V system and the IOTA I believe both chargers are charging my bank at the same time, maybe not a good thing. Not understanding how the IBS was wired and how it operated, I thought maybe pulling the inline fuse from the hot line coming from the IBS would cut off the IOTA from charging my bank. I now know this is not the case. I do remember forgetting to plug the Fuse back in. I cannot remember how long this period was, I did'nt think it was that long. I now realize that it cut my aux bank off of the system and I was running off my starting battery, that is what killed my battery. I will test this theory in a couple of weeks. Even though it is a bit of a pain I can always charge the aux bank independantly by just plugging the charger's DC power cord into shorepower or the Inverter.

About the charging with the Inverter. I just tryed it thru the 120V system here at home and it works flawlessly???
I don't understand this, I was at 6000 ft altitude and had problems as I stated before. Not the fault of the wiring.

Can you or Terry answer my question about the 400 watt converter operating the coffee maker thru my aux battery bank?

[K7MDL]

Re: 800W coffee maker on 400W inverter. Won't work. Watts are watts regardless of the voltage, AC or DC (for our purposes at least).

Your battery can supply lots of juice, but the 400W inverter can only supply more than 400W for a very brief time, likely called the surge current capacity if you had the inverter specs available. Your 800W kitchen coffee maker requires twice the continuous power capacity that your present 400W inverter can provide. So you will either need to get a larger inverter such as a 1000watt unit, or run the coffee maker on AC shore power/generator only.

Watts = current x voltage. So on the AC side at 800W and 120VAC, that is 6.7 AC amps. The battery, being at about 13VDC, would have to supply more than 62 DC amps (since inverters are not 100% efficient). I would assume 77 DC amps continuous input to a 1000W inverter, and considering conversion losses and surge, design for 90 or 100 amps. That is big wire and a lot of juice.

Perhaps heating your coffee water using the propane stove top would be a better option :-).

Edit: You said in your post you had a 800W DC coffee maker. Not sure I have seen DC one before, just AC kitchen models. If it truly is a DC model, then it does not run off your inverter. Is it possibly you are mixing up terminology?

A typical setup looks like this. 120VAC Shorepower -> 120VAC-12VDC converter/battery charger (the stock IOTA unit) -> 12VDC battery -> 12VDC-120VAC inverter (400W in your case) -> 120VAC (coffee maker and other 120VAC items).

If you tried charging your truck starting battery off your new 40amp charger, and you plugged that charger into your 400W inverter AC outlet (which is running off your camper batteries), you would be limited to the 400W the inverter can supply, well below what the charger could do, and may cause unpredicatable results as excess loading might drag down thr AC line voltage and cause one or both units to cycle on and off for overload protection.

[Walldiver]

Re: 800W coffee maker on 400W inverter. Won't work. Watts are watts regardless of the voltage, AC or DC (for our purposes at least).

Your battery can supply lots of juice, but the 400W inverter can only supply more than 400W for a very brief time, likely called the surge current capacity if you had the inverter specs available. Your 800W kitchen coffee maker requires twice the continuous power capacity that your present 400W inverter can provide. So you will either need to get a larger inverter such as a 1000watt unit, or run the coffee maker on AC shore power/generator only.

Watts = current x voltage. So on the AC side at 800W and 120VAC, that is 6.7 AC amps. The battery, being at about 13VDC, would have to supply more than 62 DC amps (since inverters are not 100% efficient). I would assume 77 DC amps continuous input to a 1000W inverter, and considering conversion losses and surge, design for 90 or 100 amps. That is big wire and a lot of juice.

Perhaps heating your coffee water using the propane stove top would be a better option :-).


Edit: You said in your post you had a 800W DC coffee maker. Not sure I have seen DC one before, just AC kitchen models. If it truly is a DC model, then it does not run off your inverter. Is it possibly you are mixing up terminology?

A typical setup looks like this. 120VAC Shorepower -> 120VAC-12VDC converter/battery charger (the stock IOTA unit) -> 12VDC battery -> 12VDC-120VAC inverter (400W in your case) -> 120VAC (coffee maker and other 120VAC items).

If you tried charging your truck starting battery off your new 40amp charger, and you plugged that charger into your 400W inverter AC outlet (which is running off your camper batteries), you would be limited to the 400W the inverter can supply, well below what the charger could do, and may cause unpredicatable results as excess loading might drag down thr AC line voltage and cause one or both units to cycle on and off for overload protection.

Thanks K7,
You are correct, I did mix up on my terminology for the coffee maker.
That is what I thought about the Wattage issue with the IOTA. I am considering on updating to a higher wattage Inverter in case of future add ons or a coffee maker w/ 12V adapter plug.

[K7MDL]

Thanks K7,
You are correct, I did mix up on my terminology for the coffee maker.
That is what I thought about the Wattage issue with the IOTA. I am considering on updating to a higher wattage Inverter in case of future add ons or a coffee maker w/ 12V adapter plug.

If you get a 12VDC coffee maker and plan to plug it into the 12VDC receptacle, note teh receptacle is limited to the wire size and fuse size (that protects the wire). I do not know offhand what that limit is, but 15 or 20 amps would be a likely limit.

I did a quick search for 12V coffee makers just now, never having seen one before, and they do exist :-).

http://www.12volt-travel.com/12-volt-coffee-makers-c-92.html is an example of some.

Looking into the specs, the fast one (19 minutes) requires 45amps and they require (appropriately)dedicated high current wiring. http://www.12volt-tr...3e8a2e4998b73e. Their cheaper one draws 25amps http://www.12volt-tr...er-p-9807.html. Claims 3 minutes for a cup, but also needs direct wiring to the battery. The offer a DC power strip to make this deveice pluggable - http://www.12volt-tr...rip-p-9803.html


http://www.12volt-travel.com/portable-10-cup-12-volt-coffee-maker-p-4339.html uses a standard plug, but takes longer and is much cheaper, and has a cutoff feature pull the first cup and not wait so long. :-) No current spec noted however.

The cheapest one claims 16 ounces in 15 minutes, and 13 amps on a standard plug.

Then there is always the compact Jetboil stove, very fast, but not as convenient.

I am considering on updating to a higher wattage Inverter in case of future add ons or a coffee maker w/ 12V adapter plug.

The inverter changes 12V DC to 120V AC, so it would supply an AC coffee maker or other AC appliances, device battery chargers, etc. A converter changes AC to DC, and its size matters only for long term loads and how fast you can recharge your battery. Your coffee maker draws a lot of power, but for a small defined period of time during the whole day, and the battery charger or built in power supply/charger (aka converter, the IOTA) will supply part of the load up to 30 amps, if not all of it for the smaller devices, and replenish the battery for what load is used beyond the converter limits if on shore power. Also running your truck will recharge the battery.

So hate to see you spend time and money on a bigger inverter (DC to AC) if you end up buying a 12V coffee maker which runs directly off the battery.

You need to make a list with all AC devices you think you want or need in one column, and another column with the DC devices you will bring along. List their power requirements. If the AC devices are to be run from an inverter and not connected to shore power, then you need to consider the whole chain for the big stuff. That list would also help discussion with FWC or us here.

[pods8]

Electric coffee maker off a battery seems like a big waste of battery capacity...

[Barko1]

Electric coffee maker off a battery seems like a big waste of battery capacity...

Haven't heard anything from the coffee thread that was active in the past. I use the little coffee press heating the water on propane. At one time I had a microwave in the camper, I think 700w, that sure killed the batteries in a hurry so I ditched it.

[DLN]

We tried a 12 volt coffee maker once and once was enough to realize it was no good. Took forever to brew and pulled a days worth of juice off the battery. Lesson learned.

[Walldiver]

You all have good advice about the coffee makers. I had the Coleman camping coffee maker that you placed on the camp stove which worked great, only problem was it seemed like it took a half an hour to make coffee and when you are itchin to get out fishin it was a pain. I am thinking about the one that uses the attached propane bottle, reviewrs are claiming it only takes about 15 minutes.