Battery Question

[cjblovinlife]

It will be a couple days before I can go back to the boat I’ll try that test and let everyone know.. after the two systems balance back out it runs great for at least a couple days because we did that over the 4th when on the dock connected to shore power every night so we weren’t using much DC but it lasted a couple days with no charge at all to #2 .. I know I have a lot left to learn and do too bad I have to go to work I’d much rather be at the boat:)

[bud37]

In my opinion, those schumacher testers are not very reliable or accurate enough for this type of system, #2 ....the Noco is ok for a bass boat but not for what you have, you need a proper marine charger with enough amp capacity to handle a ships system as you have.
FYI... It takes a considerable amount of time to properly charge depleted battery banks ( much longer that folk realize ) and not just get a surface charge on them that will disappear quickly.

Curious was there not a big charger onboard when you got the boat ?

Edit....just another thought, check around where the original OEM charger was mounted to see if there is any evidence of interesting wiring .

[bud37]

Here is some reading info if you are so inclined.......in the menu on the right side are many topics to explore that you will be coming up against.

https://gilwellbear.wordpress.com/categ ... -and-care/

[cjblovinlife]

Well , issue solved !! My battery switch was part of the problem it tested fine but I took it apart and part of the copper bus was broken just hanging up and intermittently connecting all three terminals or none depending on how the random piece of copper landed when I fixed that it was much improved and wouldn’t shut down and fail to reset but the lights flickered still intermittently especially when a larger load like a pump kicked on I had already checked every connection on the line side and every ground in the bilge before any of that I checked the common ground bar in the panel tightened all the connections and it all looked good but I went back to that since I had replaced or eliminated everything else and pushed pulled and tugged on every ground about 3/4 across the bar and the lights flickered and the panel got dim !! I found one of the larger ground wires 10g was nearly severed under the connector! It looks like it was overcrimped at some point in the past maybe in 1996 ! Everything looked factory.. I fixed it and now everything is working perfectly!! Thanks for all your suggestions I now have a much better understanding of my boats dc system . It was really baffling and starting to piss me off

[Viper]

Good find! Thanks for posting that.

[cjblovinlife]

Ok ,,, this is officially driving me crazy!!! I fridge suggestion got me excited I saw a lot of people having similar challenges with the whole system going down unfortunately that is not it . So at this point I have replaced everything… I bought new batteries so right now I have the leads that power the main panel . I connect them to my #1 battery and everything works perfectly. I remove those 2 leads and hook them to my #2 house batteries and the system immediately shuts down! If I shut off the mains and all branch circuits (no load) then tried to switch them back on one circuit at a time to see if I could isolate a particular circuit and it’s not a particular circuit any load and same result it shuts down!!! Remember it all works on #1…So whatever it is does not like AGM batteries?? The batteries are new and have 640 CCA !! So , why not just switch to all lead acid batteries instead of AGM ? apart from not having the amp hours I would want my thinking is that the battery type is not THE problem..It’s revealing a problem I haven’t figured out yet.. do you agree? Any suggestions?

[cjblovinlife]

On about 3 occasions I thought I solved it but obviously I didn’t

[km1125]

Battery chemistry (AGM vs FLA) is NOT your issue. The only real difference in those two might be how long they last or slight differences in depth-of-discharge or charge voltage(s). One or the other won't make a system "work" and others "not work".

I'd go back to that switch and the associated connections. Perhaps you have a cable failing at a connector and it's underneath some shrink tubing so you can't see what's going on under there.

[cjblovinlife]

Thanks for your help. I agree I do not think the chemistry is the problem, but I do think it is revealing the problem because I have two leads going directly out the back of the main panel directly to either one or two and I am manually hooking the two leads up to a starter battery and everything works I manually take those two leads and switch them to the AGM battery right next to them and it fails. I have eliminated everything in the circuit except for the grounds. There are no switches or connections that are different between the two systems at this time. Is it possible that the negative is Completing the circuit at the battery on one and for some reason, not completing on 2 even though all engine grounds and battery 1 grounds are all terminating on the same bus ???

[bud37]

Check continuity with a good dvm.

What are the two leads you are mentioning , do you have a pic of this set up ?