Question about battery charge

[DRich]

Is there any particular reason that a house battery wouldn't fully charge? It's a brand new battery. When it's plugged in the battery charge level indicator never goes above the "G" and it doesn't indicate the "C" that it is charging. I've had it in twice to be checked and they've said they can't find anything wrong. It's definitely charging the chassis battery because the battery indicator on the dash rises.

[treking]

I recently had the same issue with a two battery setup. Two different places checked each battery under load and said they were each fine. The third place checked the batteries with a hydrometer and found a cell in one battery to be bad. I replaced the battery and that solved the issue. Find a place that can do a hydrometer test on your battery or buy a battery hydrometer and test it. Perhaps that is the issue with that battery.

[Bertiboo]

While I have no specific knowledge of the specifics of your unit. (Actually I don’t see a reference to how old a unit you have). But I would check the other components in the system besides the batteries:

1/Output from converter measured at converter (assuming converter based system rather than inverter-based)
2/Same input at battery end to confirm good cable (ground and line)
3/Battery isolator. (Why is chassis battery charging and house battery not)
4/ without shore power and with engine running, measure #2 above again to see if house battery is getting a charge while driving.

It seems strange to me that your chassis battery is getting a charge while on shore power, unless you have a modern electronic version of the isolator. Most commonly on older systems the chassis battery does not charge from the converter so many of us run a separate battery tender during Rv storage to keep the chassis battery topped up. If you have older style (tin can) isolator, maybe it is connected incorrectly?

[ChicagoTom]

could be something as simple as your monitor...

[KennyG]

Could also be something as similar as a burnt out fuse or breaker IF one exists between the house battery and driving battery? Are you charging with the converter, or using a separate battery charger. As noted above it is unusual that the chassis battery would charge from the converter, since it is normally isolated from anything on the house side of the 12 volt system, unless the engine is running which then connects the isolator so both batteries (house and chassis) are in parallel.

[DRich]

Originally Posted by treking

I recently had the same issue with a two battery setup. Two different places checked each battery under load and said they were each fine. The third place checked the batteries with a hydrometer and found a cell in one battery to be bad. I replaced the battery and that solved the issue. Find a place that can do a hydrometer test on your battery or buy a battery hydrometer and test it. Perhaps that is the issue with that battery.

It's a brand new battery and they said they checked it at the battery.

[DRich]

Originally Posted by Bertiboo

While I have no specific knowledge of the specifics of your unit. (Actually I don’t see a reference to how old a unit you have). But I would check the other components in the system besides the batteries:

1/Output from converter measured at converter (assuming converter based system rather than inverter-based)
2/Same input at battery end to confirm good cable (ground and line)
3/Battery isolator. (Why is chassis battery charging and house battery not)
4/ without shore power and with engine running, measure #2 above again to see if house battery is getting a charge while driving.

It seems strange to me that your chassis battery is getting a charge while on shore power, unless you have a modern electronic version of the isolator. Most commonly on older systems the chassis battery does not charge from the converter so many of us run a separate battery tender during Rv storage to keep the chassis battery topped up. If you have older style (tin can) isolator, maybe it is connected incorrectly?

it's a 2012 RT 170. They said they checked the cables and fuses and that they checked at the battery and could see it charging.

[DRich]

Originally Posted by KennyG

Could also be something as similar as a burnt out fuse or breaker IF one exists between the house battery and driving battery? Are you charging with the converter, or using a separate battery charger. As noted above it is unusual that the chassis battery would charge from the converter, since it is normally isolated from anything on the house side of the 12 volt system, unless the engine is running which then connects the isolator so both batteries (house and chassis) are in parallel.

charging with the converter. They checked the fuses at the converter and at the monitor and they were all good. The battery separator does click on and off and they said it does that to prevent overcharging the chassis battery. It didn't click on and off like that when I first got it.