# Flat Leisure Battery



## belmont (Jul 31, 2008)

Your help would be greatly appreciated.

We have a Swift Kontiki 679 with a NE 183.03 control panel.
We have 2 small solar panel- one connected to the leisure battery and one to the cab battery.

We have recently had fitted Camos satellite system and Air Con.
We have to admit that we probably haven't been turning this off completely (left on standby!)but we have been on a site for 3 days and last night we realised the battery went flat.

After turning everything off we left it over night and the volt display went down overnight from 11.3 to 10.0 - despite being on electric hook up
We are now getting some charge in from the solar panels (we think) but the volts remain below 11V.
We few questions please:
1) Does the control panel need to be on for the battery to charge?
2) Is it possible for the battery to charge with the solar panel better than from the hook up?
3) If the solar patterns do charge the battery up above 12.5 then when is it safe to turn things on?
4) How long should it take for the leisure battery to charge.

We think the fuse is intact but it is an "in line" one so it is difficult to check but surely the voltage would not go up at all if the fuse has gone.

many thanks
Belmont
(from a wet South Wales!)


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## JohnsCrossMotorHomes (Jul 21, 2007)

Hi Belmont

Answers to your questions are yes the control panel does need to be turned on which will then allow a charge to the battery (dependant on which setting you have chosen you can also charge the vehicle battery).

The solar panels if regulated should`nt damage the charging batteries as when they get to a charged state it will switch off automatically.

Depending on what size and quantity of leisure batteries you have depends on the charging time.A 110amp single leisure battery will take a good 24 hours to charge from the onboard charger and a couple of hours while driving (aprox).

I would advise that you get your battery charger checked out by your dealer as we have had a couple of problems relating to these units.

I hope this helps

Regards

Glenn Harris Workshop Manager


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## belmont (Jul 31, 2008)

Many thanks 

Sorry not to have replied before but I had no power to use the computer!

I did indeed contact my dealer , but thanks to Stuart Jones from Caravan Team who runs a very efficient mobile servicing centre, he was able to confirm I had a faulty charger unit, without me even having to leave my pitch.

Even more impressive he was able to replace it under warranty as I had all my purchase details with me and he had a spare charger unit.

I can't thank him enough, as it allowed me to carry on with my holiday in the Gower Peninsula

Apparantly this is a common fault & according to my dealer,Swift are saying if it doesn't go wrong in the first year the charger unit doesn't need replacing.

However the dealer has "lost count " of the number it has replaced. 

I would be interested to know Swift's comments on this


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## JohnsCrossMotorHomes (Jul 21, 2007)

Hi Belmont

Pleased to hear you got it sorted.

Glenn Harris Workshop Manager


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## Pudsey_Bear (Sep 25, 2008)

belmont said:


> I would be interested to know Swift's comments on this


Glad you're sorted, you would I think have to PM Swift, as I don't imagine they would have the time to watch every thread.

Kev.


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