Coach Will Not Start

[Gerald Farris]

Pat,
That usually happens from reverse polarity. Just a momentary touch from the wrong cable on a battery post is all that it takes. You will get a spark and a lot of blown fuses, but the fuses protect the circuits from major damage in most, but not all cases. Therefore, be very careful in battery installation.

Gerald   

[Steve Huber Co-Admin]

Most likely an arc occurred when the batteries were replaced or ground was applied to a chassis battery positive cable after the hookup. Either can cause very high current to be present throughout the system, enough to blow a 200A fuse. No way to predict what fuses will blow, making trouble shooting tough.
Moral; Be VERY careful when changing our batteries!
Steve

[Lee Welbanks]

Most likely an arc occurred when the batteries were replaced or ground was applied to a chassis battery positive cable after the hookup. Either can cause very high current to be present throughout the system, enough to blow a 200A fuse. No way to predict what fuses will blow, making trouble shooting tough.
Moral; Be VERY careful when changing our batteries!
Steve

Added note: Make sure your main coach battery switches are in the off position. I tape up the ends of the coach main negative cables, it is real easy to hit a positive terminal with all cabling with our batteries.

[Darell T Hostland]

I have worked on Golf cart batteries and Joy mining equipment batteries and emergency generating systems for 43 years. This is Motor home number 5 for my wife and I . When I work on the batteries I put tight fitting rubber hose over the bare ends. I use red for the positive and black for the negative. I slip the rubber on as soon as each wire is removed. I put a piece of red electrical tape by the positive post on the battery. This is how I keep my wires and proper polarity in order. Be careful a small DC battery can produce very high currents (amps) and burn and start fires very fast.