Battery Bay wiring

[Rick Daniels]

I have always lived by the rule; "If it ain't broke, don't fix it".  I have read several post over the past few years regarding battery charging, battery wiring, "Birds", "Big Boys", echo charger, solenoids and the like.  My coach spends most of it's life, when not going down the road, plugged in.  I also have solar panels.  My house batteries always seem to have plenty of juice.  My chassis batteries will drain down due to parasite draw over a period of a week to ten days even when plugged in to shore power.  Seems this is a common problem. I am in the habit of turning off the chassis battery cut off and putting a charger/tender on the chassis batteries when parked and hooked up to shore power for an extended period.  My inverter/charger is always set to charge when plugged in.  With that system, I am always fully charged in both chassis and house batteries so I have assumed "it ain't broke".  I have two chassis batteries and six house batteries.  Not having significant issues with the 12 volt house and chassis system, other than chassis battery drain, I have not focused on the technical side of the wiring etc., until now....  Still no serious problem but while accessing the battery bay to service the water levels in the house batteries and to hose off the dust and road grime, I discovered that at one time there was a device screwed to the frame work in the battery bay to the right of the chassis and house battery cut off switches.  In reviewing post on this forum, including photo's and diagrams, dealing with the 12 volt systems, I believe that something is missing or my system has been modified.  I have always felt that I need a new Hart Interface Echo Charger but now I wonder if I might need more than that.  I have attached a photo and you can see that the wires that were going to what ever the missing part is are now joined together. In rummaging, I also found a white wire connected to nothing.  There are no wires, other than battery cables, connected directly to my batteries.   Do I have an issue here or has my coach undergone a logical or common modification? 

[Mike Shumack]

Looking at the wiring schematic for the 1995 - Beaver, there are a few components shown that look similar to what's in your photo, with one component missing.
I can't tell from your photo if the solenoid shown is the "Coach Power cutoff" or the "Boost Solenoid" but it would not be hard for you to figure out which one that is depending on the function of the switches in your coach.

[Fred Brooks]

Greetings Rick. Your battery bay looks like mine however I can't see the bulkhead towards the rear of the coach. If you look at your photo, just below the disconnect switches you see 2 yellow fuse holders hanging down. 1 has a solid red wire and the other has a red wire with a yellow stripe. They both come from the Echo charger which I cannot see in your photo. Here is how the Echo charger works: The solid red wire has a 20 amp fuse inside the yellow fuse holder and is attached indirectly to the "HOUSE" batteries. When the echo charger sees 13.2 volts FROM the house batteries it knows they are being charged from the converter. After sensing that, It closes a relay inside the echo charger and sends power down the red wire with the yellow stripe thru a 20 amp fuse (yellow fuse holder) to the chassis batteries to trickle charge them. Half the coaches that are that old are running around with the 20 amp fuse (red wire with yellow stripe) blown and don't even know it. Here how that happens. When the chassis batteries come to the end of their life cycle, the internal resistance of the chassis battery will cause that fuse to blow. To check both the fuses, just pull the yellow fuse holders apart and look at the fuses.
    Hope this helps, Blessing & Joy this Memorial Day!, Fred Brooks

[Fred Brooks]

    Hey Rick, Enclosed please find my coach battery bay which is all original. You can zoom in on all components to identify them. Hope this will show what has been changed or modified. Thanks, Joel
  Blessings, Fred

[Mike Shumack]

So it looks like Rick is missing the Battery Disconnect (a.k.a. Salesman's Disconnect) - which many people have bypassed as per Rick's setup.

[Fred Brooks]

  Hey Mike, Nothing gets by you! Thanks for your comment. Lots of guys have adios the solenoid and just connected the 2 2/0 cables together and eliminated the salesman switch and use the cole hersey manual switch. The salesman switch was a tool for sales people to sell these pricey coaches by turning on all 50 halogen lights.
 Blessings, Fred

[Rick Daniels]

Mystery solved.  It just so happens the only thing not working (that I know of) is the salesman's switch.  I assumed that it had been disconnected but thought it was at the switch up front.  Now I will focus on getting the echo charge to work.  Thanks to all.