Battery charging from Chevy Silverado

[Bill and Lisa]

Simple recap - nothing providing power to the converter and the "C" light was lite when I pushed the battery button. Granted I had only been disconnected from CG 110v 5-10 minutes so not much of a chance for the battery to "run down". It may be that instead of "Charging" the "C" light means "Charged" but that wouldn't fit for when you know the battery is depleted and you plug in to 110v and immediately observe all four lights lighting.

Point on checking my silverado is it appears it was not providing power to the converter in either the engine running or engine off mode. As noted early in the post, when I checked I found that I did not have a fused in the "Post 1" position in the fuse box. I now have a fuse to put in there and hopefully should get 12v DC coming out of the Bargman plug. I don't think that the TV provides 110v A/C to the converter in the Monty which then converts it to DC. I think it sends 12v DC directly to the trailer lights and brakes and IF you have a fuse in Block 1, it also provides 12v DC to the onboard DC Distribution bus and will charge the battery. I could be wrong.

Anyone else got a better handle on this than me?

Bill

[sreigle]

quote:Originally posted by Bill and Lisa

Simple recap - nothing providing power to the converter and the "C" light was lite when I pushed the battery button. Granted I had only been disconnected from CG 110v 5-10 minutes so not much of a chance for the battery to "run down". It may be that instead of "Charging" the "C" light means "Charged" but that wouldn't fit for when you know the battery is depleted and you plug in to 110v and immediately observe all four lights lighting.

If that's what is happening then I misunderstood. My apologies.

[markwick]

Here's another thought - when hooked up to shore power maybe the 110v charge goes through the monitor, and when hooked up to TV and 12v it goes straight to the batteries bypassing the inside monitor??

[dsprik]

Geeze! I don't know!!! Where's the manual on the panel???

[Cat320]

I have put off posting on this thread until I could go look at my monitor panel. I'm more confused than normal. However, I do know that:

-the converter changes AC power to 12v, and the TV cannot provide AC power to anything, it is a 12v system. Therefore, the TV has nothing to do with the converter.

-the inverter (if you have one) changes 12v to AC.

-the manual, in keeping with tradition, is worthless.

-my C light has never been lit by itself, it seems the battery part of the my panel operates like the tank side. Press the "battery" button the the number of lights that come on depend on the charge status of the battery (C,G,F,L). If the C is on, so are the G, F and L. If the battery is a bit low, the G,F,L or the F,L or the L alone might come on...I have never seen the C light lit with any other single light.

I don't know how it's supposed to work, but my battery is getting charged...even though the C light has never been on by itself.

[Bill and Lisa]

CAT320 (and others) sorry if I added to the oonfusion. My C light, when lit, ALWAYS has the lights below it lit as well. Prior to my "experiments" I had only believed the C light would light when the battery was being "charged". Take away a source of charge current and your battery would be "Good", "Fair" or "Low". Plug in to CG power and "charging" indicator would light up. Thought I could test if my silverado was charging by seeing if when plugged in to only the TV with the vehicle running the battery was being "charged" as indicated by all lights including the "C" light coming on. Planned to check how many lights lit up with no external DC power available, how many with the monty connected to the TV but the tow vehicle off lite (see if I had a battery isolator), and finally how many light lit with the Monty plugged into the TV AND the Engine running. My grand experiment fizzled when at the first data point (no external dc available) all four lights lit! So now I am not sure what "C" means.

Bill

[Cat320]

In the worthless manual, it says "C" means "charge"...which means nothing!

[sreigle]

What Bert says makes sense. I have been told the 12v from the tow vehicle is routed to the converter which then distributes to the battery in accordance with its charging capacity. But I don't know that actually works that way.

Keystone's electrical manual located at
http://www.keystonerv.com/media/manu...Electrical.pdf
says nothing about the TV 12v being routed through the battery. On page 3 it says only this about this topic:
---
The converter installed helps by trickle charging the RV battery when the trailer is plugged into AC power. When connected to the tow vehicle the RV battery will also be charged.
---

Nowhere does it say that 12v from the TV is routed through the converter. In which case, I stand corrected.