DickWells
06-10-2005, 18:26
My converter in my Sunline trailer just bit the dust the other day. My niece and her two kids were staying in it for a couple of weeks. The lights went dim, and she called me out there to take a look. Everything dead. I chased it down to the converter, and got the thing going for the night by putting a small 6 amp charger on the battery.
The begining of the rest of the story is like this. I went to the trailer dealer's place, and they didn't have the right converter. Seems Sunline uses a different one from most makes. Mine was a single output one, which is (supposed) to be a little more expensive and a little better. I guess you get cleaner power, when you are drawing from the battery at all times, rather than from the converter without the battery in-line to smooth things out, like with the dual output converter. That's what my RV DIY book says.
Well, I bought Wal Mart's best battery charger, and hard wired it into my trailer. It (seems) to be working perfectly. Keeps the battery up at about 13.6 - 13.8 V, just like my old converter did, and goes to float mode when there's no draw.
Has anyone else done this sort of thing, and if so, what was your outcome? Am I missing something here? I paid $90 bucks instead of close to $300, to get the thing working essentially the same as it's worked for five years. It runs real cool, there, under the couch, and charges at the 2 amp rate when it kicks on with no load being drawn in the trailer. It cycles more frequently, but it isn't over powering the battery.
Have I done right, or am I creating a potential problem? Any comments? Can I consider this the end of the story?
Dick Wells
The begining of the rest of the story is like this. I went to the trailer dealer's place, and they didn't have the right converter. Seems Sunline uses a different one from most makes. Mine was a single output one, which is (supposed) to be a little more expensive and a little better. I guess you get cleaner power, when you are drawing from the battery at all times, rather than from the converter without the battery in-line to smooth things out, like with the dual output converter. That's what my RV DIY book says.
Well, I bought Wal Mart's best battery charger, and hard wired it into my trailer. It (seems) to be working perfectly. Keeps the battery up at about 13.6 - 13.8 V, just like my old converter did, and goes to float mode when there's no draw.
Has anyone else done this sort of thing, and if so, what was your outcome? Am I missing something here? I paid $90 bucks instead of close to $300, to get the thing working essentially the same as it's worked for five years. It runs real cool, there, under the couch, and charges at the 2 amp rate when it kicks on with no load being drawn in the trailer. It cycles more frequently, but it isn't over powering the battery.
Have I done right, or am I creating a potential problem? Any comments? Can I consider this the end of the story?
Dick Wells