# leisure battery



## helen.dipn (Feb 4, 2008)

Hi there,

Can anyone tell me how long a leisure battery should last for wild camping assuming its fully charged to start with and it runs an average domestic supply such as lights, water pump, fridge ignition and heater fan??

I have a newish lunar champ motorhome and have two leisure batteries now as the first one only lasted one night and im only just getting a second night on 2 batgteries and am wonderin if this is the best it can do??

Thanks

Hel


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## tresrikay (Feb 4, 2008)

helen.dipn said:


> Hi there,
> 
> Can anyone tell me how long a leisure battery should last for wild camping assuming its fully charged to start with and it runs an average domestic supply such as lights, water pump, fridge ignition and heater fan??
> 
> ...



Hello Helen and welcome to the site, You should be getting more than 2 nights from 2 leisure batteries, so something isn't right. What are the leisure batteries ratings? were they fitted at the same time? If you just added a new battery to one that was already goosed then the good battery just discharges into the old one. What are your charging methods? do you hook up at home or just rely on your journey? a short journey will not sufficiently charge 2 leisure batteries. I have a Lunar Premier, made in the same factory as your Champ and mine is fitted with a 90 amp battery, so I assume yours is too, this lasts 3 nights without excessive heater use. To extend the battery life I have had a 43 watt solar panel fitted and have just changed all my bulbs to l.e.d's (Incidentally I have a source for these at £4.50 each, I am picking up 20 tomorrow, 10 of which are for forum members, so I do have spares, .50p from each order goes to ADMIN) advert over.The draw from these is a tenth that of halogens and they are very easy to change, I hope these together with my panel will enable me to get 4/5 nights out of a fully charged battery. I think you should take your van to your dealer or a motor accessory shop and have your batteries tested as something is definitely wrong. Some dealers just try and fob you off so insist on them checking and insist on a report and if they connected a new battery to a duff one then insist on 2 new ones as they will both now be duff.


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## Tony Lee (Feb 4, 2008)

Hi Helen,

more information would help

What capacity are the battery - should be a figure on the label saying something like 100Amp-hours at 20 hour rate. What type are they - lead acid, AGM, so-called "hybrid", deep cycle.
Was the original battery left uncharged for months and so irreparably damaged and maybe "holding back" the newer battery

If your major load is the heater, how many amps does it draw. Something like 5Amps. How many hours a day is it running

Lighting - halogen, fluorescent - rating 8W, 20W??

Fridge ignition and water pump not so important.

TV or computer or sound system would be significant if you use them for several hours.

Then need to know how you charge the battery up - good quality 3-stage charger, cheap auto parts taper charger or just charging from the engine when you are driving. Problem is that "fully charged" has several meanings. Obviously 100% charged is the only correct meaning but some methods of charging can be as bad as only getting to 70% so you would be losing a lot in that case.

How are you determining when the battery is flat? Flat means different things to different people.

Sorry, but these are important if you need an considered answer instead of a wild guess.

Obviously if someone has exactly your setup and the same motorhome and also uses it for winter camping, they may be able to give you a better idea without all the figures. Here's hoping.
=============================
I suspect Rick is a slow typist like me as there was no reply when I started. - similar thoughts


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## GeorgeTelford (Feb 4, 2008)

Hi Helen

Does your van have a Traffic light meter for the battery? or a gauge with numbers? Please post the reading here 

Next when the engine is running does the gauge show an increase in power?

Next does the gauge show an increase in power when hooked up?

Do the batteries look like a pair? is same make model and look the same age?

Did you personally have the second battery added?

You say you get second night out of the second battery are they switched, ie only one used at a time?


George


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## Don (Feb 4, 2008)

Hi  Helen

Two things I would suggestyou do.
1 :Make a list of what you use and what Wattage, add the total Wattage, and multiply by the hours. That will give you the Daily Wattage use.

2 : Both battery's should be same ie 2x110 or whatever. Multiply the Ah of battery capacity by 12 (volts) divide by 2 ( only half discharge your battery)
this will give you a rough idea of what your battery should provide you with.

Divide 2: Battery capacity by 1: van usage, should give you a *rough *idea of how long your battery should last.

hope that helps.

Don


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## helen.dipn (Feb 6, 2008)

*battery*

Thanks for all your replies I am very grateful but not very technically minded I'm afraid!!

I have two 85 batteries I original and one added by the dealer when I complained. He checked the original battery with some kind of meter thing and said it was ok but fitted another one as 'a favour' and now I think he thinks I shoudl be eternally grateful!! However it doesnt seemed to have solved my problem. I do have the traffic light system and after the second night this goes into the amber and my heater light flashes suggestin theres not enough voltage to run my blown air heater stystem.  When I return from my weekends I always mains charge the batteries and they show full immediately that I plug in. Also if I drive they show full. I am using tea lights in my van to conserve battery which seems a bit ridiculous but nevertheless atmospheric!! 

Do you think I should insist on a new 1st battery as my van is still under warrenty??

Thanks

Hel


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## tresrikay (Feb 6, 2008)

helen.dipn said:


> Thanks for all your replies I am very grateful but not very technically minded I'm afraid!!
> 
> I have two 85 batteries I original and one added by the dealer when I complained. He checked the original battery with some kind of meter thing and said it was ok but fitted another one as 'a favour' and now I think he thinks I shoudl be eternally grateful!! However it doesnt seemed to have solved my problem. I do have the traffic light system and after the second night this goes into the amber and my heater light flashes suggestin theres not enough voltage to run my blown air heater stystem.  When I return from my weekends I always mains charge the batteries and they show full immediately that I plug in. Also if I drive they show full. I am using tea lights in my van to conserve battery which seems a bit ridiculous but nevertheless atmospheric!!
> 
> ...



Get it straight back to the dealer and tell him you are not taking it back until its sorted. Meanwhile ring up Lunar in Preston and explain the situation and ask for their opinion and armed with that, inform the dealer that you have been in touch with Lunar. The dealer is responsible to you for providing a vehicle that is usable and yours is clearly faulty and under the terms of a warranty they must put it right. the problem may be the charger unit which is expensive. So as I said you must get it back to the dealer.


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## Tony Lee (Feb 7, 2008)

Traffic lights are good for traffic control, but unfortunately fairly useless for determining the state of charge of a battery. An accurate digital multimeter in the hands of an "expert" is a bit better provided approximate current draw and charge history are known. 

Technically minded or not, maybe the dealers assume that people don't go wild-camping in the middle of winter so have trouble comprehending the problem.

With a couple of small batteries and constant (unknown) draw of a fan for an unknown number of hours per day, I wouldn't be all that surprised if you are having problems - especially if your battery charger is incapable of fully charging the battery before you head out. Having 50% of your battery capacity to play with is a lot different to having only 20% and the difference between the two can be just the type of charger you have.

Taking it back to the dealer is probably the best option, but you still need to sit down and write down what appliances you use and how long you use them for, and how long you charge the battery before you leave and whether you drive in between the first and second nights.


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## GeorgeTelford (Feb 7, 2008)

Hi

They dont show that the battery is full when driving or when charging at home at this point they are only showing the charging sources voltage.

If the vehicle is only fitted with the usual standard charging system, then it will not be fully charged even after a week at home. They are not good chargers in fact they were only ever intended to be power supplies when hooked up on site.

The second and probably worse problem is that it is then using a split charge relay when driving, this will actually bring the charge level down, an alternator is not a good charger it merely keeps the battery at a charge level where it can fullfill its only job (to start the vehicle)

Read the free chapter at the bottom of this page http://www.caravanandmotorhomebooks.com/books/motorhome_electrics_caravans_too.htm

This problem is compounded by having two mismatched batteries.


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## Firefox (Feb 7, 2008)

Traffic lights are not much good for determining actual charge. They work on discrete voltages so with a three light system you might get the same display for almost fully charged and half charged.

If you don't go mad on power draining items like heating eg A couple of lights, fridge, and a bit of TV, you should get 3-4 nights use from a 85 amp hour battery.


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## Geoff.W (Feb 7, 2008)

HI Helen.

Reading through your posts I suspect that you do not have a fault as such but meerly reaching the limitations to your system.

It is a unfortunate fact that modern Motorhomes are designed to be opporated on "Hook up" and many of the devices fitted are really too power hungery to opporate for any length of time directly from the batteries, I suspect your problem has been running your heating which probably draws in exess of 10A, if you consider the useable output from a battery is about half of its rated value, ie. 110AH gives approx 55AH useable the heater alone would run your battery down in a little over 5hrs. Add on the other usage and a battery "life" of 3-4hrs each is all you could reasonably expect.

Although thier has on here and on other threads a lot of talk about inefficient charging and low battery power much of this is irrelevent and often inaccurate. It is true that vehicle and the on board charging systems do not achieve 100% battery charge it is in real terms better than the 65-70% quoted and has proved itself over many years to be cost effective and above all reliable, there are plenty of people who will part you from a great deal of money to supply you with uprated alternator regulators and multi stage battery chargers, however I doubt very much if they, in real terms, give anywhere near the extra power they claim. Quite simply if you wish to increase the available power you have the best method is to add greater battery power, weight and space permiting.

I suspect that if you restricted the time that you run the heater as much as possible and conserved power elsewhere,  provided that you don't stay put for more than 2-3 days at a time you should not have a problem.

Finaly having checked out the link given in a previous post I would like to point out that the source seems to be from Australia, and not only is much of the information about 20yrs out of date but does not apply to systems used in Europe. ie. Use of blocking diodes to isolate batteries went out of use about 25 years ago.


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## zulurita (Feb 7, 2008)

In the past when I have had only one leisure battery say 85 amp it has lasted a week-end at least.

I used:

lights in evening
TV maybe 3 or 4 hours, less if need be.
water heater but only on for an hour in morning mostly.
blow air heating takes a lot of battery juice and in those days I only had a gas fire heater not blow air heating.
water pump
Toilet flush

Nowadays I have two leisure batteries currently 110 amps
but if I think of last year I had 2 x 85 amps

However I had a 75w solar panel and battery master

Toured France for 2-3 months and mostly on 12V and could spend even a week with no problems. Obviously if I used the Satellite TV a lot then the batteries wouldn't last as long but then they would top up during the day via solar panel.

So as you see it all depends on the power you a drawing during the day/night.


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## helen.dipn (Feb 11, 2008)

Do you happen to know the tel no for lunar in preston?

Thanks


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## helen.dipn (Feb 11, 2008)

Thanks Geoff will check how much battery juice the blown heating uses i suspect thats the culprit then.

Can you advise on solar panel as a back up and how exactly it works? how does it actually charge the leisure battery??

hel


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## Firefox (Feb 12, 2008)

Solar panels usually produce a trickle charges (depending on size). They are very good at keeping the battery topped up through long periods of inactivity, but not much good at charging during relatively heavy use. It could take many days to charge the battery via the solar panel especially if it was cloudy.

If you have sunny weather during the day and are not using the van in the day, they can provide a significant boost though.

Think of turning on tap to fill a kettle, and then filling up your tank with a thimble of water every 10 minutes. Over a day, your tank will get filled back up with the thimble, but it takes time.


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## Telstar (Feb 12, 2008)

*lunar*

Helen

Try this number 01772 337628, that is the number I have for Lunar in my mobile phone.  They will probably give you another number for aftersales.  I found them very helpful the other week, might have something to do with having a new aftersales manager....

Jon


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## cipro (Feb 12, 2008)

helen.dipn said:


> Hi there,
> 
> Can anyone tell me how long a leisure battery should last for wild camping assuming its fully charged to start with and it runs an average domestic supply such as lights, water pump, fridge ignition and heater fan??
> 
> ...



Hi Helen check out SEARCH mode above put in battery problems has been a good subject with loads of info


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## GeorgeTelford (Feb 12, 2008)

Hi Helen

A Gas blown air system doesnt use anything like 10 Amps as claimed, I left mine on unattended for 4 days by accident once, without flattening the battery, the distribution fan doesnt use much power at all.


Geoff

That information and the technology mentioned are not out of date at all and electricity obey's the same laws in australia as it does in europe, modern split charge diodes are alive and well and being sold currently by Sterling power amongst many others.

Collyn Rivers would be amazed to be told that he is 20 yrs out of date in his recently published and updated books......


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## Don (Feb 12, 2008)

Firefox said:


> Solar panels usually produce a trickle charges (depending on size). They are very good at keeping the battery topped up through long periods of inactivity, but not much good at charging during relatively heavy use. It could take many days to charge the battery via the solar panel especially if it was cloudy.





Firefox said:


> Well all I can say is , I have just installed a 130 Watt panel, will charge on cloudy days (not black storm clouds)  and has been the answer to my problems. I sat there last night and watched tv for 4 Hrs (4x40Watts) two lights (2ox4) and tinkered on the old laptop.
> 
> The morning dawned with the control panel showing partial depletion of Battery and by 11 am (same day) control panel had switched off solar panel and battery was fully charged.
> 
> ...


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## Guest (Feb 12, 2008)

*Sensible use*

Hello and welcome to Wildcamping.
We have never had battery problems and have gone for several days without hook up and without moving or starting the engine, however that is summer use.
We have gone for several weekends ( Fri eve to sun afternoon) during the winter and again we have not started the engine and have had no problems.
We only have one 85 amp leisure battery and we use all our appliances sensibly, by that I mean that we don't use unnecessary lights, but we also don't sit in the dark  and will use the heater blower as required and we do like to keep warm
We also have the TV on for about 3 hours per night
I think it is just a case of not leaving all the lights on all night and not having the TV on day & night!
I carry a geny for emergencies, but have never had to use it for such!
Touch wood!


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## Firefox (Feb 12, 2008)

Yes it comes down to panel size and usage, I suppose Don. 

The thing is to check your appliance ratings. For example if you have 2x40w bulbs for 8 hours on a long winter evening, then a 100w panel will only just about replace that during the day. But in summer, you'll be in credit. It is weather and season dependent and the panel rating is the max you can get given good conditions.


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## Julie798 (Feb 12, 2008)

*Battery*

Hi Helen

Just a thought,  could your radio be draining the battery, it depends how they are wired in, could be someone changed over the radio at some point and didn't connect it properly.


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## Firefox (Feb 12, 2008)

The radio is usually on the vehicule battery, but could have been swapped I suppose. Worth checking.


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## Tony Lee (Feb 12, 2008)

Geoff.W said:


> ... if you consider the useable output from a battery is about half of its rated value, ie. 110AH gives approx 55AH useable the heater alone would run your battery down in a little over 5hrs. Add on the other usage and a battery "life" of 3-4hrs each is all you could reasonably expect. ...
> 
> Although thier has on here and on other threads a lot of talk about inefficient charging and low battery power much of this is irrelevent and often inaccurate. It is true that vehicle and the on board charging systems do not achieve 100% battery charge it is in real terms better than the 65-70% quoted and has proved itself over many years to be cost effective and above all reliable,  Quite simply if you wish to increase the available power you have the best method is to add greater battery power, weight and space permiting.
> ...
> ...




Geoff, you are trying to have a both ways bet here. You agree that charging systems found on many motorhomes are pretty rubbishy and won't charge the battery beyond about 70%, but claim that this is irrelevant and also claim that this lousy system is cost effective and efficient.

If you have a system that you (correctly) say can only safely provide 20% of the battery capacity, then adding another battery in a motorhome that is already pushing the limits of space and legal weight (as you agree is often the case) is still not going to achieve as much as would be gained in charging the battery up properly in the first place. If you just don't have room, then the only way to overcome the problem is to use the available room more efficiently and the only practical way to do that is to use as much of the battery capacity as possible. Money is almost an irrelevant factor in this case.

Collyn Rivers is quite thorough in the research he does for his books and there are few sources that cover the field as well. The electrons that flow in Australia are subject to exactly the same physical laws as the ones flowing in Europe and unlike in some countries, Australia is happy to import the latest technology from whatever country produces it. Some of it even comes from the EU.
Whether they are the best way of doing it or not (and electromechanical switches also have problems), diodes are still commonly used in battery isolation systems and Collyn discusses their limitations and also ways that the inherent voltage drop can be eliminated. Use of Schottky diodes with their much lower voltage drop overcomes some of these limitations anyway.

What is 20 years out of date is MH manufacturers supplying units that do only allow 20% utilization of a costly and heavy battery, especially when doing so invariably results in the battery failing well before its design service life. If they were to clearly state the limitations of the installed systems so that purchasers could make an informed decision, that would help a bit, but since most people never bother to read the instructions anyway, I guess the average purchaser is only going to worry about the things they can see. If, as seems to be the case in most countries, 95% of MHers and Vanners never wild-camp anyway, I guess it doesn't matter. However since this IS a wild-camping forum, I would have thought the members realise they MUST spend extra money to pursue their chosen activity - or if they don't spend the money, they must be content to just follow the crowd into the nearest camping ground with full services.

You said the solution to the OP's problem was "if you restricted the time that you run the heater as much as possible and conserved power elsewhere,  provided that you don't stay put for more than 2-3 days at a time you should not have a problem." 
Better advice, but even less practical would be to fit an isolating switch on the battery so by turning it off, the power use would drop to zero and they could stay in one place forever.
I chose the other course and built a system that can quietly provide all the power I need almost indefinitely so that I never have to use hookups. It is possible but very expensive - or seems that way until you add up the cost of staying in van parks every night. Then it works out cheaper.


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## Tony Lee (Feb 13, 2008)

"and the panel rating is the max you can get given good conditions."

Yes, under absolutely ideal laboratory conditions that don't really ever apply in the real world.

The inevitable increase in cell junction temperatures above 25ºC immediately drop this value by at least 5% whenever the sun actually shines on the panel.

Then since most places in the world don't receive one kW of solar radiation at any part of the day, you will need to drop another 10 to 50% off the rating and then if the panel is flat on the roof of the RV and the sun is not overhead, you can drop another 10 to 30 % off depending on angle.

Then since the peak transfer of energy from a solar panel occurs at 17 volts and your charger operates at 14.4V and below, then unless the charger is using the latest technology to maximise the power (Maximum Power Point (MPP) Tracking), you can drop another 10 - 20% off the rating.

Then since there are many places in Europe where you would be lucky to get more than 4 hours of rated solar radiation in a day even in the middle of summer (and that includes a lot of Australia in the winter), you are not going to get even the de-rated power output for most of the day.

So all in all, I would say that Firefox's estimation of the time taken for a 100W nominal rated panel to replace 640WH of power during winter is being very generous.


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## helen.dipn (Feb 13, 2008)

*solar panel*

sorry to keep harping on......can anyone tell me how you connect a solar panel and what size would you recommend for wild camping in the winter months??

This is a fab site and I really appreciate all of your responses even though they are a little conflicting at times.

Many thanks

Hel


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## helen.dipn (Feb 13, 2008)

Thanks Julie,

Unfortunately or maybe fortunately my radio is only connected to the engine so wont work without the engine started hence no drain on battery.

Whilst on the subject of radios does anyone know of anyway of connectin a radio to leisure or ??

Hel


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## Don (Feb 13, 2008)

helen.dipn said:


> sorry to keep harping on......can anyone tell me how you connect a solar panel and what size would you recommend for wild camping in the winter months??
> 
> This is a fab site and I really appreciate all of your responses even though they are a little conflicting at times.
> 
> ...



I know that the "Experts" will be along to ridicule, But hey at my age , Im use to that.
Helen, a piece of cake, if you can wire a three pin plug and follow simple instructions, you can fit a Solar Panel.
I read some where that about 80 Watt is minimum.
I fit mine in a day, and despite the critics of solar power it charges my !00 Ah battery up in our winter sunshine. The manufacturer states it will charge at a reduced rate under a cloud filled sky. so will waite with baited breath.

Don


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