Human kindness

DJW1966

Guest
I have had our toyota Hiace since september and haven't used the hook up yet. But I'm taking it down to my mums for xmas and need to hook up while there. The camper came with a hook up lead and so I bought an adapter to hook up to her house.

Yesterday I tried to hook the camper up here in order to give it a charge but found that the lead would not fit on to the hook up point on the camper. The little nobble bit was in the wrong place and so it wouldn't fit in.

It didn't matter because I decided to go over to Llangefni this morning to but a new one. I set off early but when I got there discovered that the shop had shut for christmas. Oh no!!!

I had seen a volkswagon camper in the Asda car park where I had parked up and as I walked back saw the owner getting in his van. I went over and asked if he knew where I might get a hook up lead. He told me of a place nearby that might sell them and also of a place near Rhyl (quite far away) that definitely would as long as they were open. I thanked him and he set off on his way.

I was just pulling out of my parking spot when he came back and pulled in behind me. He said "how silly of me, I can trust you can't I?" and then he leant me his hook up lead for over the christmas period. A complete stranger!

Well I never, how very very kind. I am so grateful to this kind gentleman. It is good to know that there are still trusting genuine people in this cynical world.

So now I just need to ask. I have plugged into the house to try to charge up the leisure battery. I have switched the button to the picture of the leisure battery on the control panel. Is there anything else I need to do to charge it up?

Merry Christmas everybody and good cheer to one and all. :king:
 
Ah! the power of the VW Camper you see! As soon as you get in one your whole persona changes and you become one of the worlds few remaining "nice people". Maybe thats why people love VW's. They tend to be driven by cool layed back people. Having done many boys trips in VW's I have first hand experience of what they do to you. They do break down a lot though. How nice of the chap to lend you his lead.

Its sounds like you have done the right thing. All I do on my Kontiki is plug in, make sure the control panel switch is set to battery and I know its charging as there is a meter and the needle bounces all the way over to the right.
 
Thank you Barry.

There is no meter and needle on my zig unit, so I am not sure if it is charging or not...fingers crossed eh

Merry Christmas :)
 
Stermats at Gaerwen, Valley or Bangor do camping bits and pieces

if you need any help in the future I live near RAF Vally, home most days
fairly good at DIY and lectrics



Lorry :drive:
 
Hi Lorry

Many thanks. I think I will need to take you up on that. I'm not really sure how anything works and could do with some guidance. So I might need to visit after new year if you are sure it is okay.

I'm hoping I can figure out the heating system or we shall be pretty cold. Or may be go to plan B and hook up an electric heater from mum's house.
 
Im no techincal expert but see if you can get someone to test the battery with a multi metre or something. That should tell you if its charging. Maybe you can take two readings. One before its hooked up and one a few hours later. It should charge faster than you can use the power in the van.

For heating a fan heater is always good as a backup if your on hookup. We are currently on hookup in the Lake District and I am using a Convector Heater 2KW from Argos (cost £20) its like a fan heater but bigger and makes no noise, has three power settings and a thermostat. Warm as toast in here. Had to turn it off last night as it was boiling.

I had the same struggle with our van at first. Could never figure out how anything worked. We got there in the end though.
 
DJW1966 said:
Thank you Barry.

There is no meter and needle on my zig unit, so I am not sure if it is charging or not...fingers crossed eh

Merry Christmas :)
Click to expand...

Turn all your lights on. Then watch the lights as you turn on the 240v. They'll get slightly brighter if the 240v is getting to the battery. Alternatively buy/borrow a multimeter - Take a volt reading across the + & - terminals, it'll probably be 11v to 13v; then attach 240v and it should read 14v. Multimeters are about a fiver and easy to use.
 
yeah I have a feeling that nothing is happening.

We've been plugged in for a few hours now and the lights aren't very bright which makes me think that the hook up isn't working because if it was then the electricity from the house would be running the lights and things.

I'm just not sure what to do now. There are so many switches and I am sure it must be easy to work it out but I can't seem to. I bet there is some switch that I haven't turned on. There are switches and fuses in cupboards. Some kind of cascade thing, as well as the zig unit which is old and has faded in places and was probably in Japanese to begin with. And now I want a ciggi after not smoking since Feb....I won't have one!

I wish I had a technical brain
 
has your zig unit got a number on it eg cf6 just read your original post turning the switch to leisure battery means you're connecting to the lb,try turning it the opposite way,also don't worry about trying different switches you won't blow up!
 
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DJW1966 said:
yeah I have a feeling that nothing is happening.

We've been plugged in for a few hours now and the lights aren't very bright which makes me think that the hook up isn't working because if it was then the electricity from the house would be running the lights and things.

I'm just not sure what to do now. There are so many switches and I am sure it must be easy to work it out but I can't seem to. I bet there is some switch that I haven't turned on. There are switches and fuses in cupboards. Some kind of cascade thing, as well as the zig unit which is old and has faded in places and was probably in Japanese to begin with. And now I want a ciggi after not smoking since Feb....I won't have one!

I wish I had a technical brain
Click to expand...

Our van may be completely different but wierdley I had a similar issue this morning. I noticed that our van wasnt charging. The 240v stuff was working but and the switch was set to charge / use the leisure battery but someone had switch the 12v charger switch off on the MCB (main circuit board?). Linked to this is a battery charger in the garage which also has an on off switch. I switched the 12v charger switch to on on the MCB and it immediately started charging. If I hadnt noticed this despite us being on hookup we would have eventually ran out of power to all devices that are on the 12v circuit.

Im the last person to be advising you on stuff like this and hopefully one of the resident experts will be along with a solution but I suspect you are on the right lines. There must be a switch other than the one on the control board to switch on the charger. There must be a charger mounted somewhere which is then connected to the battery, that must also be switched on.
 
If you're still having problems I could help. Old Colwyns not far away and the run would help charge the batts

Let me know if you need help.
 
DJW1966 said:
yeah I have a feeling that nothing is happening.

We've been plugged in for a few hours now and the lights aren't very bright which makes me think that the hook up isn't working because if it was then the electricity from the house would be running the lights and things.

I'm just not sure what to do now. There are so many switches and I am sure it must be easy to work it out but I can't seem to. I bet there is some switch that I haven't turned on. There are switches and fuses in cupboards. Some kind of cascade thing, as well as the zig unit which is old and has faded in places and was probably in Japanese to begin with. And now I want a ciggi after not smoking since Feb....I won't have one!

I wish I had a technical brain
Click to expand...
have you switchted on to 240 volt yet as you said youy were hooking up,your batteries should get a full charge through this,i expexct if you switch to 12 volt you will discharge,let us know how you went on please,
Solarman.
 
Hello all again. Thank you for all your advice and offers of help. I'm sorry I missed some as I was packing up the van with pressies for Christmas and everything else we needed and went offline before I saw them.

Well, what a palaver. It was all a bit of a nightmare actually. I plugged the van into the house during the day while I was packing up and getting it all ready for a week away. I had my doubts as advice from folk on here suggested that it wasn't charging. It got to the end of the day when I had to pick up my daughter from work and set off on our journey from North Wales to Kent, on Xmas eve.
It was raining and dark so I had the windscreen wipers on and the lights on and the stereo playing. I picked something up from my son's house en route and then went to Morrison's to collect my daughter. Well, when she came out of work the van wouldn't start. There was nothing, just a little cough and then dead!
My daughter called her friend and her dad came and kindly jump started us. He noticed that the connections on the battery were a little loose so we drove to his house and he tightened them, then jump started us again. He suggested driving around to see if that would help but we were very low on diesel and I knew we couldn't do that for long.
Okay, so here is where I show my complete stupidity. I can see you all now with your head in your hands thinking..."really, you shouldn't be allowed out".
I drove to Tesco filling station and decided to risk it. I filled up with diesel, thinking that if it didn't start again there would be someone who would jump start us on the forecourt. Yeah right!!! :eek:
It didn't start (no surprises there) so I went into the garage and they informed me that there is no way that you can jump start a vehicle on a petrol station forecourt. By this time it is 18.50 on Xmas eve. The store is about to close and I was going no where. They asked if I could push the vehicle off the forecourt!! "It's a camper van" I said.
I went to customer services and pleaded my case. They said that as the garage is about to close they will find someone to jump start me. In the mean time I run around the store grabbing what I can as I have nothing to eat on Xmas day, as we had planned to be away for Xmas.

When I get back to the van they are clearing the forecourt, shutting down the pumps and surrounding the van with sand and have someone standing by with a fire extinguisher.
They managed to jump us with out blowing up the petrol station and for that I am very grateful. I drove around doing about 30 miles and then drove home. Deciding to try the van when I got there. When I got home the van started fine, so we set off on our way. The drive down to Kent recharged my battery, and everything was fine. We had a lovely Xmas.

But I need to know what went wrong. The van battery was practically new, only bought in Sept. I just know I did something wrong and need to find out how to work the van before I try this again.

Many thanks again for all the help ;)
 
sounds like you found the problem-loose battery connections.if your van battery isn't charging your leisure batt certainly won't.take the connections off[if you have a coded radio,connect the leads to a charger first]then clean them and slap some vaseline on them.tighten nicely
 
Go down to Maplins (or use them off the internet) and buy a multimeter. They only cost £10 or less. Then you can take various voltage readings and let us know what they are and we will give you an idea what is wrong.

Trying to solve the problem without one is like trying to pick up a ping pong ball from somewhere on a football pitch with a blindfold on :lol-053:
 
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