RE: 2 x 6v T-105 Trojan - Charge Time
The Honda EU1000 is very quiet with a light load, but it gets pretty loud when you put a full load on it.
I use an EU1000 to charge the batteries in my 36V golf cart. The Deltran charger is a perfect match for the Honda. It's rated at 36V@15A, just under 600W of charge power. To get that bulk charge rate, it draws about 660W from the EU1000, but the real power draw is 900VA because the Deltran's Power Factor is a poor 0.72
At that rate, it took about 5 hours to bulk charge, and 24oz of gas, once on the
final charge stages, the power dropped to about 100W, and finally to 12W.
RE: T.V. picture fades/brightens while watching DVD?
Yeah, it's MacroVision.
You can defeat it with a full frame Time Base Corrector (TBC) or
some Chinese DVD players allow for Macrovision Disable.
A lot of people just 'rip' the DVD on their PC and reburn a copy without all the
commercials and warnings and other junk you are forced to watch.
VCR combo TV's usually don't have inputs that bypass the VCR, your video has to
go through the VCR video processing section to be displayed on the screen.
RE: BatteryMINDER
A 1A batteryMinder is more of a trickle charger, it's something you leave on the battery over the off season so you'll have a good battery when to take the rig out for the first time in 6 months. It's a bit smarter than the usual trickle charger, it will cycle the battery to keep it in top shape.
RE: BatteryMINDER
A 1A batteryMinder is more of a trickle charger, it's something you leave on the battery over the off season so you'll have a good battery when to take the rig out for the first time in 6 months. It's a bit smarter than the usual trickle charger, it will cycle the battery to keep it in top shape.
RE: Need to convert to R-134A from R-12
I would take it in and have it drained and flushed.
Get all the old mineral oil out of the system.
Replace the drier and refill with the proper amount of
double end capped PAG oil or the proper viscosity for your system.
Put in R134, but it's not going to work was well as R12 did.
I used R152a in my 1993 Ford. Had the compressor rebuilt with new PAG compatible seals and replaced the hoses with modern hoses for the new R134a and all o-rings.
I also replaced the orifice tube, it was covered in black gunk, meaning that
the original compressor was ready to go, it was working , sortof.
I put in the new drier and pulled a good vacuum on it overnight.
I shot a little 152a into it and pumped it down again to clear any remaining air from the guage lines or the filler line.
I get about 220PSI high on a cool night, 25PSI low.
At 100F in the driveway, it's up to about 285PSI on the high side.
R152a is what's used in AeroDuster cans, it's properties are more like R12.
It's 10x better for Ozone than R134a, 100x better than R12. Yes, it is slightly
flammable. If you hold a lighter to an aerodust can nozzle and spray gas
you will get a 1-2" weak flame. Do this outdoors, the decomposition product
is fluorine gas. BTW decomposition of R12 is Phosgene and R134 is some fluorine acid. But it's much better than the R12 replacements which are in some cases mostly propane or butane.
The system blows cold air on Texas 100F days and the high side pressure is much lower than R134a, so the compressor is doing much less work and is quieter.
RE: Fixing water damage on the old Dodge (pics)
Have you thought about getting a cheap wire welder and using square tube steel to outline the cabin? A cheap band saw is like $150 and so is a wire flux core welder.
RE: Oil Change Myth?
Once a year is good for synthetic oils. I would change Dino oil every 5000 or again once a year, or before a big trip. Change the oil filter every 3K
and your motor should outlast the transmission at least.
Most RV miles are highway, but on the other hand, you run wide open throttle a lot more in an RV than on any normal car. Ypu won't get the sludge from stop and go, but the oil will be worked really hard mechanically, breaking it down.
RE: Converting tail lights to LED tail lights
"I'm replacing my 1156 interior lights with LED as they burn out, which doesn't take long, I'm always replacing them. The kitchen fluorescent will stay of course."
Why are you keeping the kitchen fluorescent fixture if LEDs are the holy grail?
bumpy
Mainly because it never burns out like the 1156 bulbs do.
I could replace 1156s with fluorescent, but they cost more than LEDs, use more power, don't last as long and can break. So until the ballast goes, I'll keep the little 15W fixture, but when it does, LEDs.
RE: Hooking up 4 6 volt batteries (series / parallel)
You dont want to hook them up incorrectly before you apply power either.
Some things don't take kindly to reverse polarity power. Especially with a golfcart battery punch behind it.
Since everything's disconnected.
Find your ground wires, they're hooked to the chassis, usually black, marked -, measure with an Ohmmeter with all power off. 0-1 Ohms.
Usually the grounds are paired with a 'hot' lead, usually red or marked +
So you should have 2 pairs of 'hot' and GND wires coming to the battery box.
The Generator Starter leads are big heavy wires.
Don't connect anything yet.
Plug in your City power, switch your meter to DC volts and black - lead on the GND and red + lead on what you think is 'hot' , do you see 13-16 V?
That's your inverter/charger which gets 120VAC from City and converts it to 12-16 V to charge your batteries. If the meter reads -##(14-16) volts, somehow you guessed/measured the GND resistance wrong. Double check.
Also you should be able to measure 12V (13-16) with the meter black on the chassis and +,red lead on the converter 'hot' lead.
Find the + and - posts on the batteries and hook them together was shown in 'Configuration 2' , your meter should show 12-14V when measuring the batteries.
At this point you can shut off City power and hook up the charger/inverter leads to the batteries.
The generator - starter lead should have been directly connected to the chassis, this goes to the - side of the batteries and the Generator + start lead was open circuit or high resistance, this goes to the other batteries + leads.
So two 6V batteries have their + connected together and to the 'hot wires' the - sides of those batteries connect to the other two batteries + leads and the - leads of those two batteries connect to the GND wires of the generator and converter.
RE: Why I Left Texas for the Summer
Yeah, you can have as much Austin weather as you like right now, about 100deg/70%
during the day, and about midnight it cools below 90 as the pavement and ground cool. Supposed to be a cool front coming, sure hope so.
RE: Truck AC blew up!
A/C recovery machines are often full of die. You got some for free when they filled you system up. Most OEM are now loaded with die right from the factory. (warranty pays .2 hrs to find a leak)
The wrench cranked the manifold down too tight, it happens.
And God knows what else, maybe some propane, or some other dodgy refrigerant that got put into some other customer's system.
The system should not have put anything but clean refrigerant into a system, old oil and dye should get filtered out as they don't have the same properties as R134. The shop should be sending what's in the tank back for recycling if it can't clean out all the old gunk. I wouldn't want someone's old acid-laden, wet R134 in my newly repaired system.
(yeah, yea, 134 doesn't get quite as nasty as R12 did when the drier saturates)
All the shops here have to use those electronic halogen detectors, they can sniff out a 5 year leak, or so says the wrench at the local AC shop. (leak that takes 5 years to run the system dry)
RE: Converting tail lights to LED tail lights
If he has two bulbs not working, then his tail lights would have been out.
8/10 LEDs vs 0/2 bulbs .. Maybe that's why they use them?
I'm replacing my 1156 interior lights with LED as they burn out, which doesn't take long, I'm always replacing them. The kitchen fluorescent will stay of course.
I also replace the outside lights with LEDs as the fixtures fail from corrosion, or the lenses crack or get lost. One less thing to deal with come the yearly inspection. I can glue those LEDs down so they don't leak into the side panels.
RE: Truck AC blew up!
Green?
All AC oil that I've seen is clear, unless he put a leak detect can in, but why do that on a new system? And why would a pro do it, they have far more sensitive leak detectors than just looking to where oil is seeping out of a bad fitting.
It sounds like they put the wrong kind of compressor oil in. R134 oils are glycol based, they didn't use anti-freeze did they? That would be really dumb.
RE: LED tail lamps and side markers
"The LEDs save big time on your battery and alternator."
yeah, a real big advantage, right? my turn signals virtually destroyed my alternator overnight once, much more than my A/C, radio, DVD player, TV, CB radio, etc. etc. I just went out and disconnected my brake light switch so my battery wouldn't disintegrate.
:p
bumpy
Care to speculate as to why you think the LEDs ruined your alternator?
They pull too much current? Not enough?
Old alternator not compatible with solid state LED, it only worked with incandescent filaments ?
Think they pull more current than your headlights? Than your starter?
I've replaced a couple of rotted out marker lights with LEDs, they work fine, a little brighter, and they are potted with epoxy, so they wont ever corrode like the originals.
RE: Battery issue
Get yourself a cheap ammeter, rat shack may still carry them, otherwise
you'll have to go to a hardware or electronics supplier (not consumer electronics)
You want something that can measure at least 50Amps or more with a digital display.
Put the ammeter between leads of any battery, so it's part of the circuit.
Do not try to start your generator with the ammeter in circuit, they can pull 200Amps surge, it may burn out the ammeter.
Then turn on your lights, one at a time, take readings on the ammeter, turn on the furnace and the fridge for a max reading. Your battery is like a bank account, everything you withdraw has to be put back in at some point.
If your max load is 20Amps, then for a 220Ah battery, you get about 11 hours.
You may get more than 220Ah if you withdraw slowly, like 1Amp load. But if you withdraw at 50Amps, you will not get 220Ah, maybe only 150, 3 hours.
Then, turn all the lights out, and position the solar panel, and see, is the current going into the battery, and at what rate? The charge efficiency of a lead-acid battery is 70%. Meaning , you have to put in 142Ah to charge a 100Ah battery.
For your 225AH, that means your panels have to charge at a rate of 32 Amps for at least 10 hours. (321 Ah) That's some big panels, about 400W.
In reality you probably would need 500W panels and a good DC-DC battery charger.
Without tracking solar panels can not make their rated power.
If you have a 50W panel, then you can only use about 10% of your battery every day. 25Ah doesn't go very far after the 1amp+ Fridge circuit and other 'hidden'
12V loads are considered.
RE: Propane lantern tank refill - anyone try this?
How would anyone be able to tell if a qt. container had been refilled?
BTW I think this is something like the warning on mattress tags, it's only illegal for dealers/resellers to refill.
My BBQ tanks will put out liquid when inverted, I just bought them last year.
The have overfill devices inside the tank, but they don't seem to affect anything
when exhausting the tank, I use the liquid for a torch/icemelter to get big, bright flames.
RE: AC problems
The Kill-a-watt is handy, but IIRC it tops out at 2000W, your roof AC can pull more than that.
I've popped breakers running mine on extension cord, I got a plug in voltmeter
that I keep in one of the RV kitchen outlets. Some times you just get a bad connection and it drops a couple of volts. And gets real hot too.
I bought two more RV 30Amp extensions, they have RV plugs on them for high current. With two of them connected, I can get a low voltage drop so that I see 110V in the RV, enough to run the AC on 'Low' without blowing the 20A house breaker.
Of course the ideal setup is to run 50Amp Service to an outside box with an RV socket for 30 or 50Amp service. But if you've priced copper wire these days, you'll know how expensive 6GA 3cond +Gnd wire is, 125ft roll was $257 last I looked. Yeah, I could cheap out and go with 8GA 2cond + gnd, that's only about $120 and only have 30A service, single phase. I dont run the RV that often in the driveway anyway, mostly just to keep the house battery charged.
RE: Fuel Prices
The price of oil is high because the value of the dollar is low.
It's that simple. Before the wars, you could buy 2 Euros with a dollar,
now it takes 2 dollars to buy a Euro. The price of gas has not gone up much, if
at all in Europe.
The current Administration is running the war on borrowed dollars, the only way to pay that debt back is to radically devalue the dollar, so the $1 trillion debt when it's all over will cost only $250 billion or so. Well, in their simple minds, that's how it's supposed to work. Neer mind that every one of those dollars was borrowed with interest, that's got to be paid every year out of our taxes. Who 'owns' most of this debt? Foreigners, like the Chinese.
Think of how your life would be if you had a dozen credit cards maxed out to a total debt over your yearly income by a factor of 4, that's pretty much the state of the Federal Government, the debt is pushing $10 trillion, and they borrow another 400 billion every year (the deficit)
We may complain about the price of gas now, but in 10 years, every road may be a tollroad and there will be no medicare, S.S. or any sort of public health infrastructure. But hot damn will we have a great military.
RE: Purging brand new propane tank question?
Here's a really good description of the what, why and how of purging a RV propane tank
http://home.earthlink.net/~derekgore/rvroadiervfulltimingwhatisitreallylike/id45.html
