I am painting the interior, but as l have to wait for the coats to dry l have taken advantage of that driveway and finally changed my house battery.
Costco Battery $89. Whoot!! Whoot!!
The one that came with the van was put in in 2006 (sticker on it) and it was D-E-A-D! It had a crack in it that leaked battery acid and just last week it finally did it's death roll and wouldn't hold a charge or recharge.
One thing l discover is that l really don't use that much electricity in the van. I don't really run the lights. I do have that headlamp that l use when l read. The pump is only used when l run the water to flush the toilet. And l haven't had dishes to do, except the occasional silverware. I have switched to paper plates for the cats food in the morning. I don't know why l didn't do this sooner.
I know my battery use will increase with the cool/cold weather since the furnace will use battery power for the fan.
Getting at the battery is a bit hard. Usually l have the back box on the van, but since l have been house sitting, l have taken it off, which is also why l have decided to replaced the battery this week, access.
Look at how hard it is to get the battery out. That grey pipe is the water pipe for the toilet. It needs to be pushed aside to either put the battery in or out. And of course, batteries are not light.
I also decided to put a tint on my windows. I have tint on some of the windows, but not all. I wanted to put tint on the side door windows, and l needed to fix the screen - it had come loose from the edging.
The tint doesn't look all that dark from the inside looking out, however it is pretty dark trying to look in. I got the tint at Wal-mart, it is 2.5%, which is the darkest they had.
I must of got it on sale when l bought it 3 days ago, when l returned the unused packages today it had gone up from $16.97 to $49.00.
I returned a 2.5 % and a 5%, and l needed to purchase a 20% for the driver and passenger cab window. The cashier at the return desk was nice enough to give me the sale price on the new one l needed, even though it wasn't a straight exchange. Score!
Oh...and today l moved the extra rocks from the pond build to the back of the property.....and l thought it was my day off!!!!
you probaboy already know this but a deep cycle battery shouldn't be depleted lower than 50%
ReplyDeleteand a furnace will eat a lot of energy ( yes, I learned the hard way )
a full battery is 12.6 and 50% is 12.2, to find out that info you can buy a meter cheap at walmart that plugs into a 12volt socket if you have one or the ones that has alligator clips to put on batt terminals. the one I use is "Equus 3721 Battery and Charging System Monitor" . you can use up a battery past 50% but they don't last as long. to check battery using this make sure your master switch is off for an accurate reading of usage.
like I said, you probably know all this but in case you didn't I hate to see someone use up a battery and have to spend more mony..!
M.
Ok M....where would l find the Master Switch? I do know about the 50%, but wasn't aware of the little gadget that l could just plug into my 12V socket. Thanks!
DeleteI did buy my battery at Costco, and they have an excellent return/warrenty, so if l do kill it, l will get a credit for some of the value.
Also, l most likely won't run the furnace all night, just flick it on in the morning to warm up the place before l get out of bed - that's the plan anyways :-)
T,
ReplyDeleteyou can just make sure everything is off to get a reading with that gizmo I suggested but it looks like your switches are on the pantry wall ( above pillow ). could one of them be the master 12volt switch the one that if off no lights/water pump/ etc work...?
make sure the 12 volt socket you plug it into is for the house battery and not the van battery. ( although I did find my van battery needed to be replaced using it)
you sure made that camper " yours" with the paint job, very nice and sure brightens up things..!!
Michael
T,
ReplyDeleteI should have said " the gizmo told me I would have to replace my battery soon " not my battery needed to be replaced using it " ...
sounded like it hurt the battery by using gizmo which it can't ....
M.