can I charge rv batt. while driving

[Joe G.]

It would probably be a good idea to check the rest of the plug wiring to make sure that it corresponds to the wiring shown in klenger's drawing. If the back up lights are wired wrong something else may be too.

 

[Dkevdog]

Good information here, to be sure. Just FYI, my truck sends back about 9-12amp of charge (as read on my TM500 monitor) to the the trailers' battery bank. As was pointed out, depending on the SOC of your bank, that could take all day of running the truck to recharge. A better alternative (and sadly more expensive) is to run genset with a high quality charger. My Trace RV200 inverter/charger charges at 100+amps, and can recover the battery bank in very short order. Bottom line is I would not dry camp and depend on the truck to charge my batteries.



Kev

 

[CORed]

klenger and Joe, thanks for the suggestions. Everything else works as desired, blinkers, brake lights, trailer brakes, parking lights. I'll see where that wire is going in the trailer and disconnect it since the trailer didn't come wired for reverse lights and at only 16 feet long, my auxiliary backup lights work just fine.



As far as charging, I'd love a nice solar kit, but I can go 6+ days on one deep-cell (dropped down to 12. 15 volts) with this small trailer so the investment isn't worth it. I have purchased a second deep-cell that I carry with me for in the event the first one gets drained and for longer dry camping stays. Someday, when I get a bigger, nicer trailer, I'll save the solar investment for it.



Steve

 

[TTullio]

Wiring & Dry Camping

If you are going to run seperate wires from the truck battery to the camper/trailer plug, be sure to put a 25 or 30 amp solenoid inline. Wire the solenoid so that it turns on when the ignition is turned on. When you turn off the key, you break the connection to the trailer so you never drain your truck batteries or visa versa.



I miss dry camping down in Baja California (live in the MidWest now). We came up with some great ideas for lengthening the time we needed between chargings. I finally built a portable wind generator from an old UltraLight prop and an old computer tape drive motor. The wind near the beach kept the wind generator going almost constantly and it charged at about 4 amps. Didn't need to start the generator once to recharge batteries. If I ever figure out how to post pictures, you guys would get a kick out this setup. I made it so the tower slid through a special hitch I welded up and I used tie downs to the wheels for guide lines to keep the tower/pole steady. I had every local in Bahia De Los Angeles trying to buy this generator from me.



Tim

 

[Joe G.]

Tim,



I use 70 amp relay that is on when the acc position of the ignition swith is on. That means that it is off during start.



The easy way to post pictures is to put them in a Reader's Rigs gallery. Then inlcude the URL in a {IMG SRC="whatever the URL is"} In this example I used { for < and } for >. This is what the first picture in my gallery looks like posted that way:



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You can put more than one of this type pictures in a post.



I'm interested in your little gen set too. Would like to see the pictures.

 

[willyslover]

me too ... me too



I would love to see the generator set up. . never know when a guy needs something like this LOL