California Beach Leisure Battery

[tassiej]

Hi All,

We just took delivery of our new California beach last week but have been having problems finding out about the leisure battery.

The manual states that no sockets or lights can be used with the ignition switched off which doesn't seem right. I have called the branch of VW up where I brought the vehicle but they were not sure as to whether the leisure battery actually cuts off before using power from the main vehicle battery.

Since taking delivery of the van we have had 2 flat batteries where I have had to call RAC out, the latest being in the middle of our first camping trip! I am only using the sockets behind the front 2 seats and briefly the parking heater which apparently uses minimal electricity.

Any advice would be much appreciated.

Great forum btw, was a big help when choosing the optional extras.

Thanks
Jason

 

[Bigbud]

I'm sure I read there is supposed to be a cut off on the leisure battery ? Were you running the radio all night as well ? The only other thing I've read is when the vans new the leisure battery isn't charged up right away and run's out quickly.

Just checked the brochure and it states "leisure second battery with cut off relay" Just using the 12v in the back shouldn't run down your main battery. :?

We'll be in the same boat if it does run down, We're getting a retrofit heater soon and I've been looking at a hook up, charger and beefing up our battery. Not sure weather to go with just a bigger battery and get another so we have two.

Let us know how you get on as this subject is definitely an interesting one for beach owners

 

[Custardtart]

I think the sockets behind the front seats run from the leisure battery so you shouldn't be able to flat the starter battery and they do power up without the ignition key in.

I'd be interested to hear about a retro-fit parking heater - who is installing, which one, where you install (under the drivers seat or under the van). Thinking of doing the same sometime.

 

[Bigbud]

I think the sockets behind the front seats run from the leisure battery so you shouldn't be able to flat the starter battery and they do power up without the ignition key in.

I'd be interested to hear about a retro-fit parking heater - who is installing, which one, where you install (under the drivers seat or under the van). Thinking of doing the same sometime.

I'll start a new thread in the beach section save taking over this one :mrgreen:

 

[jamesC]

My experience, in case anybody finds this post in the future.....

Our 2013 Beach has five 12v sockets in total, two on/in the vehicle dashboard, one behind the passenger front seat, one to the left of the opening for the sliding door, and one in the boot.

At the COTF event this weekend, we did nothing to prepare our Cali's batteries, just drove around 2 hours down from Suffolk, we used the lights in the evenings, and sockets for powering our Waeco CF-18 Fridge/Freezer (permanently plugged in), charged our phones numerous times, charged our 3G dongle, and ran our Parking Heater occasionally.

The whole lot worked without issue..... I was pretty impressed, so I thought I would take my cheap volt meter and plugged it into the various sockets to get a voltage reading on Sunday morning. All of the sockets mentioned above were showing the same voltage 12.1v... this leads me to believe that all the sockets run from the Leisure battery.

When it was time to start the van, it leaped into life as if the bluemotion had switched it off at the traffic lights, so no reason to think that the starter battery had been effected at all.

Obviously our Cali SE friends have the option to plug in and fully charge the leisure batteries from the mains, but as Beach owners we only have the built in circuits in the van to recharge our batteries, I also believe that the SE Leisure batteries are significantly larger, and yet there are numerous posts on this forum talking about battery issues with Cali SE... maybe just because these vehicles have been around longer, or maybe the built in permanent features and electric roof??

 

[Custardtart]

Have I missed one socket on the dash?

I know about the one in the pull-out tray - where's the other?

 

[simon.foster]

Yes where is he second socket in the dash, I only have one in the ashtray

 

[James]

Yes where is he second socket in the dash, I only have one in the ashtray

Smokers package????

 

[NickE]

I think redzimmer must have the same dashtop socket I've got on my new SE.

 

[jamesC]

The second is on top of the dash, behind a flip cover.... Usefully positioned to supply power for sat nav!! Maybe this is a new addition!!

 

[simon.foster]

Can someone take a photo? Is it hidden where the tray is on top of the dash?

 

[jamesC]

hopefully you can see the socket with the VW torch in it

 

[James]

hopefully you can see the socket with the VW torch in it

that is really good I thought it was part of the smoking package - extra 12v?

could be wrong

Brilliant though

James

 

[kouppette]

Hi,
Does anyone have anymore info regarding the beach leisure battery?
We have only just got ours and just back from a single night away. We have a waeco cooler with a built in battery cut-off and even after a 2 hour drive when I plugged it in the LED flashed saying low battery.
Last night we had the radio on for about an hour max and a couple of lights for about half an hour (cooler not plugged in) and this morning the low battery sign on the radio panel showed. Van started without trouble.
From reading the other posts it doesn't seem like we can see what the battery charge is like you can on the cali proper which is a shame but our leisure battery doesn't seem to be functioning properly.
Although it is new to us, the van is 18 months old.
Has anyone found out any more about it?
Cheers!

 

[jamesC]

Sounds like your leisure battery needs a really good charge. I use a 5amp CTEK charger bought from amazon, it plugs into one of the 12v sockets.

 

[cleve]

Hi,
Does anyone have anymore info regarding the beach leisure battery?
We have only just got ours and just back from a single night away. We have a waeco cooler with a built in battery cut-off and even after a 2 hour drive when I plugged it in the LED flashed saying low battery.
Last night we had the radio on for about an hour max and a couple of lights for about half an hour (cooler not plugged in) and this morning the low battery sign on the radio panel showed. Van started without trouble.
From reading the other posts it doesn't seem like we can see what the battery charge is like you can on the cali proper which is a shame but our leisure battery doesn't seem to be functioning properly.
Although it is new to us, the van is 18 months old.
Has anyone found out any more about it?
Cheers!

Do all beach batteries have an led indicator for battery level or is this something the previous owners would have added to ours?

Last weekend we camped without ehu, 12v cool box for 1 hour, had lights on, 12v tap on kitchen pod, roof light on all night, charged 2 phones & ran parking heater on level 1 for at least 12 hours with no problem. We have 3 led lights under the passenger seat which flash green, amber or red. We started with 3 green lights but woke to 1 red light. Luckily I took our solar briefcase trickle charger we bought from maplin & impressively by lunch time it was up to 2 amber lights! Not sure if it would be powerful to get back to green as we then drove after lunch for 30 mins & left the trickle charger plugged in & got it back to 1 green light so we could run the heater overnight again!

We have a retro fit ehu on our beach but I think I'll be looking into solar panels now I've seen how useful a tiny trickle charger was!

 

[James]

Hi,
Does anyone have anymore info regarding the beach leisure battery?
We have only just got ours and just back from a single night away. We have a waeco cooler with a built in battery cut-off and even after a 2 hour drive when I plugged it in the LED flashed saying low battery.
Last night we had the radio on for about an hour max and a couple of lights for about half an hour (cooler not plugged in) and this morning the low battery sign on the radio panel showed. Van started without trouble.
From reading the other posts it doesn't seem like we can see what the battery charge is like you can on the cali proper which is a shame but our leisure battery doesn't seem to be functioning properly.
Although it is new to us, the van is 18 months old.
Has anyone found out any more about it?
Cheers!

Do all beach batteries have an led indicator for battery level or is this something the previous owners would have added to ours?

Last weekend we camped without ehu, 12v cool box for 1 hour, had lights on, 12v tap on kitchen pod, roof light on all night, charged 2 phones & ran parking heater on level 1 for at least 12 hours with no problem. We have 3 led lights under the passenger seat which flash green, amber or red. We started with 3 green lights but woke to 1 red light. Luckily I took our solar briefcase trickle charger we bought from maplin & impressively by lunch time it was up to 2 amber lights! Not sure if it would be powerful to get back to green as we then drove after lunch for 30 mins & left the trickle charger plugged in & got it back to 1 green light so we could run the heater overnight again!

We have a retro fit ehu on our beach but I think I'll be looking into solar panels now I've seen how useful a tiny trickle charger was!

If you've got retrofit EHU - then the LED indicator will be part of that.


James

 

[Bertie63]

Just bought a 2014 Beach and found very little in the manual, so here is what I have found so far:-

All the internal sockets and lights switch to the leisure battery once the ignition is off. When the engine is on the power comes from the engine battery/alternator and both batteries are charged.

The leisure battery fitted in ours is an 80 Ah. These are designed to deliver up to 4amps continuous current (at which would last 20hrs). Higher currents can be delivered but the total charge delivered by the battery will drop unless the battery gets a "rest" of a few hours for the voltage to bounce back.

The manual advises to limit the total load on the 12v light/power circuit to 120W (i.e. 10amps)

There is no installed instrumentation to tell you the remaining charge. You can buy cheap volt meters to infer the state of charge, but the figures depend on a number of factors and are only reliable if there is no load on the system and the batteries have been rested for several hours (not very practical). Once the volts drop to around 11.5 this indicates very low charge, but under load and not rested you'll see these voltages often and the volts will bounce back when the load stops and the battery rests.

I concluded the only practical option was to fit a proper battery monitor http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B004 ... UTF8&psc=1

I am now learning about the system. FYI the internal lights consume 1amp all on. The auxiliary heater draws up to 9amps in startup and settles at 3.5amps.

Next project is to determine the best way to top up the leisure battery when on a hook up. Any experience out there?

 

[cleve]

Hi,
Does anyone have anymore info regarding the beach leisure battery?
We have only just got ours and just back from a single night away. We have a waeco cooler with a built in battery cut-off and even after a 2 hour drive when I plugged it in the LED flashed saying low battery.
Last night we had the radio on for about an hour max and a couple of lights for about half an hour (cooler not plugged in) and this morning the low battery sign on the radio panel showed. Van started without trouble.
From reading the other posts it doesn't seem like we can see what the battery charge is like you can on the cali proper which is a shame but our leisure battery doesn't seem to be functioning properly.
Although it is new to us, the van is 18 months old.
Has anyone found out any more about it?
Cheers!

Which waeco do you have and is it a low battery warning on the waeco itself or in the van somewhere?

We have the waeco cf 25 and finding that the low battery cut out is very sensitive and turns the fridge off when there is still plenty of charge left in the leisure battery.

Having broken our 4w trickle charger, I've just ordered a 15w one from maplin on offer as it did mean we could leave the fridge running 24/7 without really worrying about the battery going low enough to cut the fridge off.

We're now looking into how to override the battery cut out on the fridge. I'd rather have a flat leisure battery than warm milk and wine! Also wondering if the battery is actually holding charge as it should- charged on our retro fit ehu overnight, drove for 1 hour and with only fridge on lowest setting from 11am, by 4pm the battery led i have was flashing amber which isn't enough to keep fridge running.

 

[owen_h]

Which power socket are you using to power the coolbox? The coolbox cutoff is measuring voltage and long cable runs (say to the boot area) with thin(ish) cable can result in a voltage drop even with a fully charged leisure battery. Waeco recommend any extension is in a minimum of 6 sq. mm cable. Thinner cable can be rated fine for the current but suffers from voltage drop which with 12v systems can be an issue.
People fitting the full Waeco fridges often come across this problem and have to wire them direct to the leisure battery (with an inline fuse of course) rather than via distribution units. I ended up doing similar for my pod, power is now a dedicated connection with thick wire direct to the battery rather than via the power sockets. Also made the supplied coolbox cable as short as I could.
In summary it may be that your battery is fine but the Waeco is highlighting voltage drop in the wiring.