Leisure Battery blown fuse.

[Chris]

Hope you can help as losing the will to live.

I have a 2009 California:- with
1. Special vehicle battery in rear cupboard (LB)
2. Secondary battery under passenger seat (SB)

During our trip to France I did comment to other half that the fridge was sucking a lot of juice in one day but thought that was the heat causing it to work hard. However …….

Thursday the Control panel showed 100%. Decided to try give the heater a try. Not used it all year. The heater fired over but percentage dropped to 50%.
Gave the van a 24 hour mains charge and tried again. Same thing. 100% down to 50% when heater starts. I know this is not normal.

I thought I would investigate. I took the LB out and noticed that the 50a fuse that sits on top of the positive terminal had blown. How long ago I don't know. Fitted an in line 50a fuse.
So i tried the heater again. Same thing happened 100% down to 50%. I stuck a voltmeter across the LB but there was no current drawn during the heater firing up stage. LB had 12.7 volts in there. 0 amps though.
When I connected the mains to the van the LB was sitting at 14v - so the LB is being charged.

I then switched on the fridge. Again nothing was being drawn from the LB.
I presume that all my equipment at the moment is being powered by the SB under the passenger seat. The LB and SB are connected in parallel.

I will be making a phone call to local VW tech centre tomorrow but I know the collective on this forum are more aware of how these vehicles work and may point me in the right direction .

Has anyone come across this problem.
What could I look at next? relay or fuse?

Thanks for your time guys.

 

[Chris]

Update. Vw local dealer not much help. Want lots of money to have a look. No trust there...

So my next plan to to take readings from the secondary battery under the left hand / passenger seat. I presume I need to remove the seat to access the battery terminals?
Has anyone done this and any tips?

 

[Californiaman]

How old is the battery? It sounds like it has failed to me. If it is more than say 3/4 years old, I would replace that first.

 

[Chris]

How old is the battery? It sounds like it has failed to me. If it is more than say 3/4 years old, I would replace that first.

cheers. I did think that. I still suspect its a disconnection some where, but will not rule that out as a possible. When the weather dries out, and I get over my norovirus, will start doing some checks.

 

[barry]

How much are the leisure batteries to replace?
Mine must be due for a renewal .....

 

[Martin]

From what I remember they are around £220 each, possibly more.

 

[GGT]

Can anyone help me? I just bought a 2006 California. The leisure batteries aren't being charged when on hook-up. Whem investigating, I found an in-line fuse holder in the cupboard with the 2nd Auxiliary battery, and no fuse in it. I assume it should be a 30mm glass fuse, but what rating? I daren't try putting one in, to see if it affects my problem, in case I choose one too high.

 

[MattBW]

Can you take a photo?

The rear battery should have a 50a fuse right on the battery connector

 

[GGT]

Can you take a photo?

The rear battery should have a 50a fuse right on the battery connector

 

[TripleBee]

I don't think that is from the battery.
The battery fuse is more like this on the red line:

 

[GGT]

Thanks. I think it's too low rating a cable to have anything to do with charging, anyway

 

[AlanC]

That is a feed for something else and nothing to do with charging.

Have you checked that the breaker in the rear cupboard is in the up position?
You can check the power is getting into the van on hook-up by checking the control panel (should be a plug icon in the bottom left corner when on hook-up) or plugging something into the mains power socket on the front of the kitchen unit. On your van, this will be a continental two-pin plug.

If this is all OK, then you will need to check the front battery is charging on hook up. If so then it will be down to the cube fuse on the rear battery.

Alan

 

[GGT]

Breaker is up; mains power socket works, but plug icon does not appear.

 

[AlanC]

Ah, in that case, you have an issue with the mains power getting to the charger.

As a first stop try resetting the control panel.
Switch Off Control Panel using L lower button.
Wait 30 secs.
Switch On using L Lower Button.

Does it work?

If NOT then try this.

For those of you who don't know, if you ever get any problems with roof stuck or any other error say with the heater, you are able to access the hidden menu in your control panel as used by the VW Engineers.

Access as follows:

1. Hold down the centre of the rotary button together with the menu button (button below with the squares on it)

2. You will get the hidden menu.

3. Rotate the rotary button to get to "VW diagnose" and select this by pressing on the centre of the rotary button.

4. If no errors are present it will display "no errors"

5. If Errors are present, then a list of errors will appear

6. Press the centre of the rotary button again to delete all the errors

7. Repeat process above just to check that errors have disappeared!

8. Re-configure the time and date if necessary.


Any problems should be resolved assuming these are Electronic and not Mechanical.


The charger on your van is located under the fridge. It is possible that the mains plug has worked loose and not powering up the charger. Getting to it to look is a right PITA. You will have to lift out the fridge which is something others have done but not me.

There is an access panel on the left side wall under the fridge in the left cupboard. The compressor can be seen and I think the charger. Worth shining a torch in there to see if there are any loose cables.

Alan

 

[AlanC]

Another thought.

Your van is quite old and there was a known issue with the electrics around this age.

There is an Earth Shunt fitted behind the fridge. This is a resistor plate connected from the -ve pole of the leisure batteries to the body of the van. A thinner sensor cable is connected to the control panel so it can display battery voltages etc. On early Calis this shunt played up and was replaced. Your van may not have had the mod done.

There are lots of threads about this on the forum search for 'Earth Shunt'.

You may have to take the van into a VW Cali dealer to get this checked out. If it has been replaced and by a VW dealer there will be a record of it on VWs computer system.

Hope this helps.

Alan

 

[Malc69]

I

Breaker is up; mains power socket works, but plug icon does not appear.
[/QUOTE
I had the same issue on my 2015, no ‘plug’ icon on display so no charge on hook up. Problem was a blown 30A fuse under passenger seat. Check fuses with multi meter (continuity) as fuse looked ok. Incidentally, when on hook up, both my leisure batteries and starter battery get charged by charger.

 

[GGT]

Thanks. I had looked at the fuse, but I'll now go back and check it with a meter.

 

[GGT]

Thanks. I had looked at the fuse, but I'll now go back and check it with a meter.

Shame - both 30s are intact

 

[WelshGas]

Can anyone help me? I just bought a 2006 California. The leisure batteries aren't being charged when on hook-up. Whem investigating, I found an in-line fuse holder in the cupboard with the 2nd Auxiliary battery, and no fuse in it. I assume it should be a 30mm glass fuse, but what rating? I daren't try putting one in, to see if it affects my problem, in case I choose one too high.

In summary:
You have mains power into the Van, kitchen mains socket working.
You have no charging icon on the Control Panel.
You have checked the 20 amp, 12v fuses and they are OK.

The Mains 12v Charger is located under the Fridge, on your vehicle. It was moved to above the Rear Leisure Battery about 2010 because of a higher failure rate due to overheating of the charger unit. NB: the Mains Charger Unit has an internal thermo protection fuse which can be replaced.

Have you checked that the Mains Charger has a 240v supply?
The Charger mains lead plugs into the charger with an electric kettle type plug. Check you have 240 v at the plug.
If you do have mains power to the charger then the Charger should get warm to the touch, but also check the 12v outlet socket. If no output voltage then remove the Mains Charger. It can be done without lifting out the fridge, fiddly but Apparantly doable.
Check the internal Thermo Protection fuse?
If the fuse is intact - New Charger.


See here Post 6 by @v-tec

Location of mains powered battery charger fuse

Hello Everybody , My first posting .....T6 having problems with the mains powered battery charger , it is not charging the leisure batteries . The control panel shows the leisure batteries taking charge from the alternator when the engine is running but the control panel does not indicate...

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