T6.1 Leisure batteries not charging on EHU

[Loz]

So on a positive note I've worked out the ucb ports in the kitchen, the gas hob igniter and the interior lights work The VW assist guy says this is because they are powered from the 12v battery under the passenger seat which is fully charged. It's the 230v battery at the back (which is flat) that charges the fridge and probably the water pump, so they won't work. Also not sure if I could get the heater to work with the control panel shut down but I doubt I'll need it this weekend.

Sorry but if that is what said, that’s rubbish.
the batteries are connected in parallel with a cube fuse in between. All the kit is fused off the under seat battery.

 

[Ladymuck]

Hi @Ladymuck
OK so firstly both leisure batteries are 12v.
My understanding is that they are wired in parallel so anything connected to them in the habitation area should operate even if one battery is failing i.e. the fridge and water pump. It would just mean you drained the ‘good’ battery quicker. Somebody might correct me on this though?

The only 230v you have in the van is:-
1. When you are hooked up to the mains electricity supply via the external connector. You have one 230v socket at the end of the kitchen unit.
2. You have 230v from the built in inverter with a maximum of 300w (on a T6.1).

Re the Aux Heater. You’re right, without the Camping Control Panel working you won’t be able to activate it unless the Remote Control works?

I've tried the remote control but it's doesn't work unfortunately.

@Loz @GrumpyGranddad
I've really no clue about the electrics, just repeating what the VW assist guy said, which I was surprised at given that he initially didn't even know there was a second battery, apparently the battery at the back states 230v ?? And has an inverter?

I wonder why the lights and USB work then but not the fridge and water pump ?

 

[GrumpyGranddad]

I've tried the remote control but it's doesn't work unfortunately.

@Loz @GrumpyGranddad
I've really no clue about the electrics, just repeating what the VW assist guy said, which I was surprised at given that he initially didn't even know there was a second battery, apparently the battery at the back states 230v ?? And has an inverter?

I wonder why the lights and USB work then but not the fridge and water pump ?

I think the VW guy is in serious need of training. Maybe he should join this forum to learn about the California

 

[GrumpyGranddad]

I've tried the remote control but it's doesn't work unfortunately.

@Loz @GrumpyGranddad
I've really no clue about the electrics, just repeating what the VW assist guy said, which I was surprised at given that he initially didn't even know there was a second battery, apparently the battery at the back states 230v ?? And has an inverter?

I wonder why the lights and USB work then but not the fridge and water pump ?

I wonder why the lights and USB work then but not the fridge and water pump ?

Maybe blown fuses?

 

[yossarian]

@Ladymuck, you may get better advice if you check the accuracy of your vehicle shown in your profile.

 

[GrumpyGranddad]

On that general point @yossarian I don’t see vehicle details in many peoples profiles. When I click on a member I often get a message saying they don’t want to share their profile or the OOPS! WE RAN INTO SOME PROBLEMS message. Am I doing something wrong?

 

[Ladymuck]

@Ladymuck, you may get better advice if you check the accuracy of your vehicle shown in your profile.

Thanks, updated, a T6.1 Coast wasn't an option when I got the van in March

 

[Ladymuck]

On that general point @yossarian I don’t see vehicle details in many peoples profiles. When I click on a member I often get a message saying they don’t want to share their profile or the OOPS! WE RAN INTO SOME PROBLEMS message. Am I doing something wrong?

I get that too

 

[Ladymuck]

I wonder why the lights and USB work then but not the fridge and water pump ?

Maybe blown fuses?

I'll report back when it's been fixed

 

[WelshGas]

I've tried the remote control but it's doesn't work unfortunately.

@Loz @GrumpyGranddad
I've really no clue about the electrics, just repeating what the VW assist guy said, which I was surprised at given that he initially didn't even know there was a second battery, apparently the battery at the back states 230v ?? And has an inverter?

I wonder why the lights and USB work then but not the fridge and water pump ?

From what I have gathered the lights and USB points are wired directly from the Leisure batteries but fridge, Heater and Water pump go via the Control Panel. So if the Control Panel has the " Hump " no fridge etc:.
It may also be that the Control Panel on the T6.1 also has some bearing on charging of the rear Leisure Battery but how I have no idea.

 

[yossarian]

On that general point @yossarian I don’t see vehicle details in many peoples profiles. When I click on a member I often get a message saying they don’t want to share their profile or the OOPS! WE RAN INTO SOME PROBLEMS message. Am I doing something wrong?

To verify vehicle details need to do a lot of tapping on a mobile browser, on a desktop browser it's readily available. I'm sure some long serving forumer can enlighten us?

 

[yossarian]

From what I have gathered the lights and USB points are wired directly from the Leisure batteries but fridge, Heater and Water pump go via the Control Panel. So if the Control Panel has the " Hump " no fridge etc:.
It may also be that the Control Panel on the T6.1 also has some bearing on charging of the rear Leisure Battery but how I have no idea.

Yeah, it appears some loads are automatically switched off if one battery sensor reports a low state of charge. We don't know how the data from the two sensors are combined, however from the wiring diagram we can see that the rear sensor is supplied with incorrect voltage data if the cube fuse is blown. Speculation: this may cause inaccurate and rapidly varying states of charge to be reported.

I hope to test this speculation soon and get some better answers.

 

[yossarian]

It may also be that the Control Panel on the T6.1 also has some bearing on charging of the rear Leisure Battery but how I have no idea.

From the wiring diagram it is clear that there are no mundane modes of failure that could cause the control unit (the panel [E153] appears separate to the control unit [J608]) to alter the state of charge of the rear battery.

It is possible (but highly unlikely) that some esoteric failure modes exist permitting this but these would inevitably result in a flow of VW Germany personnel to observe the failure.

https://vwcaliforniaclub.com/resources/camping-electrical-t6-1-ocean-2-battery.212/download

 

[Rololux]

I'm still not convinced my batteries are working properly. I'm going away tomorrow - batteries were fully charged from hookup, then I went out to buy supplies. When I returned, battery life showed >60 hrs, 12.7v. I turned on the fridge, and hours immediately went down to 19hrs. I then connected EHU again and hours immediately returned to >60hrs.

Is this normal behaviour? I always camp with EHU, so I've never tested how long it would actually run the fridge for on batteries only. Or because I have never done an extended stay on batteries, maybe the control panel simply has never had enough data to give an accurate estimation?? All this does not give me great confidence in the state of the batteries.

 

[WelshGas]

I'm still not convinced my batteries are working properly. I'm going away tomorrow - batteries were fully charged from hookup, then I went out to buy supplies. When I returned, battery life showed >60 hrs, 12.7v. I turned on the fridge, and hours immediately went down to 19hrs. I then connected EHU again and hours immediately returned to >60hrs.

Is this normal behaviour? I always camp with EHU, so I've never tested how long it would actually run the fridge for on batteries only. Or because I have never done an extended stay on batteries, maybe the control panel simply has never had enough data to give an accurate estimation?? All this does not give me great confidence in the state of the batteries.

As has been stated before. The Hours left is a calculation based on the current draw at the time the data is logged and the calculation made. It is a gimmic. The voltage reading is a real life measurement. 12.7v is fully charged. The fridge or heater will switch off when the voltage drops to 11.5 volts.

 

[andyinluton]

I'm still not convinced my batteries are working properly. I'm going away tomorrow - batteries were fully charged from hookup, then I went out to buy supplies. When I returned, battery life showed >60 hrs, 12.7v. I turned on the fridge, and hours immediately went down to 19hrs. I then connected EHU again and hours immediately returned to >60hrs.

The 19hrs was because the fridge was going flat out as you had just turned it on, & the algorithm thinks that the large current draw is going to carry on at that level. Once the fridge has cooled down the current draw drops off & the range extends.
Chances are as you had just got in the van all the lights were on as well?
Same thing happens if you turn the heating on, hours drop massively until the draw has stabilised.

If you left the fridge running without hookup & returned in a couple of hours chances are it would be showing something like >60 hours again.

Note that level 1 or 2 is cold enough for the fridge to store stuff & seems to correspond with level 4 or 5 on the older vans.

 

[Rololux]

So, everything went well on my trip, but as usual I was on EHU every night. I decided to do an experiment when I returned. Batteries were fully charged, and I turned on the fridge at level 4. Checked status on a regular basis, and battery voltage gradually went down as expected. After 69 hours, it reported 11.8v, 50mins remaining, and I got the 'please charge the batteries message'. Over the almost three days, I took the van out once for about a 10 min drive total, with three stops.

While this is just about adequate battery life for a short trip, it does not seem to correct. Is this normal battery life, or do I have a problem?

Thanks for any input.

 

[andyinluton]

So, everything went well on my trip, but as usual I was on EHU every night. I decided to do an experiment when I returned. Batteries were fully charged, and I turned on the fridge at level 4. Checked status on a regular basis, and battery voltage gradually went down as expected. After 69 hours, it reported 11.8v, 50mins remaining, and I got the 'please charge the batteries message'. Over the almost three days, I took the van out once for about a 10 min drive total, with three stops.

While this is just about adequate battery life for a short trip, it does not seem to correct. Is this normal battery life, or do I have a problem?

Thanks for any input.

Level 4 on my T6.1 fridge turns it into a freezer. level 2 is enough to get frozen water bottles if touching the rear wall, level one is sufficient to keep it at about 5 degrees when outside was about 28-30 degrees. The power consumption of the fridge is very different on the different settings.

 

[Stu@rt]

So, everything went well on my trip, but as usual I was on EHU every night. I decided to do an experiment when I returned. Batteries were fully charged, and I turned on the fridge at level 4. Checked status on a regular basis, and battery voltage gradually went down as expected. After 69 hours, it reported 11.8v, 50mins remaining, and I got the 'please charge the batteries message'. Over the almost three days, I took the van out once for about a 10 min drive total, with three stops.

While this is just about adequate battery life for a short trip, it does not seem to correct. Is this normal battery life, or do I have a problem?

Thanks for any input.

Sounds about right to me, I think. I agree with @andyinluton in that I don't feel the need to run the fridge that high and therefore your could reduce demand a touch, by backing that off a little. I think your experiment ratifies the control panel's calculations when it says at 12.8v >60hrs. And possibly a little more with conservative usage. Thanks for the info.

 

[Ladymuck]

So, than went in and the battery/control panel issue is now fixed, all charging up nicely, it was a fuse apparently...
However, there is now a problem with the water info on the dashboard, filled the water up but still shows as empty, then when initial turn on tap this error message occurs but then the tap works anyway

 

[Stu@rt]

So, than went in and the battery/control panel issue is now fixed, all charging up nicely, it was a fuse apparently...
However, there is now a problem with the water info on the dashboard, filled the water up but still shows as empty, then when initial turn on tap this error message occurs but then the tap works anyway

Now that is frustrating. A simple fuse that the VW assist guy could have dealt with. Did they give you anymore detail? Cube fuse on the 2nd battery, or a fuse relating more specifically to the control panel? And now fresh water sensor issues. Blimey. We had no water briefly yesterday. Could hear the clicking of the switch but no pump running. Popped the control panel on and a msg showing "Pump protection mode enabled. Add fresh water". I had only filled up in the morning so knew there was plenty. So assumed an air lock. Responded "ok" to the message and removed the filler cap with the intention of returning inside and blowing up the tap. But trying again and it had sorted itself. @GrumpyGranddad had sensor issues whilst away recently, but a complete empty and refill seems to have muted the gremlins for now at least.

 

[GrumpyGranddad]

Now that is frustrating. A simple fuse that the VW assist guy could have dealt with. Did they give you anymore detail? Cube fuse on the 2nd battery, or a fuse relating more specifically to the control panel? And now fresh water sensor issues. Blimey. We had no water briefly yesterday. Could hear the clicking of the switch but no pump running. Popped the control panel on and a msg showing "Pump protection mode enabled. Add fresh water". I had only filled up in the morning so knew there was plenty. So assumed an air lock. Responded "ok" to the message and removed the filler cap with the intention of returning inside and blowing up the tap. But trying again and it had sorted itself. @GrumpyGranddad had sensor issues whilst away recently, but a complete empty and refill seems to have muted the gremlins for now at least.

Water Sensor errors seem to be a common issue. Fingers crossed, mine’s still OK, however I haven’t driven the van again with water sloshing around in it yet. That’s a test i’ll do tomorrow.

 

[Ladymuck]

It must be a control panel issue surely, all water sensors were fine when the control panel was working properly a month or so ago. Will try to empty and refill tomorrow, if that doesn't work it'll have to go in, again :-(
Stuart, I'm not sure which fuse it was, I'm going to find out tomorrow.

 

[sewb]

We are having issues with the leisure battery display on our Ocean 6.1. It is fully charged and runs the fridge etc no problem, but the display shows 0h as shown on the photo below - this is obviously just an error, but does anyone know a quick fix for this? Thanks

 

[Stu@rt]

We are having issues with the leisure battery display on our Ocean 6.1. It is fully charged and runs the fridge etc no problem, but the display shows 0h as shown on the photo below - this is obviously just an error, but does anyone know a quick fix for this? ThanksView attachment 87858

Looks like you need some sort of reset eh? 12.7v is fully charged, so normal behavior from the panel at that stage is to show the ">60 hrs" . You could ignore it, if everything is behaving as it, should but it would worry me too. Have you tried leaving it on EHU for 24hrs+ to see if some re-calibration happens?