That Fancy Inverter is Driving Me Nuts and I Need a Bucket of Help/Advice

Well the weather is nice finally and after some medical stuff would like to exit Tulsa for a while.  Went out to change oil and do a little general clean-up/maintenance and discovered once again the inverter/charger has pretty much cooked the batteries (no water).  It has been on shore power since returning from last trip ~1Dec09.  I am tempted to yank that sucker and put in a standard house power supply/charger.  I have done the tricks listed in some other threads and nothing is solving this nightmare.
Any suggestions would be appreciated.  Thanks, L. G.

I agree with you in regards to our inverter on a 2007 2350.  You can't simply leave the inverter on shore power for months at a time and expect the batteries to be properly conditioned.  It seems the invertor can't tell when the batteries are fully charged.  It keeps charging and charging until the water is gone.  That is why I don't plug into 110v when at home.  I shut down the RV power completely and use a Black and Decker smart charger straight to the batteries for a week here and there.  It is easy for me to play around with that because our PC is conveniently stored in our attached garage.  If stored outside, it would be a hassle.

Ron,
Mine is under cover, although not inside.  That may be the way for me to go too, with an external charger.  I found out tonight that the inverter is evidently directly wired to the shore power without going through a breaker, at least none of the breakers de-power it.  THAT needs changing I think,  don't know how PC gets around code with that latch up.  It seems too that there is no way to de-power 12V from the batteries to the inverter, so that needs to change too, although the output from the inverter does go through breakers.  That still leaves the hot side of the breaker hot, ALWAYS, as long as the batteries are above a certain voltage.
This set up is not conducive to being on shore power at all IMHO.
Thanks for the tip.
L. G.

Hi Everyone!

My wife and I have recently purchased a 2007 PC 2350.  I also have questions regarding the proper set up of the inverter.  We are not new to motorhomes; instead, this is our fifth, though it is the first with an inverter.  I don't anticipate doing much, if any, dry camping.  Instead, the PC will either be secured on a storage lot or we will be on the road staying in a camp ground.  In storage, the battery disconnect will be in the Store position.  On the road, of course, it will be in the Use position.  In a campground we will be plugged into shore power.  My concern and question is which position should the switch on the inverter be in; the "Charge Only" or the "Auto/Remote" position?  I have read the manual and have watched the DVD "Meet the Cruiser" a few times.  The narrator of the DVD, at one point, states that it is important to have the switch in the "Charge Only" position.  What have all of you learned?  I would very much appreciate input from those who have been there and done that.

JamesH

JamesH,

The Charge Only/Auto-Invert switch you refer to, is disabled unless you or the previous owner had unplugged a headphone style jack from the back of it.  Read through the post I provided here as it explains in detail, the purpose of it all.  If you are still confused afterward, just reply again with your question and I will try my best to answer it with better clarity.

CLICK HERE-------> http://forum.phoenixusarv.com/index.php?topic=73.0

Quick summary for the 2007s (any many other years too)......The factory wired the RV such that all 12V opperations including power to the inverter is controlled by the switch at the entry door.  If dry camping without shore power, killing 12V power at the entry door, kills the fridge on propane, spoiling all food.  The solution is to leave 12V on, but this keeps the inverter powered up all the time using 12 amps for nothing, draining the batteries unneccessarily.

Unplugging the head-phone style jack at the Trpp-Lite control panel, allows 12V opperations to stay on in the RV (importance to the fridge), but then allows you to switch the Tripp-Lite control panel to Charge Only which shuts it down, saving a lot of 12v battery reserves.

We would leave camp in our tow vehicle, leaving the motor home at a primitive camp site for the entire day.  Gone all day, the inverter was running for nothing, just so the fridge could run.  With the jack unplugged, we can control the inverter independantly of the rest of the RV, conserving lots of battery power.

The flip side to this is, you can forget to turn on the inverter when plugged into 110V shore power.  The factory setup is geared toward RV park travelers, not people who do a lot of primitive camping.

I might have a little of this wrong, but I think my input is accurate.

Ron Dittmer