Honda CR-V battery drains during towing

[bennefim]

Any other crv owners had/have this problem?
I have not been removing the fuse that the owners guide describes. Does this fuse actually protect the battery?

Doug

[bennefim]

Also, found out my CRV battery was bad and replaced. Still plan to add the charge line.

Doug

[bennefim]

Thanks for the helpful inputs. I think I will install a charge line from the rv to the crv. If the rv 7 way receptacle is already wired, seems like connecting to that would make sense. Thoughts.

Doug

[gafidler]

have a 2011 CRV .. battery went dead while towing ... ran a charge line from RV to battery ... problem solved .. easy to do .. don't need to pay anyone .. do it yourself.

[vjstangelo]

We tow a 2011 CRV, but it does not have the navigation system in the radio. My understanding is this is key to whether or not the battery will drain to the point the vehicle will not start.

We have run ours with the radio off (not pulling the fuse) for up to 15 hours of towing no problems, but that is with starting the motor and cycling the transmission after 8 hours as recommended by the manual. Also, we use the RVi brake system which also draws off the battery.

Regards.

[mockturtle]

I used to tow a CRV (with another RV) and had the same problem. The fuse you have to remove varies by year and model. When I quit, I had to reprogram my radio but no big deal.

[Happytraveler]

We did this to our 2013 or 2014 CRV to prevent battery drain. http://www.rv.net/forum/index.cfm/fuseaction/thread/tid/27443336/gotomsg/27444131.cfm#27444131

[lryrob9301]

Or you could eliminate the problem entirely by installing a larger capacity group 24 battery of at least 850 CCA. You will need to replace the battery box with the Odyssey battery box to support the larger battery (about $25 from Honda).The part numbers are 31521-TK8-A00 and 31531-TK8-A00.

[F1bNorm]

On our CRV, I just added a screw/knob battery cut out. If I had known ahead of time, I would have added a charge line to the harness. For convenience, we made a 3x5 card with the factory tow routine and added the radio reset code.

Norm

Edit: This doesn't work if your brake actuator requires electricity. We use a Ready Brake surge system.

[Jayco-noslide]

Make sure you are doing exactly what it recommends in the car's manual.

[tropical_ron]

Yes it does. I had the fuse for our radio, fuse #34, remoted with a kit. In our case we mounted the switch below the steering wheel on the plastic facia. I struggled to make the connection to the fuse block, located under the dash above the parking brake, so I went to a car stereo shop and they made the connection for the price of a cup of coffee. Now we tow for 8, 10, or more hours without battery issues. PS, we had battery issues before the switch...oh, I forgot to mention, the kit is available from FuseMaster.

[ksg5000]

I haven't set up my CRV as toad but did some research before I bought. Removing fuse isn't designed to protect the radio but save you from depleting the battery - all the radio/electronic stuff runs though that fuse. Apparently after towing a long distance dead batteries are common problem. Removing fuse is suppose to resolve the problem but accessing the fuse is PIA - some put in switch - others run a charge wire from rig to toad battery.

I know my 2014 came with an undersized battery - and lots of complaints about people being stranded. I got stranded by leaving my lights radio on waiting for my wife to finish shopping - so I have no doubt that long distance tow might result in dead battery.