Norcold 12cu Drains Battery on LP

[hugsfamily]

Good day all,

Looking for some advice. We just upgraded to a 2022 Crusader 305rlp fifth wheel. We park our rig in storage with no access to shore power. We have always gone to storage and turned our fridge on (LP) the day before we are to leave for a trip. The fridge cools overnight and is ready to go the next day. With the new fridge, every time we do this, it drains the battery in just a few hours and we arrive at storage to a hot fridge. We have a pre-installed port for a Furrion solar panel that is located near the storage compartment at the front near the pin. We wouldn't want to leave a solar panel unsecured at storage as batteries have been known to 'disappear' and we are sure a solar panel might too. Considering getting a solar panel with a long cable, setting the panel on the roof and using a bike style cable to lock it to the ladder. Husband is worried that that would work for daylight hours but that the fridge would drain the battery overnight and turn off.

Looking for any ideas, thoughts, anyone else have this experience? Without a solution, we would have to take all of our food in coolers for the first 24 hours of any trip....that's way to much like our old days of tent camping!!!!

Thanks.

[schlep1967]

To the Original Poster. Your problem is 12 volt/DC current related. Turning off the A/C current breakers did nothing for your problem unless you have something running off of a D/C to A/C converter. Now if you pulled all of the fuses except what you need to run the fridge, that may help your battery problems. But it would be a royal pain to do that.

My guess is you had either a bad battery or a loose connection that was fixed by replacing the battery.

[2112]

Thermoguy wrote:
Please get a volt meter - one better than the $15 one...

Or get one of these:

LCD Display

LMAO
You're saying buy a $17 panel mount monitor with external shunt rather than buying a $15 handheld DMM for troubleshooting? Really

[2112]

Grit dog wrote:
One battery in a big 5ver is just the mfg or dealer being cheap.

This doesn't make sense. Why would the size of the rig dictate battery capacity? The load in a 19' TT would be the same as a 36' FW other than the furnace.

Required battery capacity is defined by how the rig is being used, not its size

[Gdetrailer]

fj12ryder wrote:

Gdetrailer wrote:
...
HF used to give those away for yrs with a coupon, I have something like a dozen of those around my garage and basement and even have one in my RV.

Yeah, I used to hit the place when the "Free" coupons came in the mail. I bet I've got a dozen of the darned things around. They work well enough and if you short one out, not a biggie because you have several others at hand. 🙂

Yep, don't feel too bad about killing a $7 HF meter.

Killing a $150+ Fluke?

Yeah, that would upset me :M

[fj12ryder]

Gdetrailer wrote:
...
HF used to give those away for yrs with a coupon, I have something like a dozen of those around my garage and basement and even have one in my RV.

Yeah, I used to hit the place when the "Free" coupons came in the mail. I bet I've got a dozen of the darned things around. They work well enough and if you short one out, not a biggie because you have several others at hand. 🙂

[Gdetrailer]

Thermoguy wrote:
Please get a volt meter - one better than the $15 one...

No need to buy a $15 or higher "volt meter".

You can buy a HF DVM for $7 which is pretty darn accurate..



Found HERE

And yes, I HAVE checked the HF meters against Flukes that were calibrated against a known standard.. Any differences in measurements was insignificant for common every day use..

HF used to give those away for yrs with a coupon, I have something like a dozen of those around my garage and basement and even have one in my RV.

[Grit_dog]

Well, it's of no nevermind now...
The OP found a couple work-arounds which may or may not be part of the actual issue to begin with and they're off into the wild blue yonder.
Until the "Sick of turning off all breakers to get the fridge to work." thread pops up next month or next year.

[Thermoguy]

Please get a volt meter - one better than the $15 one...

Or get one of these:

LCD Display

Or both...

I forgot to turn my fridge off last week and it has been running for 7 days on propane. My batteries are lower than I like, but not too low, and we had lights on, slide in and out a couple times, jacks down then back up, moved to my parking spot and now plugged in. But, point is, I can run for days on propane and not even think about the batteries or my propane tank.

[Grit_dog]

One battery in a big 5ver is just the mfg or dealer being cheap. Plus assuming it was a normal 100ah ish battery, even if perfect, the 2 6v more than doubled your useable battery capacity.
However, when troubleshooting, if you make 2 changes at once, you are not really figuring out what went wrong. However performing your test with the breakers on again is easy.

[2112]

Thanks for following up with this. I wish everyone did.

You Stated wrote:
At the time batteries were reading 2/3

This implies you do not own a voltmeter. Your 12V troubleshooting ability is handicapped without one. It's $15 well spent.

[hugsfamily]

Well, we have found a solution. We tried two things as we prepared for this weekends camping trip.
1) we turned off every circuit breaker except the converter and the fridge
2) we swapped out our 12v battery for two 6v batteries.

Started the fridge on LP at 10:30pm. At the time batteries were reading 2/3. Left for camping at 3:30pm the next day and the fridge was cold and the batteries were still reading 2/3. Not sure if one of those two solutions was the trick or if it was the combo. Frankly, I don’t care. It works and it’s an easy solution. This will be our game plan going forward, as well as disconnecting the battery at the battery, not with the factory switch off.

Thanks everyone.

[BarabooBob]

I installed a switch on my propane/CO detector to turn it off when we are not using the TT. I also installed a battery power smoke/CO detector and a battery powered lp gas detector. We also installed a switch to turn off all power to the radio because I don't need a bright blue night light to stay on all of the time.

[dougrainer]

StirCrazy wrote:

Charlie D. wrote:

StirCrazy wrote:
are you running the fridge on propane or electric?

Op said he was on propane

yup, but I am wondering if it realy is.. no way it should drain a batery when its on propane in 4 hours, unless the battery is already dead.

Steve

Even tho he has a 2022, that does not mean his battery is GOOD. It could be out of water(boiled dry) or partially boiled and has no reserve power. Doug

[StirCrazy]

Charlie D. wrote:

StirCrazy wrote:
are you running the fridge on propane or electric?

Op said he was on propane

yup, but I am wondering if it realy is.. no way it should drain a batery when its on propane in 4 hours, unless the battery is already dead.

Steve

[Charlie_D_]

StirCrazy wrote:
are you running the fridge on propane or electric?

Op said he was on propane