Cheap shore power, Battery charger = dead battery

J

Jeanie P

New member
:?: I followed a fellow C-Brat's advice and installed a poor man's shore power by using a dock power cord and plugging it into a GFI four plug outlet box inside the cabin next to the helm seat.

I then plugged in a ProSport -12 two battery charger and wired it to my house and starter batteries. I have a Perko 1,2,All,off switch which I usually leave on 2 for my house battery and then switch to 1 to start and switch to ALL once I leave the dock.

I forgot to switch to ALL the last two times I ran the boat in November, starting it on 2 both times and last week pulled it for winter storage.

When I tried to start the engine on 1 the last time, it was dead. I switch to 2 and it started right up. I didn't have time to run a check before pulling the batteries. Today 1 is compleately dead, no reading at all while 2 is at 12.4 and 2/3's charged.

I'm now charging 1 but any ideas on why it was drawn down? Now that I have a battery charger, should the battery switch be left on ALL to charge both?

P.S. - The blow in PNW has started to arrive here on the east coast. Good thing most of the leaves came down last week!

Allan
 
Jeanie P":3rqcuiwx said:
:?: I followed a fellow C-Brat's advice and installed a poor man's shore power by using a dock power cord and plugging it into a GFI four plug outlet box inside the cabin next to the helm seat.

I then plugged in a ProSport -12 two battery charger and wired it to my house and starter batteries. I have a Perko 1,2,All,off switch which I usually leave on 2 for my house battery and then switch to 1 to start and switch to ALL once I leave the dock.

I forgot to switch to ALL the last two times I ran the boat in November, starting it on 2 both times and last week pulled it for winter storage.

When I tried to start the engine on 1 the last time, it was dead. I switch to 2 and it started right up. I didn't have time to run a check before pulling the batteries. Today 1 is compleately dead, no reading at all while 2 is at 12.4 and 2/3's charged.

I'm now charging 1 but any ideas on why it was drawn down? Now that I have a battery charger, should the battery switch be left on ALL to charge both?

P.S. - The blow in PNW has started to arrive here on the east coast. Good thing most of the leaves came down last week!

Allan
Click to expand...

Yes :wink: Depending where you have the charger connected? 1 will feed #1, pos #2 will feed batt #2 All will feed Both :mrgreen: :beer Have a good one!!
 
If you have wired the charger directly to both batteries than it shouldn't matter what the perko switch is set to other than you might not want them in parallel. I'd confirm that the charger is actually putting a charge to both batteries. Maybe there's an inline fuse to that battery that was blown?
 
I leave boats for months without being on a charger--I suspect that there is something draining the battery, and you do need to look for it: radio memory, bilge pump switches are the most common items. Use a digital volt meter and measure the current draw between the Positative post and all of the cables attatched to the battery.

If you do leave the charger on--which can be acceptable--there is some risk considering the "Cheap man's" hook up--there is no galvanic isolator. There is some risk of increased electrolysis on the motor leg or any other metals in the water, if the boat is kept in the water. You now have current going to the battery, and even if the switch is "off", there is a connection to the ground. It should be isolated in the charger--but there are cases where it is not.

I enjoy the convience of 110 volts, but I also be sure that the boat is wired to NMEA standards.
 
The charger is wired directly to the batteries. It may be the inline fuse to #1. The boat is shrinkwraped and stored 1 1/2 hr away so I won't be able to check it until Spring.

Bob- if I remember correctly, all electronics with a memory are wired to #2 battery, including the bilge pump. so I'm not sure what would be draining #1.

Also, do you need a galvanic isolator, if your outboard is trimmed out of the water and you have no thru hull fittings or electrical connections that would make contact with anything that would conduct through water?

Allan
 
My battery kept going dead and I could not figure it out. Lights off, bilge off, radios off, etc... then I went out and checked it at night for some lure I had left in the boat and needed to use on another boat. light in the bunk was on. never saw it in the day light. really got to check everything close.
 
I had the same situation as Tom, then went looking in the dark, (Pun intended) and found that the stereo has a very faint power button light that stays on even when it is turned off. Really faint glow, but enough to draw the power down. Now I remember to turn off the power at the battery control switch, not just the switch panel.

Harvey
SleepyC :moon
 
No, a galvanic isolator is not essential if you don't leave the boat in the water. But what is essential is that the boat be properly wired. The danger is that occasionally in some marinas (RV parks and even homes) an occasional electrical outlet (or even an entire circuit) is mis-wired. The neutral and hot wires are reversed. It might not even be at your your outlet, it could be an outlet on another boat in the same marina--but that would give a positive voltage to the neutral. There then is the risk of electrolysis, but also of an electrical shock. This is why it is proper to have a double pole breaker on the input of the the 110 pannel, along with a reverse polarity indicator. Another way to guard against this is to have a plug in reverse polarity indicator.

Also proper wiring would have a fuse at the power outlet of the battery charger (probably will be built in) and another fuse within 7" of the plus terminal of the batteries.
 
Bob - My question is the galvanic isolator needed if the boat is IN the water but O/B is trimmed up and nothing wired to any hull openings?

Also, could I put a reverse polarity plug type indicator on the power cord and then plug it into the GFCI receptacle and meet that requirement?

Allan
 
I can't speak for Marinas but I can tell you that after RVing for 30 years pretty much full time reverse polarity in campgrounds isn't at all uncommon. There's a simple receptacle device you can plug into a 20 amp 110 receptacle to check polarity before plugging your boat or RV into the plug. I would expect the wiring in some Marinas isn't much better that RV parks. I've more than once come to my RV in a park and grabbed the door only to be greeted by a hand full of 110V only because some resident or untrained maintenance guy did a little wiring while I was away. I'd hate to have this experience possibly barefoot and wet. When ground fault breakers came into use they were a good idea but more times than not they were replaced by regular breakers when they tripped to often. On a very long dock due to voltage drops present you can't always assume that a breaker will trip if there is a fault.
 
Marvin,

ABYC A 28 basically states that: "The latest ABYC standards specify that the galvanic isolator must be capable of carrying 135% of the rated shore power current, in the event of malfunction in the AC breaker/circuit protection."

"Galvanic isolators are installed on boats to prevent galvanic corrosion when the boat is connected to a shore power source; however, that is not their only important function. The fact that a galvanic isolator is installed in series with the safety grounding conductor of the shore power cable makes this product a critical link in safety grounding of the boat. If an electrical fault on the boat occurred and this safety grounding path was interrupted, personnel on the boat or bridging the boat and the dock and anyone in the water near the boat could be subject to serious electrical shock or potential electrocution."

I am not going to go into the complex subject of electrolysis--DC vs AC current etc. Nor am I going to say it is OK to have a boat with out a galvanic isolator--nor will a galvanic isolator give a 100% guarantee that you won't have a problem. The CD 22, with no metal in the water, should not have any problem without a Galvanic isolator. I'll bet that the boats from the factory 110 V AC system currently come with a galvanic isolator, but some in the past did not. But I have owned a number of boats, in the distant past, without a galvanic isolator. Yes. A GFI gives protection in the boat. But be sure that all outlets are protected.

The plug in polarity indicator does the same thing as the built in reverse polarity indicator. Remember that I suggest that you check the dock outlet as well as the boat. (I have a pigtail which takes the "usual 30 amp marina plug to the standard 15 amp outlet, and plug the polarity indicator into this outlet for the test.) Also if a boat is miswired, there can be a low voltage AC current thru neutral, as current flows thru appliances on that specific boat. I also found that there was some leakage when wire was run in long conduits where there might be some leakage of salt water into the conduit--so on my own docks, I put a separate ground, and tied the ground to neutral right by the boat outlet, even though this is tied in at the power pole and the house main breaker box. I have found large docks entirely miswired. I have had a number of outlets in one of my RV's disabled, because the inverter sensed the miswiring and shut down. It turned out that just hitting the "reset" button didn't solve the problem. The inverter had to be disconnected from the 12 volt source to reset the unit. That taught me to check the polarity of the RV plugs also (a separate pigtail for that!)
 
A couple of points to think about:

If the busbar/circuit breaker/GFI unit has enough outlets, just plug the small reverse polarity/ground fault indicator unit into one of them and leave it there for continuous checking. The LED lights will indicate if there is a serious problem.

You can also check for gross electrical problems by using a digital voltmeter (actually a volt/Ohm, ammeter, or VOM meter). Put the meter on AC Voltage, and connect one lead to something metal in the water like a metal through hull or electrolysis anode. (make a rod conductor of aluminum if you need to.)

Check for voltage between this water grounded source and the three conductors coming into the boat and also the three conductors at an outlet on the boat.

The ground connector should read 0 volts or something very close to approaching it, and the common should also read about 0 volts. Next, the hot lead should give you something around or less than 120 volts, but definitely indicate that the lead is hot compared to the grounded rod in the water. You'll get more voltage in salt water, of course. If you've got some funny voltage readings, it's time to do some problem solving.

Another point: Do you have a true GFI inlet/busbar or just a circuit breaker? The standard busbars are just load protected though a circuit breaker, but a GFI device for extension cord type use is a special animal. I have my GFI set up connected between the incoming cord and the busbar so that I can remove it when using the Honda 1000i generator, which has a "floating ground" (read no ground). This grounding set up confuses the GFI unit, so it must be removed when using that type of generator.

I connected my battery charger to the 6 gauge trunk line running from the batteries to the windlass. That way, turning the 1-both-2 switch to the desired battery(ies) will select the units to be charged. Is your charger connected directly to one or both of the batteries, or connected in such a way that it's charging current can be directed to the desired battery and any one of the batteries isolated from the charging process?

By the way, Dr. Bob might describe a way to check your electrolysis potential using a silver chloride electrode which is much more sensitive but this is another, but related issue.

Hope this helps with the issues.

Joe. :thup
 
Bob in answer to your question my 2007 which came with factory shore power included the galvonic protection. I assume the factory recognized the need and is installing it on all their boats.
As I stated the polarity tester which can be used with and adapter to check 30 amp circuits is a really good tool to have as you mentioned. I'd much prefer using it than my RV or boat system to check for faulty wiring.
Typically the average maintenance guy at a RV park has a 50/50 chance of installing a receptacle correctly. They get pretty defensive when you tell them they reversed the wiring and nearly electrocuted you.
 
Marvin, Agreed, it's best to check circuits before plugging in to them. Last Summer in Refuge Cove, Desolation Sound, My Blue Seas panel showed all red lights when shore power was connected. Checking the 15 amp outlet with a multi meter showed 115 v between the hot and ground but 10-15 v. between hot and neutral. They didn't seem too concerned and I got my $8 shore power fee back and used the Honda gen.
 
Dreamer":1x9wr2k8 said:
Marvin, Agreed, it's best to check circuits before plugging in to them. Last Summer in Refuge Cove, Desolation Sound, My Blue Seas panel showed all red lights when shore power was connected. Checking the 15 amp outlet with a multi meter showed 115 v between the hot and ground but 10-15 v. between hot and neutral. They didn't seem too concerned and I got my $8 shore power fee back and used the Honda gen.
Click to expand...

Happens all the time. I guess having been and electrician for 35 years this is one of my pet peaves. Multi Meters are great if you know how to use them properly but I wouldn't recommend them to everybody they can be dangerous used improperly. The little plug in polarity testers are so convenient and very easy to use.
 
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