BradW
Mayor of Flat Rock
Senior Member
Joined: 10/29/2001
View Profile
|
Got 25' of red and black 8 gauge copper wire, a 40 amp breaker and some lugs. I plan on wiring this truck correctly for the 12v frig. I hate to admit I never wired the three previous trucks correctly and the frig never worked right.
Wake Up America
2019 Lance 1062 and 2018 F-350 CC PSD 4X4 DRW
Tembrens, Rear Roadmaster Sway Bar, Torklift 48" Extention and 30K Superhitch
Our New Lance 1062 Truck Camper Unloading at Dealer Photos
|
Trackrig
Spent the summer in Conconuly, Wa, MH now in Vanco
Senior Member
Joined: 05/15/2011
View Profile
 Offline
|
So why didn't they work before and what are you doing different this time?
Bill
Nodwell RN110 out moose hunting. 4-53 Detroit, Clark 5 spd, 40" wide tracks, 10:00x20 tires, 16,000# capacity, 22,000# weight. You know the mud is getting deep when it's coming in the doors.
 (200x149) (2) (130x97) (110x82).jpg)
|
Kayteg1
California > Nevada
Senior Member
Joined: 06/18/2015
View Profile
Offline
|
Assuming that you do it to factory fridge - I have been thinking about this, but too many dilemmas like :
1. with heavy cables supplying 150 amp to deeply discharged camper batteries you can blow them up.
2. 12 v refrigerator elements are lower output. Maybe adequate where you camp, but I camp in 110+ F and full fridge output is crucial.
3. My truck has factory 400W inverter and I was thinking about running 120 v wire, but making it safe is whole new gimmick
4. propane use for fridge is minimal, while it still cools better than 120V (although by small margin)
So why bother, spend money and have additional risk/hassle, when it works pretty good?
|
burningman
Seattle, WA USA
Senior Member
Joined: 04/26/2003
View Profile
Offline
|
I disagree with a few things here.
The first is, 8-gauge is still way too small. 2-gauge or larger is more like it. Especially if you plan on running your fridge on 12V. One easy and cheap way to get them that I’ve done is to buy a set of 25’ 2-garage jumper cables and cut the clamps off.
If there was a risk of blowing up the batteries with a heavier charge line, you’d see batteries blowing up when people jump start cars with dead batteries. It doesn’t happen. And you absolutely will not get anything close to 150 amps through 25 feet of 8-gauge anyway.
Generally, people are only running their fridge on 12v while driving, and that works OK.
It’s totally worth running heavy-duty camper battery charging cables even if you never use the fridge on 12V.
They barely charge at all through the stock tiny wires and light-duty 7-pin RV plug.
2017 Northern Lite 10-2 EX CD SE
99 Ram 4x4 Dually Cummins
A whole lot more fuel, a whole lot more boost.
4.10 gears, Gear Vendors overdrive, exhaust brake
Built auto, triple disc, billet shafts.
Kelderman Air Ride, Helwig sway bar.
|
work2much
On the Road
Senior Member
Joined: 12/30/2006
View Profile
Offline
|
I don't use the alternator for anything on the RV. Pulled that fuse.
Absorption fridges are really inefficient in any mode, 12v the worst.
If you are looking to upsize wiring and use the trucks alternator to supply power while you travel you might fine better efficiency inverting to 120V near the trucks battery and running 120v from there to the fridge. The wiring shouldn't be too hard saddled to the 7 pin with it's own quick connect.
We do run ours on 120v through the inverter/battery/solar during the day when sun is out but when this sucker dies I will going to a more efficient compressor unit.
2022 Ram 3500 Laramie CTD DRW Crew 4x4 Aisin 4:10 Air ride.
2020 Grand Design Solitude 2930RL 2520 watts solar. 600ah lithium. Magnum 4000 watt inverter.
|
|
|
Optimistic Paranoid
East Nowhere NY
Senior Member
Joined: 08/29/2010
View Profile
Offline
|
burningman wrote:They barely charge at all through the stock tiny wires and light-duty 7-pin RV plug.
Honestly, they're not really designed to keep house batteries charged. Trailers with electric brakes have a small emergency battery that will provide power to the brakes in the event of trailer separation. The RV plug and wiring is designed to provide a trickle charge to keep THAT battery topped up automatically while you drive. That's all.
|
Optimistic Paranoid
East Nowhere NY
Senior Member
Joined: 08/29/2010
View Profile
Offline
|
As to whether you can successfully charge house batteries from the alternator with heavier wires, I see different results posted in forums. I suspect it has to do with the way the computer is programmed to prevent the engine battery from being overcharged and damaged. In other words, sometimes it works, and sometimes it doesn't.
Try it, and if you find it isn't working out for YOUR particular year and model, look into getting a battery to battery charger, like the marine units sold by this company:
https://www.sterling-power-usa.com/sterl........erusadcinputbatterytobatterycharger.aspx
|
NRALIFR
Let’s Go Girls! [End of Quote]
Senior Member
Joined: 11/27/2005
View Profile
|
Brad, if your goal is to get good refrigerator performance in DC mode and still keep the camper batteries fully charged, you might want to read this topic of mine in Tech Issues. I did this after being disappointed with the camper battery charging I was seeing after running 4 AWG welding cables from the truck batteries to the camper plug in the bed of the truck. My camper is also a Lance, so the wire size then changed to 8 AWG in the umbilical.
When I had a 1995 F350, I upgraded the truck-side wires to 6 AWG, connected them directly to the alternator, and got acceptable charging performance to the camper battery. On my 2010 F450, I went to 4 AWG wires still connected directly to the alternator, and was surprised to see that the charging performance was no better than the old truck. Possibly because the camper umbilical wires were still 8 AWG, but upgrading them was going to be a huge project as you can see in the linked Tech Issues topic.
When I upgraded the charge wires on my current truck, I found that the alternator/battery charging system on the truck had changed so radically that I was very apprehensive about connecting any auxiliary loads directly to the alternator. Plus, if you have a single alternator on your truck, it’s located way down low on the driver-side of the engine, and you’d have to remove a lot of stuff to get to it. I connected my new charge wires directly to both truck batteries, which improved the charging performance over the OEM wires, but it still wasn’t as good as what I was seeing out of the older trucks. It wasn’t keeping up with the drain on the camper battery from the fridge running in AC mode through an inverter, or running in DC mode.
Without going into a long-winded explanation, the fact is the charging systems on new vehicles is so tightly controlled by the ECM that it’s nearly impossible to get decent auxiliary battery charging out of a single alternator system. I’m fairly certain that on a new truck with a single alternator, you could run 0000 cables to the camper and still not get good performance. I have no idea if the dual alternator systems work any better since I don’t have dual alternators.
I finally bit the bullet and did what I describe in the linked topic, including upgrading the camper umbilical wires to 4 AWG as well. That required removing the water heater from the camper so I could get to the area the wires enter the camper. The results have been fantastic. The refrigerator DC mode now works so much better that I no longer run the fridge in AC mode through an inverter. I believe this is due to the camper voltage always being over 14 volts thanks to the Redarc DC-DC charger. Best of all, we always arrive at camp with a fully charged camper battery.
Redarc DC-DC Battery Charger
![[emoticon]](http://www.coastresorts.com/sharedcontent/cfb/images/smile.gif "smile")
|
deltabravo
Spokane, WA
Senior Member
Joined: 09/08/2003
View Profile
Offline
|
work2much wrote:If you are looking to upsize wiring and use the trucks alternator to supply power while you travel you might fine better efficiency inverting to 120V near the trucks battery and running 120v from there to the fridge.
We do run ours on 120v through the inverter/battery/solar during the day when sun is out but when this sucker dies I will going to a more efficient compressor unit.
This is what I do as well. I use the inverter in the camper to power the fridge while driving.
Here's my video:
Truck to truck camper battery charging
2009 Silverado 3500HD Dually, D/A, CCLB 4x4 (bought new 8/30/09)
2018 Arctic Fox 992 with an Onan 2500i "quiet" model generator
|
Kayteg1
California > Nevada
Senior Member
Joined: 06/18/2015
View Profile
Offline
|
Optimistic Paranoid wrote:As to whether you can successfully charge house batteries from the alternator with heavier wires, I see different results posted in forums....
Different results for different use.
I run fridge on propane and drive long distance.
Truck system keeps my camper batteries topped up all the time.
But I don't boon-dock for more than 1 night and my batteries are never deeply discharged.
The 10 ga factory wire is limiting the current and gives voltage drop at higher amps. When it slows full recharge of camper batteries, it makes self-protection.
As I wrote above, I was considering running 2 ga cables to the camper, but vision of camper batteries discharged to 10V level and shooting 200 amp from dual alternators via heavy gauges is not passing my smart test.
* This post was
edited 02/26/19 09:10am by Kayteg1 *
|
|
|
