Battery charging

[neely butler]

Saw a '76 GMC today owned by elderly gent, he had a jumper wire on the
terminals on the relay mounted on firewall above battery. He says that
while plugged in to shore power this jumper allowers truck battery to be
charged at same time that house battery is being charged. I have a '78
Elengaza II.
Will this work for me?? Thanks
Neely B, TN

 

[edgar kremer]

> Saw a '76 GMC today owned by elderly gent, he had a jumper wire on the
> terminals on the relay mounted on firewall above battery. He says that
> while plugged in to shore power this jumper allowers truck battery to be
> charged at same time that house battery is being charged. I have a '78
> Elengaza II.
> Will this work for me?? Thanks
> Neely B, TN

Sure it will. It has worked for many of us over the years.


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[blank]

Neely, it's my understanding that the seventy seven and seventy eight coaches
come out with a one hundred per cent duty solonoid on the battery selector. You
can confirm this by checking to see if your selector button is spring loaded,
and if the solonoid is metal or bakelite, a brown plastic looking substance. If
the button is spring loaded, then more than likely you would have to jumper
across your solonoid also. Also if your solonoid is bakelite. it will also be
necessary to jumper it. Other wise all that is necessary is to select "Boost "
on your dash switch and it will tie the batteries together. Good luck.
Pat 77 Birchaven

> Saw a '76 GMC today owned by elderly gent, he had a jumper wire on the
> terminals on the relay mounted on firewall above battery. He says that
> while plugged in to shore power this jumper allowers truck battery to be
> charged at same time that house battery is being charged. I have a '78
> Elengaza II.
> Will this work for me?? Thanks
> Neely B, TN

 

[al chernoff]

When you want, you can energize the solenoid that normally comes on when
you want a boost (ie using the coach and the engine battery together).
Thus is you energize the solenoid, the voltage going to the rear battery
will also go to the front one. Use this only if the solenoid is a
continous duty. If not, the jumpers you talked about must be pretty sturdy
to handle the 40+ amps that can flow from the rear to the front.
However, if yo have a combiner installed you need not do anything as they
will charge both batteries.
al

> Saw a '76 GMC today owned by elderly gent, he had a jumper wire on the
> terminals on the relay mounted on firewall above battery. He says that
> while plugged in to shore power this jumper allowers truck battery to be
> charged at same time that house battery is being charged. I have a '78
> Elengaza II.
> Will this work for me?? Thanks
> Neely B, TN

 

[gary miller]

If you put one trickle charger to the center post of the battery isolater it will
charge both the house and the engine batteries without messing around with the
solenoid. At least this is the way I have been running for over a year.
Gary and Edie
North Bend, Oregon Coast

> Neeley - yes this will work the same as putting the Boost battery switch on
> all the time. The problem with this is that you might burn out the solenoid
> that you are jumping across as it will be drawing current through its coils
> all the time. The other problem is that you are placing the front and rear
> batteries in parallel and if you have a weak or shorted cell in one battery
> it will drag down the charge from the other battery. This is why GMC put a
> battery isolator in -- to separate the front and rear batteries so that they
> would not be able to exchange current from one to the other.
>
> A much better approach is to buy a little trickle charger for the front
> battery. Camping world sells one that will not overcharge a battery. I used
> two of these for about a year to keep my batteries up without boiling out the
> water or overcharging until I got my StatPower 40 charger that will charge
> both the front and rear batteries on separate lines. I'll make you a deal on
> one of them if you are interested. I'm using the second one on a car that I
> don't drive often to keep up its battery.
>
> Emery Stora
> 77 Kingsley
> Santa Fe, NM

 

[edgar kremer]

> Neeley - yes this will work the same as putting the Boost battery switch on
> all the time. The problem with this is that you might burn out the solenoid
> that you are jumping across as it will be drawing current through its coils
> all the time. The other problem is that you are placing the front and rear
> batteries in parallel and if you have a weak or shorted cell in one battery
> it will drag down the charge from the other battery. This is why GMC put a
> battery isolator in -- to separate the front and rear batteries so that they
> would not be able to exchange current from one to the other.

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I think the original post refers to putting a jumper across the battery terminals
on opposite sides of the solenoid. If this is the case, of course it would not
energize the relay coil. A separate charger, as you stated, certainly is a better
choice; but the jumper serves as a temp method.
- --
&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&
& GMC Schematics &
& http://meltingpot.fortunecity.com/greenside/321/ &
& &
& Forest City Pixs &
& http://users.erols.com/mistifawnvideo/Forest_City &
&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&