Problems wiring things to the leisure battery

[singlewestfalia]

I have looked and cant find anything on the wiki...

Apart from "If it aint broke don't fix it", I wonder if there is any advice on what to do next to figure out the wiring problem on my vans leisure battery?

- Everything worked fine (Fridge, lighter socket, water pump/tap) off the leisure battery.
- We connected a new Halogen mini reading lamp
- in the process rather then cram all the wires from all 4 appliances straight into the one Chocolate block (is that what they're called- little plastic, cheap connectors) we decided to split it so that the positive from the battery was split in to 2 chocolate blocks, and then each one of those had 2 of the positives from the appliances connected to them. Same thing was done with the negatives.
- Now, all 4 appliances work but only for a short while after the van has been driven- about half an hour later there is no power going to them and all are dead.

QUESTION 1: Does this mean that the leisure battery (which has never gone flat/ had ANY problems over the last year) is now unable to hold its charge- if so what could cause this?
QUESTION 2: If we had accidentally attached the wires the wrong way around on one of the appliances- could this cause the battery to loose is charge?
QUESTION 3: The halogen reading lamp- its meant for 12V but could it be draining the battery (it's not been left on)?

IS IT BROKEN FOREVER? any pointers for how to proceed would be appreciated. Going to Spain next week and need the fridge to chill the beers!

[T'Onion]

it sounds like you've either connected something wrong or missed one of the wires off maybe for the split charger

or you've wired the fridge direct to the battery ,rather than via a relay



ps. i'll move this to the techie forum you'll get more info that way

[1664]

Your fridge shouldn't be connected to your leisure battery. Should only work on 12v when the engine is running via a relay. The 12v halogen lamp (if it's a 50W domestic type) will draw about 4 amps. If you run the fridge (8 ish amps) and the halogen lamp your leisure battery will do the proverbial 'witches tit'........