Oh and best wishes getting through your virus infection, my family and I caught cases Christmas 2020 right before vaccines became available. We all had super mild to no symptoms but it was scary to think it could be over for any of us. I’m a mustard seed of faith kinda guy but I’ll say a prayer for you.
My new 40.1 ran down the house bank
- Thread starter hvac&r tech
- Start date
Been following and hope you get this sorted out to your satisfaction.
Just a note to your quote: the two AC inputs should NEVER ever be on at the same time. I hope you know this. [Unless you have two separate 120V services inside the boat that get fed by only one source at a time.]
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yes, thanks Stu. The transfer switching in normal mode is through the controller and with power relays /contactors and won’t allow both gen set and shorepower to be hitched to “onboard” 120v bus/wiring at once. And with the manual transfer switch, it has to turn through the “open to none” center position before toggling between generator and shoreside power, so one can’t manually parallel the sources at all.
And I also noticed when I had the manual transfer switch lined up to shorepower (when it was working yesterday) the display showed a yellow caution with a lock symbol. I of course didn’t attempt to parallel the generator then, but possibly it wouldn’t even allow that I’m guessing.
Again, thanks for the heads up
Also Stu, my boat does have two separate 120v buses fyi. The 2 Dometic air conditioning/reverse cycle heating units are 120v, and have a second separate but identical transfer switch to line that up to either shoreside or generator supply 120v. FYI
First time I thought about it but that might be handy at a marina that only had 30 amp service and I wanted to run A/C or heatpumps. I could start generator and line it up to either the onboard power or the A/C/heater, line up the onboard 120v to the source I wasn’t using for ac/heat power.
First time I thought about it but that might be handy at a marina that only had 30 amp service and I wanted to run A/C or heatpumps. I could start generator and line it up to either the onboard power or the A/C/heater, line up the onboard 120v to the source I wasn’t using for ac/heat power.
Certainly the conditions you describe are perplexing.
I can't imagine that any alternator design would require that the battery (the thing being charged) would have to be near 12V or even 10V to allow the alternator to pass the charge to the battery. They do have diodes and its possible to fry one of these diodes and possibly prevent the alternator from charging.
Something I don't understand about the pictures you posted of the display panel. I'm assuming the pictures are being shown without any charging source and taken at about the same time.
1. You show -1 amp (a discharge) from the "combined bank" which would be some sort of base load, like radio memories, instrument memories (including the power to run the display itself), some small load, or some parasitic load. It's not unusual to have some small constant load on a boat with all this equipment. At that load it would be 24 Amp Hours over a day and 504 Ahrs over 21 days with no charge source at any time.
2. I'm having a hard time understanding when at a combined bank reading 12.7 V and 12.7V on each of the individual batteries how two of the 4 batteries are showing a -.8A and -.6A (small discharge rate on each battery if your are showing -1A total) yet one battery is mysteriously showning a charge of +.2A and the other is 0.0. What is the "charge source" for this +.2A? Are there individual loads tapped of from each battery rather from the combined output? Why would someone do that. Maybe there is a good reason and its entirely possible that I'm not understanding the display and what it is supposed to provide. Is it possible you have undergone "cell reversal" on one battery (where a single cell in a battery reverses and becomes a load). I imagine these are agm batteries rather than wet cell. If they are wet cell, can you check individual cell voltage and specific gravity of the individual cells? That would be an indicator of a bad cell. Of course if they are agm you can't do that.
I can't imagine that any alternator design would require that the battery (the thing being charged) would have to be near 12V or even 10V to allow the alternator to pass the charge to the battery. They do have diodes and its possible to fry one of these diodes and possibly prevent the alternator from charging.
Something I don't understand about the pictures you posted of the display panel. I'm assuming the pictures are being shown without any charging source and taken at about the same time.
1. You show -1 amp (a discharge) from the "combined bank" which would be some sort of base load, like radio memories, instrument memories (including the power to run the display itself), some small load, or some parasitic load. It's not unusual to have some small constant load on a boat with all this equipment. At that load it would be 24 Amp Hours over a day and 504 Ahrs over 21 days with no charge source at any time.
2. I'm having a hard time understanding when at a combined bank reading 12.7 V and 12.7V on each of the individual batteries how two of the 4 batteries are showing a -.8A and -.6A (small discharge rate on each battery if your are showing -1A total) yet one battery is mysteriously showning a charge of +.2A and the other is 0.0. What is the "charge source" for this +.2A? Are there individual loads tapped of from each battery rather from the combined output? Why would someone do that. Maybe there is a good reason and its entirely possible that I'm not understanding the display and what it is supposed to provide. Is it possible you have undergone "cell reversal" on one battery (where a single cell in a battery reverses and becomes a load). I imagine these are agm batteries rather than wet cell. If they are wet cell, can you check individual cell voltage and specific gravity of the individual cells? That would be an indicator of a bad cell. Of course if they are agm you can't do that.
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Thanks for the continued interest and thoughts, I am not doing any disassembly or deep into it troubleshooting at this point I want to get dealers professional boatyard marine electrician/s fully in loop from here on and will resume that Monday, so this is more a show and tell now. Which it was to begin with actually, I posted since I know I like seeing and hearing about issues other sailors are contending with.
Anyway, about your specific question “Are there individual loads tapped of from each battery rather from the combined output? Why would someone do that. Maybe there is a good reason and its entirely possible that I'm not understanding the display and what it is supposed to provide. Is it possible you have undergone "cell reversal" on one battery (where a single cell in a battery reverses and becomes a load). I imagine these are agm batteries rather than wet cell. If they are wet cell, can you check individual cell voltage and specific gravity of the individual cells?”
I had similar thoughts about the diagnostic battery screen individual readings.The 4 batteries are all hard connected with heavy gage wire and those readings are all digitized data from four separate “sensor” harnesses hooked to each battery and fed back to the input board of a battery monitoring module. There is no perfect way to know the current going in (or out) of a heavy gage wire from a battery post with transitors, resistors, voltage sensors etc and everytime the monitor powers off and on it does some zeroing or memory loading process/routine between the sensors and the monitors measurement routine and analog to digital converter electronics. Same as you I’m thinking if those small current differences might mean something, but not knowing the actual technology to a tee and seeing you he 4 green hearts in the “battery health” line, I’m holding off on my speculations about the small current differences.
Anyway, about your specific question “Are there individual loads tapped of from each battery rather from the combined output? Why would someone do that. Maybe there is a good reason and its entirely possible that I'm not understanding the display and what it is supposed to provide. Is it possible you have undergone "cell reversal" on one battery (where a single cell in a battery reverses and becomes a load). I imagine these are agm batteries rather than wet cell. If they are wet cell, can you check individual cell voltage and specific gravity of the individual cells?”
I had similar thoughts about the diagnostic battery screen individual readings.The 4 batteries are all hard connected with heavy gage wire and those readings are all digitized data from four separate “sensor” harnesses hooked to each battery and fed back to the input board of a battery monitoring module. There is no perfect way to know the current going in (or out) of a heavy gage wire from a battery post with transitors, resistors, voltage sensors etc and everytime the monitor powers off and on it does some zeroing or memory loading process/routine between the sensors and the monitors measurement routine and analog to digital converter electronics. Same as you I’m thinking if those small current differences might mean something, but not knowing the actual technology to a tee and seeing you he 4 green hearts in the “battery health” line, I’m holding off on my speculations about the small current differences.
While you're waiting for the weekend to, erm, end, don't know if you have the three standard Beneteau battery switches. If you do, this might enlighten you somewhat:
Beneteau Wiring Diagrams - Maine Sail's corrections - Just in case you have a friend with a Beneteau and want to help him with his unusual switching Reply #8
One black and two red electrical switches
Beneteau Wiring Diagrams - Maine Sail's corrections - Just in case you have a friend with a Beneteau and want to help him with his unusual switching Reply #8
One black and two red electrical switches
I had the same thoughts on the accuracy of those individual battery measurements based on experience with calibration of M&TE and uncertainty in the individual components that make up the train from component to readout. However, since the current direction (ie + or -) wouldn't seem to be subject to the same kind of uncertainties it wasn't so much the raw numbers but the direction of current flow. That's why the -1 A combined draw may differ from the individual flows -.8-.6+.2 = -1.2 it is consistent. The resolution of the combined Amp reading may be different from the individual cells so the -1.2 actually shows as -1. I don't have the system manual so just speculation.
You are probably right that the measurement uncertainties may very well be the source of the apparent. I have never been a fan of Battery Management Systems after having one that people relied on that had a "corrupted control system" and effectively disabled a safety related High Voltage (240V DC) Wet Cell Battery UPS system without people realising it at a "highly hazardous" chemical facility. Because the operators, including the Electrical System Engineer, just assumed the BMS was doing its job they ignored signs that it wasn't performing as expected until if failed when external power was lost.
You are probably right that the measurement uncertainties may very well be the source of the apparent. I have never been a fan of Battery Management Systems after having one that people relied on that had a "corrupted control system" and effectively disabled a safety related High Voltage (240V DC) Wet Cell Battery UPS system without people realising it at a "highly hazardous" chemical facility. Because the operators, including the Electrical System Engineer, just assumed the BMS was doing its job they ignored signs that it wasn't performing as expected until if failed when external power was lost.
hvac&r tech, having experienced the new “out of the box” boat myself, I will admit the journey was a long but pleasurable one. You need and will continue to need the assistance of the dealer and expertise of her/his service department. So “DEMANDing”, at least at this early date, should not be considered.
I am sure that the dealer gave you a day or more of orientation; however, there is a heck of a lot of info to hoist in and retain. A fire hose comes to mind. In hind site, a GoPro would have been invaluable. I had the dealer’s service manager on speed dial and used it . . . a lot and I spent 35 years as a marine (as in naval) systems engineer. All this to say: take a breath, work with your dealer and make him/her part of your team.
Welcome to the forum.
I am sure that the dealer gave you a day or more of orientation; however, there is a heck of a lot of info to hoist in and retain. A fire hose comes to mind. In hind site, a GoPro would have been invaluable. I had the dealer’s service manager on speed dial and used it . . . a lot and I spent 35 years as a marine (as in naval) systems engineer. All this to say: take a breath, work with your dealer and make him/her part of your team.
Welcome to the forum.
Good advice from @Hello Below especially with his experience of a brand new boat from a dealer. Its best to keep that good relationship with the dealer and his service shop, not just for ths but for further help down the road. Demand is probably too strong a word. Keep in mind the potential loss of capacity and life of the batteries since it seem like, from your description that you can't really say when you reached the point where sitting at a fully discharged state started and how long it lasted. For most lead acid batteries, including AGMs sitting discharged is not good for their health or longevity. Best of luck in sorting this so you can have a great year on the water this year with good looking boat.
If I understand one of your posts you can get 120V AC to the onboard AC charger but couldn't get the charger apply voltage and current to the house battery bank. Is that correct? Do you know the voltage at the Battery when you tried to do this?
Do you have the manual for your charger or can you look it up online? Some chargers (possibly not marine chargers though) require a "minimum" voltage sensed on the battery being charged in order to allow them to kick in and charge. I'm guessing to keep from charging a damaged battery. The manual should describe if that feature is present on your charger.
I wouldn't think that the engine driven Alternator would not have that "minimum voltage" to start charging the battery though. That would seem to be counterintuitive. Per recommendations from Mainsail (Rod at Compass Marine site) I installed a "emergency cross connect" between my house bank and my start bank so the house bank could be used to start the yanmar if the start battery were to fail. Similarly, the start battery can be used to supply "essential DC loads" if the house battery bank fails. Get to know the Compass Marine site - it is a treasure trove of info and consider donating to the Go Fund Me page
None of these explain why the battery discharged so low in the first place though. Still something that has to be sorted and managed with the coming work week hopefully you'll get to the bottom of this. We'd all be interested in knowing the cause of the deep discharge.
Do you have the manual for your charger or can you look it up online? Some chargers (possibly not marine chargers though) require a "minimum" voltage sensed on the battery being charged in order to allow them to kick in and charge. I'm guessing to keep from charging a damaged battery. The manual should describe if that feature is present on your charger.
I wouldn't think that the engine driven Alternator would not have that "minimum voltage" to start charging the battery though. That would seem to be counterintuitive. Per recommendations from Mainsail (Rod at Compass Marine site) I installed a "emergency cross connect" between my house bank and my start bank so the house bank could be used to start the yanmar if the start battery were to fail. Similarly, the start battery can be used to supply "essential DC loads" if the house battery bank fails. Get to know the Compass Marine site - it is a treasure trove of info and consider donating to the Go Fund Me page
None of these explain why the battery discharged so low in the first place though. Still something that has to be sorted and managed with the coming work week hopefully you'll get to the bottom of this. We'd all be interested in knowing the cause of the deep discharge.
The battery charger I got working nicely for most of Friday and it brought the house bank from 4 volts up to 12.7 and it read fairly healthy on the monitor screen like I photographed, I did that with dealer and Beneteau’s remote assistance to dealer by phone who referred me to manual (by page number conveniently) and instructed me to use the manual shore power to “onboard” power transfer switch which powered up the onboard 120 and the 120v supply to battery charger.
I tried at 20% charge level and above 12v to return the transfer switch to normal center position and get the boat to use it’s own logic and controls to power up the 120 v from shore to Onboard plus battery charger- no luck. I told dealer that but he advised to stick with going back to manual switch and see if it eventually can be returned to normal position which I did, After about 6-8 hours of charging ( it was reading about 20A of charging current all day) the batteries read 80% charged on the monitor.
i attempted again to put system back to normal by putting manual 120v shore to Onboard switch back to “no selection” (generator or onboard) center position. But even with the battery bank decently charged and the controller operating other functions, it didn’t make the connectionas it regularly did.
then like I mentioned earlier it got worse, I put the manual switch back to shore power but it now won’t start the battery charger doesn’t seem to be any power getting to onboard 120 at all- microwave stays dead, 120v outlets have no power.
I thought about digging in and putting the voltmeter to AC and search for where it wasn’t present, but that will require disassembly since the 120v terminals are all either fully insulated or inside enclosures. Going to wait until Monday and take Dealers advice. I had some othereasier season prep stuff to attend to anyway so I have just left it on for a few hours to charge my cell phone but powered it down overnight and most of day and only turn it on to run the water pressure pump to run the sink or night head flushes.
got some stick on battery lights at hardware store and ran a 120 extension cord in to charge phone battery and use my computer and stuff tomorrow.
interestingly I did a little test and the battery bank was at 64% 1 o’clock and I turned off the bank switch. Turned it on at 6:30 and it still read 64%. I gave it a short 1 hr test with no loads turned on at all, just the parasitic loads, and after an hour it was still right at 64%. Not conclusive, but doesn’t look like it’s draining fast definitely with bank isolation switch open (which I expect but that’s a good thing to prove) and at least for an hour with system just like I left it, it’s not draining super quick at least.
I’ll try to update you guys- thanks for the support.
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Really strange behavior. It seems with the manual 120V selector switch in shore the charger should provide power to all the 120V ac loads. It should be a rather simple mechanical connection and not prone to failure????
I could easily see how an automatic controller logic could get corrupted and need reset or reprogrammed, but the mechanical switch, which most of us have with two sources of 120V power should be pretty foolproof.
Sound like you have several problems that need sorted, not the least of which is the mechanical switch portion of the system. That is your "fail safe, can't screw it up, works everytime" backup when all the gee-wizzz-wing-bang stuff goes bonkers. IMHO every boat needs those fall back, fool proof methods on something as important as keeping the battery charged and the essential DC loads powered. (Hence Mainsail's DC emergency cross connect recommendation) Appears as if the controller is somehow interfering with the mechanical system?
Separate issue, but I still don't understand why the Alternator didn't charge the batteries, but maybe it interfaces with that "controller system" somehow? Seems that should also be a foolproof, can't screw it up (at least easily) system. Engine running = charging both the start and house batteries PERIOD. No operator action required. Can you imagine if you had to do something special everytime you drove your car to make sure the alternator was charging your battery?
Best of luck and as an engineer I'm interested in the resolution although my boat has few gee-wizz-wing- bang systems. More than some I am sure, but less than the newer boats of similar size
I would have expected the dealer to have checked all that stuff before delivery? A good surveyor (which I wouldn't expect to be required for a brand new boat) would have checked most of those systems out as part of a professional survey. At least that is what was paying him for and that is what I would expect of a dealer.
I got the boat in December and all systems were fully functional and had my commissioning turnover, these are emergent issues
That's a good data point on when everything was working to look to some subsequent sort of "glitch" or corruption in the electronic control panel/system. All of these are most likely micro-processor based systems. Just about everything that controls something is now micro-processor based. Some may be sensitive to electrical surges or electric pulses, even if they don't fry the board. Like a modern car, its hard to tell what portions of what systems interact. You could very well be into a "easter egg hunt" in replacing electronic gadgets like the sensors and/or control panel like they end up doing in new cars when something goes wrong unless your system has something like the data error codes that can definitively pinpoint the problem. Was there any kind of major electrical storm near your boat after you tied up to your slip? Where there any boats anywhere in the marina hit by lightenting or even a tree or building nearby struck.
What still puzzles me is the "mechanical switch" portion of the system not allowing the battery to be charged or 120V ac system to power up. While its possible the mechanical switches could fail it is highly unlikely at this age of boat. Shouldn't be any corrosion build up on connections yet. Again, that points to some sort of interaction with the electronic system and/or some common cause glitch that also did something to the charger, which is also micro-processor controlled.
When Monday comes you'll have the full force of your team in there digging into the problem and at some point they will get to the bottom of it. Knowing the cause will be as important as just fixing the symptoms to prevent it from happening again.
Keep us posted, especially on the cause.
Thinking about my last post on the "mechanical switch portion of the system" On my boat there is a reset button on both the white and black wires directly downstream of the shore power plug. Now I think ABYC requires a breaker at that point now, not reset buttons. I had a problem with one of those that had to be reset once in awhile so shore power would work sometimes and then a little while later wouldn't work. After I replaced them both, I have never had a problem since. Won't have anything to do with the control panel problem but might be an explanation for the mechanical switch portion of the sysem. When you went back the second time (after it worked on the shore switch position) is it possible those breakers had tripped? Just tryng to relate your symptoms to past experiences although my boat, being older is not nearly so complex.
For me, since the mechanical switch to manually connect 120v shore power to the 120v “onboard power” as Beneteau calls it (which powers the battery charger) worked after the initial battery drain to recharge the batteries, it doesn’t seem like that switch could be the cause it’s not connecting when I close it now. The controller display measures the AC voltage from the shore power plug - says 116 with it plugged in, 0v with cord unplugged. I am not testing down stream of the switch, so I don’t know at what point the circuit is open, but the 120v receptacles remain dead and the battery charger doesn’t energize. I am not disassembling anything to test. Possibly a fuse or breaker I’m guessing, but I’m going to go forward under dealer guidance tomorrow.
With engine running was your alternator energized? (depending on setup your tach might not work if alternator is not activated).
We have a 12V relay that activates the alternator field - if batteries are low it doesn't always switch in. Did your start bank get a charging voltage when running?
Even a typical .5 - 1.0 amp draw from stereo memory or other standby electronics will, left on its own, draw 250-500 Amps over 3 weeks...
We have a 12V relay that activates the alternator field - if batteries are low it doesn't always switch in. Did your start bank get a charging voltage when running?
Even a typical .5 - 1.0 amp draw from stereo memory or other standby electronics will, left on its own, draw 250-500 Amps over 3 weeks...
Agree with not doing any disassembly. Best to let them do any of that if it is necessary. Just pointing out that there is or should be a readily visible "breaker" of some sort very close downstream of where the shore power cord plugs into the shore power recepticle on the boat. If that plug is external the breaker may be inside of a lazarette nearby. It will be someplace close to where the shore power cord connects to the boat. It is required to be pretty close to the point where 120V ac enters the boat. Easy enough to check and should require no disassembly. Depending on where the controller display measured the 116V it could be the breaker. If it senses upstream of the breaker it would show 116V when plugged in but 0 when unplugged. Don't know where that sensor is on a Beneteau.