camdunning
Veteran Member
Hi all, I'm having an electrical issue that I'm trying to sort out and could use a sanity check. My boat has five batteries total, 2 are wired up to be the 'house' bank, two are banked as starter batteries for the main engines, and the last one starts the generator. There's no selector switch, and the bank is charged by a 5/5/5 15 amp charger. I am plugged in to shore power full time, so the charger is always going.
Lately if we run lights on the house system for more than maybe an hour, they start dimming, and will dim drastically if the water pump kicks on. Evidently this morning the lights and the water pump stopped working entirely (I'm at school but got some exasperated messages from my girlfriend). Is this most likely due to the batteries just being at the end of their useful life? I believe they're between 2 and 4 years old. Since we're permanently on shore power though, should the battery charger be keeping up with the power use and not drawing the batteries down at all?
The battery charger shows that the batteries are charged full right now (even though they're not), so I'm also going to check for corrosion on the terminals and/or blown fuses when I get home, but would appreciate any tips you all might have.
Thanks for the help!
Lately if we run lights on the house system for more than maybe an hour, they start dimming, and will dim drastically if the water pump kicks on. Evidently this morning the lights and the water pump stopped working entirely (I'm at school but got some exasperated messages from my girlfriend). Is this most likely due to the batteries just being at the end of their useful life? I believe they're between 2 and 4 years old. Since we're permanently on shore power though, should the battery charger be keeping up with the power use and not drawing the batteries down at all?
The battery charger shows that the batteries are charged full right now (even though they're not), so I'm also going to check for corrosion on the terminals and/or blown fuses when I get home, but would appreciate any tips you all might have.
Thanks for the help!