Help - One House Battery is Cooking - Printable Version

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Help - One House Battery is Cooking - LionStar - 04-05-2020

We have been at an RV park for the last three weeks, hooked up to shore power. Got a fault and temperature alarm on the inverter panel today. Opened the house battery bay and one battery is hot and bubbling. The other five batteries are cool to the touch. How can I disconnect the house batteries to let this cool down enough to check/add distilled water?
Are the house batteries necessary if using shore power?
Just got the coach out of repair for major electrical issues before coming to this park...
I know this may have been addressed in other threads, but I have not found it yet and don't want to take too much time. Any help would be appreciated.

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RE: Help - One House Battery is Cooking - whatsnewell - 04-05-2020

You need to be connected to at least one house battery to operate your 12 volt lights. Just disconnect the sulfating battery from the others, and you should be okay. Once it cools down remove it, as it will keep gassing and that gas is vey corrosive, and then replace it. This just happened to me two days ago.

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RE: Help - One House Battery is Cooking - LionStar - 04-05-2020

Thanks for the advice! I had unhooked the whole bank so it would cool down, and of course lost my 12 volt systems. Glad to have gotten your reply about leaving the bad battery out. Fortunately, the main cables were long enough to bypass the bad battery. I cleaned the cables and posts while I was down there, and made sure the other batteries had enough water - a couple of them were pretty thirsty! Everything is up and running again. I cleaned off the battery that had been cooking, but may need to leave it on the rack a few days.

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RE: Help - One House Battery is Cooking - Richard - 04-05-2020

You should test it of course, but the battery that was boiling is likely beyond salvage. I highly suspect a bad or shorted cell in that particular battery.

There are two competing schools of thought on replacing the battery. One is that all batteries in a bank should be replaced at the same time. The second is just replace it. Depends on your budget and how much you boondock. You may even think about just running with one less battery if you mostly go pedestal to pedestal.

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RE: Help - One House Battery is Cooking - LionStar - 04-05-2020

That's a good point. We are probably 95% pedestal to pedestal, with an occasional night of boondocking in route. Working with five house batteries is likely fine for at least a while. Would like to make the switch to AGM eventually (maybe when the stock market comes back up...?)

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