Using battery power on 1007 PUP for first time

[raising4daughters]

When we bought our gently-used 2007 Jay Series 1007 in 2009, the battery was virtually dead. We never replaced it since we've only camped at sites with electricity until yesterday. Yesterday we had the opportunity to dry/primitive camp, so I bought a deep cycle marine battery. No problem hooking it up.

I was able to power the interior lights and low-voltage fans as well as the exterior (orange covered) light and the refrigerator.

I knew the AC wouldn't work, but I was surprised that the interior and exterior 3-prong outlets didn't work. I thought the converter (inverter?) would step up the voltage and allow us to operate devices like radios, cell phone chargers, etc.

Should the 3-prong outlets work under battery power? Could I have a non-working fuse, circuit breaker, or entire converter unit? Or, it this just one of the limitations of running on battery power?

[WinnieView]

It's likely based on your RV generation that your converter is not also an inverter.
Ours has a separate converter and inverter.

[RoyBraddy]

Here is a typical 30AMP Electrical Block Diagram that might she some light of what does what...

Your Trailer have two POWER DISTRIBUTION CENTERS one for 120VAC and the other for 12VDC...

The basic concept is Shore Power or generator will run your 120VAC Power Distribution where a 120VAC Converter is used that will produce 13.6VDC to run the 12VDC Power Distribution side. Your battery is direct connected to the 12VDC side and when you are plugged into shore power or generator your battery should also be charged while you are doing this. Without Shore Power or Generator then only the battery side is working feeding the 12VDC side of the Power Distribution side.


Google image

If you want to run some 120V Outlets etc you will need to install a Power Inverter to run from from the 12VDC side to produce 120VAC. I do this all the time to run a small 'Pure Sine Wave' 600WATT Power Inverter from my multiple battery bank and then I run two 120VAC extension cords from the Power Inverter to a couple of locations inside the trailer. Home entertainment and a couple of lights/fans etc maybe a power station to run some battery chargers for laptops etc...

The battery Bank will need to be upgraded to more batteries to run the Power Inverter. I did just fine with a 255AH battery bank for a few years - finally bit the dust just a couple of seasons back after being initially installed in 2009. Then when the batteries get down to around their 50% charge state you have to come up a way to recharge them back up to at least 90% charge state otherwise it will do damage to your batteries... I use a 2KW generator to only run my Converter/Charger unit to recharge my batteries which takes around three hours of generator run time to go from 50% to 90% charge state. Not all places will allow you to run the generator especially after dark.

Got to do some planning here to get setup for what you are wanting to do... You just can't show up and snap your finger and it all works... After everything is planned and gets installed then it is all second nature camping off the battery system OFF-GRID...

We camp more OFF-GRID with our batteries then we do at regular camping spots with electric hookup...

Roy Ken

[bankr63]

Originally Posted by raising4daughters

When we bought our gently-used 2007 Jay Series 1007 in 2009, the battery was virtually dead. We never replaced it since we've only camped at sites with electricity until yesterday. Yesterday we had the opportunity to dry/primitive camp, so I bought a deep cycle marine battery. No problem hooking it up.

I was able to power the interior lights and low-voltage fans as well as the exterior (orange covered) light and the refrigerator.

I knew the AC wouldn't work, but I was surprised that the interior and exterior 3-prong outlets didn't work. I thought the converter (inverter?) would step up the voltage and allow us to operate devices like radios, cell phone chargers, etc.

Should the 3-prong outlets work under battery power? Could I have a non-working fuse, circuit breaker, or entire converter unit? Or, it this just one of the limitations of running on battery power?

Your system is working as designed, as a others have pointed out. A couple of other things to be aware of though. I would not run your fridge of the DC voltage while camping. The 3-way fridge does have a DC setting, but this is really good only for use while on the road with the truck's alternator providing the power. Your fridge will drain your battery completely in a matter of hours. Use it on propane while camping. We had dual tanks on our 1007, but never went through much more than a tank a season (still don't).

Same goes for wanting to run 110V appliances. A single group 24 or 27 battery won't provide a heck of a lot of run time for any serious AC appliance. If you have multiple batteries and a solar system to keep them charged, then you might consider adding an inverter.

What you might want to consider is installing a 12v power point (cigarette lighter plug). Then you can plug in a 2 or 3 port USB charger point to keep all of your phones, tablets, go-pro, etc charged. It doesn't make much sense to convert 12VDC to 110VAC so that you can convert it back to 8VDC for these USB devices.