Thanks

fred

fred

+1 to both GlueGuy and fwunder who both are just describing the same functions differently.

Hooked up the "charge wizard" pendent to my Progressive Dynamics circuit board today. I like now having the options of stepping through different charging modes and being able to quickly diagnose a problem with the converter. 

Thx!

Hey Mike, I'm just now catching up on this thread - if you are able, would you mind sharing which voltmeter combo you used? Would like to purchase one myself. Thx!

Originally posted by mcarter Not sure about that, mine in bulk is over 14 volts. Float 13.1 and absorbtion is 13.6. The charging cycle is defined by battery charge status. I have never seen mine in bulk. I have a volt gauge and monitor 12V status. Mine cycles in 2 phases, which is normal for a properly charged and used battery.

You won't see bulk mode as a voltage. Most smart chargers are in bulk at the beginning of a charge cycle "on their way" to absorb mode. They will be limited by the maximum current the charger is capable of. Once they reach the absorb voltage, they will hold that voltage as the current slowly decreases. Once the current at the absorb voltage gets to "the set point", the charger will drop to float mode.

I have been installing remote solar-powered communications sites for over a decade. Here is a graph showing the different cycles and the voltage/current relationships. The equalization stage is not normally run every cycle; only "periodically", and some chargers won't have an equalization stage.

+1 Exactly, well stated.

Obvious things that are killers to electronics circuits are water, heat, and vibration. We can eliminate water to this which leave's only heat and vibration. I don't think WFCO problem is heat since they use a computer fan plus large ceramic power resistors that can dissipate a large amount of heat. So that leaves only vibration and I was shocked to find when my converter died only a little dab of caulk cementing these resistors to the circuit board that had broken loose. If you want to insure that your WFCO converter will not have the same problem the solution is simple. Buy a tube of silicon adhesive and put a generous amount of this around these resistors and the circuit board. These resistors are pretty obvious in that they are large white square ceramic components (two in the front and one toward the rear of the board if I remember right) and don't worry how much silicon you use to anchor them to the circuit board since its non-conductive.   

The WFCO converter has a two year warranty.  We can debate the meaning of "way out" but given the age of the Pod in question, we are looking at 3 years at most on this one, ie. a year beyond the deadline.  I was told by WFCO that they can go beyond the two years, but they wouldn't define what that meant.  But, OK, lets accept the strict deadline of the warranty.  As you may know from my spoiler issue, if it is a product defect (as with the spoiler), my view is that a good company stands behind the product rather than blame the problem on the owner or some unseen force. In another conversation with WFCO, I was told that the problem was probably due to a thin or cold solder joint. That's a product defect.  Given the minimal cost WFCO has in one of those foreign made converters, they could easily meet the consumer of a bad product half way (and still make money and a strong reputation that's worth money). Prove the case?  Even the small sample that shows up in this forum (which is actually empirical data) is sufficient mathematically to verify a wide range of failures.

Originally posted by Keith-N-Dar Inother words you don't have data.  You have an opinion.

Let see I think you can count as well as I can, yes? When numerous forum user post they have a problem then I think that gives you a good indication there is a problem. Yes, I do have a OPINION, indeed, its an opinion from spending over thirty years repairing electronic circuits that are used in a high vibration environment. Which I believe may give me some validity to make an opinion but I guess you believe otherwise? So please tell me and everyone else what your opinion is and your qualifications to come to such a conclusion.

Peace 

Originally posted by Keith-N-Dar How many converters have failed?  How many have been installed? I would be interessted in the numbers you have to prove your case.  in Tibof's case the converter was way out of warranty.

I believe if count up the number of people who have posted on this forum on the failures of WFCO converters it is more then obvious this company now has a problem. One that could easily be solved by a more generous use of silicon caulk to anchor the ceramic power resistors to the circuit board which would prevent their leads breaking off from vibration. I spent my career working on electronics in a very heavy vibration environment so not to brag but I think I'm a bit qualified to make a diagnosis and judgement. No matter who manufactures a converter or how long you have had it there is no excuse for this type of fault, period! Tibof has a valid complaint whether or not his converter was in or not in the warranty period. We all may agree to disagree here on this or other issues concerning our R-Pods that part of what an open forum is all about. In the end it's about helping each other out with what ever problems we encounter on out campers I would hope everyone would agree with? One can only hope some one from Forest River is also viewing these posts and comes to the conclusion they have a problem they need to address.