Topic: FYI - Lithium ion batteries . .. . . . and the cold - lesson learned (Read 1428 times) previous topic - next topic

We had an interesting learning on our recent trip. We have lithium ion batteries, solar, and a generator. We were camping in mid 40's at night weather. I had turned off the battery warmer because I didn't think it was cold enough weather to need it. We were off-grid. After the first few days of everything working great, the fully charged batteries draining faster one evening than normal and the whole house had gone dead by morning (despite us having reduced usage to almost nothing). In case you have never hit this, it is a bit scary. The chassis still started but the generator would not start and the solar displayed an error. We had to jump the house batteries to get enough charge in them for the solar to be willing to charge them and for them to have enough juice to start the generator. The lesson learned is make sure the battery heater is on for the house batteries if they are Li-Ion and the temperature outside will be below 50.

I had a similar experience in my newly acquired Unity RL.My lithium batteries where down to 9 volts. My question is if I’m not connected to shre power and I activate the inverter will the refrigerator draw from substitute 110 supply from the inverter and thus drain the batteries instead of defaulting to the propane?

What year is your unit and what fridge is installed? The OEM Dometic shouldn't use Inverted power as it's designed to use 12v directly if called for. If it was set to use 12v directly or if set to "Auto" and unable to lite the propane burner, it would revert to 12v and  could cause the problem you describe. It's a 3 way unit that's happiest on propane.

 It’s a 2023 Unity, thanks for the response! That make sense!

At some point LTV changed over to a 12v compressor fridge as standard. Check your spec sheet to see if your unit has the Dometic 3 way or the Norcold 12v compressor model. If it is the Norcold then your going to have to monitor your battery closely.