amphi_sc

Understanding BigBoy and control board.... Just curious if my system's operation is normal. While the Big Boy engages and charges from shore or alternator (BB internal contacts cleaned periodically), I have noticed that after a couple of days on shore power and with the Magnum float charging at basically 0 amps and 12.6 volts the board will decide to disengage the Big Boy causing the chassis to slowly discharge over time (days) ... 12.4-12.3v at the chassis battery posts. I've verified the house batteries at 12.6v at the battery posts. When I press the boost switch the BigBoy will click back on (temporarily) and the two banks are connected and charge together. If I kill the shore power breaker, wait a couple minutes, then turn the main shore breaker back on the Magnum cycles into absorb charge around 13.3-13.4v and the BigBoy re-engages charging the chassis back. If I'm parked for days on shore power this happens and the chassis will slowly drop. Is the board dropping because the float voltage is too low and I should set a custom setting to raise the float voltage a little? Otherwise every few days I just kill the shore power for a bit and top off the chassis. I have Lifeline AGMs and AGM-2 setting on the Magnum 2812. BTW , it appears the AGM (1) setting floats at 12.4v vs the AGM-2 setting 12.6v. A custom profile could be implemented. Thanks

Regarding an unexpected lean, and reading where you said you checked your air bags for leaks. From personal experience, an air bag can leak in certain inflation levels but not others. Just saying... I had a minor irritation where sometimes a corner would drop and other times not. I have only air leveling. I had aired the coach all the way up and sprayed bags and no leaks. At home with my driveway slope the rear is pretty much on the bump stops and front almost fully inflated. It would stay for days. Most campsites were fine ... many are sloped toward the front. Some campsites I couldn't stay level Finally I found the cause. I had an airbag that at about 1/3 inflation would start leaking at the roll point and thus go flat. At ride height or more the rubber sealed itself and it would hold air for days! Just saying to check oldish bags for leaks where the rubber may be rolling at different positions for minor leaks that open or close depending on rubber position. I'm sure my "sometimes" leak would have gotten progressively worse and become more obvious over time as the rubber deteriorated. FWIW, just saying...

If when you press the wall light switch the lights don't turn on that implies one thing to me. The green LEDs on the boards on the closet light up when the circuit is supposed to be on, and are off when the circuit is supposed to be off. What happens when you command everything to turn on by holding the Master Off switch? (Not the salesman switch but the wall switch labeled master off typically up front and also by the bed.) Do all the lights turn on in sequence and thus the green LEDs also turn on? If so I would try carefully pop the cover off the wall switch(es), unscrew the two screws to pull it off the wall, unplug & replug the backside wiring connection. A bad connection could break the blue or yellow loop serial operation. Check for unusual kinking in the wires. You could also unplug/replug the edge connectors on the closet boards. This assumes you have done the CPU reboot mentioned above ... Although not sure why Tom mentions multiplex chassis stuff I wouldn't think you have and I can't think of a connection to the front run box???

Recognizing that Lionel doesn't have the simple BigBoy setup, I would still like to ask: Can the Bluesea internal contacts be as easily cleaned as the BigBoy when the time comes that it gets a voltage drop across the unit? I carry my spare BigBoy so a 5 minute swap and then at my leisure clean the green off the old BigBoy and have that spare ready to go. I've debated trying the Bluesea but the simplicity of the existing BigBoy is compelling.

Steve, If/when you end up pulling the entire assembly out by removing those 6 bolts (accessible when the genny is slid out), let me know any tips and take some pictures of the motor/gear interface. And how the slack in the wiring works to slide the assembly out.... I can't imagine how it could have broken to require welding that rod. Thanks, Al

Steve, that hook and cross rod right behind the spring in my second photo is what basically stops the forward motion toward the door and causes the cover to lift. That hook catches the rod which then causes the arms to pivot up.

Looks like the web site is merging some of my posts into one! Great! This video show the motor slipping before lifting the floor up, and then it manages to lift. PXL_20240413_155645495~2.mp4 Well it merged some but not all into one post. Here's a final one where I placed a loose nut just to raise the back edge up a little. Could be the mechanism has worn and gotten sloppy and the nut "band-aid" gets the initial angle a little better to help the lift get started. Obviously I can't leave a loose nut there...I was just brainstorming... You can even see that loose nut vibrate and bounce to a different place at the very end as the cover lifts into place. That nut height has plenty of clearance as it retracts. Maybe I could jury rig an adjustable bolt on the location to raise that back side just a little. However I still think the gear teeth have worn from no limit switch causing the motor to continue trying to push at the full upright position. Only by pulling it out for bench testing can I better analyze the situation. That's all for now. PXL_20240413_161047899.mp4

For Steve R: I took some more still photos and videos of mine in operation. In the first two stills you can see the support (identical on either side) by the door and the hook/bar mechanism that grabs the cover as it slides out at the extreme and lifts it up into place at floor level. The next video is of the top side with the cover extending and mostly rising up to floor level before the motor/gear teeth start to slip. You may also notice the chair side lifts mostly up while the dash side doesn't quite and you can observe the tilt. Due to size restrictions I'll post video from the underside in another follow-on post PXL_20240413_155057000.mp4 Continuing with my post. In this video you can watch the how the hook engages the bar and caused the mechanism to lift as the motor continues to push. I think a good design should have had a limit switch. I do recall over the years asking my DW to creep up on the full out extreme as I would hear the teeth slip once in a while. Over the years I think this just aggravated the situation. PXL_20240413_155532020.mp4

Well Steve, it was indeed obvious once I took a closer look and also slid the generator out and looked up. When I was initially looking I didn't look close enough and thought those were screws into the floor and couldn't reach the rear ones. But as bolts coming up from the bottom that won't be a problem. I feel a little embarrassed I didn't look closer before posting. After I get the air bags done this is the next project this month. Thanks. I forgot to take a video of the motion for you to compare to yours. I'll try to remember that when I go back to continue with the airbags.

Following up on my project to have an ignition switched TRLR CHRG line vs what the factory provided as an always hot line with a 20amp fuse I can't find. Also as my 7 to 6 wire umbilical cord is only 14 gauge I wanted a 15amp breaker on the circuit and one way current draw coach to toad only. Yes, the plug I was looking for was indeed a 350809. As shipping was significantly more than the cost of a single plug I got a few spares and the corresponding sockets (unneeded at the moment but who knows what future project I might undertake that might need polarized locking connections) were 350810 and naturally pins 350550 female and 350547 male. Anyway when the alternator is running it more than compensates for the voltage drop across the diode and I'll still have plenty of voltage to keep a charged toad battery up while driving down the highway. And as it is relay switched, when I boondock for the night along the way the relay insures the coach chassis batteries are isolated from the toad. Now to update my coach wiring diagrams to match my customization. P.S. If anyone needs a plug or socket with pins my spares are available.

None of my devices can show an heic image, so I too always ignore. One time I went to the trouble of booting up a computer, downloading the image, searching for an on-line converter, had to sidestep all the spam ads and unwanted risks of some unwanted virus or spyware, and concluded to just delete the darn thing. Trying view an heic image simply isn't worth the trouble. It is about as useful as posting to this forum in EBCDIC or swahili. Please use universal JPG/JPEG or PNG as first choices. JM2¢W

Getting ready to change out at least a couple of air bags and want to make sure I have the right Fastenal 69857 reducer. Thought I'd start with the driver front as you say it's the easiest. I'm wondering about the airline (see attached photo) as I could only see your airline elbow on the rear bags. Before I get to the point of no return I want to verify the size of my airline that threads directly into the reducer, and if the reducer will indeed pull down through some opening, or if the reducer also needs to be unscrewed in place. Thanks for all your great maintenance tips & videos!

I had that problem too with the outside "Coach Step", but Lippert had taken over Coach Step and had a gear plate that was even somewhat reasonable in price. If I had caught it earlier I might have been able to keep the gear plate from getting chewed up. I had to add an additional flat washer to align the gear plate and off-the-shelf power window motor, and replaced all the worn out bushings in the arms. But at least with the outside steps there was access. With this stairwell cover it isn't obvious to me how to get access back to the mechanics. And it isn't obvious to me how to remove this from under the floor if I had to completely replace it. I was hoping to catch the problem before it got as far as chewing up the gear too badly.

I've looked at some of the previous threads but those look like they are driven by a worm gear and follower. Mine looks more like a window regulator and arm. Problem 1: about 1 out of 5 times the gear/motor seem to chatter slipping teeth. I'm thinking it might be a worn bushing or loose bolt messing with the gear alignment. Problem 2: How to gain access to really see what is happening? Did the factory build the coach around this mechanism? I see 3 or 4 small screws on each side that seem like they could go into the floor but there is no way to reach the back ones. It also looks too wide for the door opening and unsure if there is slack in the electrical wire way at the back Pictures are with a thousand words so see what I'm looking at and give me ideas. You can see in the dust pattern how the gear & arm rotate but the motor is too far back to observe the linkage and gear meshing. Thanks!

I forget where I was when a trucker and I shared discount information. There was a Pilot or Flying J across the highway from this no name mom&pop station. It's posted dieseI price was about 0.45 less than the big name across the highway and had a couple of 18 wheelers filling up. I pulled into one of the empty truck lanes. My card wouldn't work at the truck lane pump so I pulled to the front car lanes, the card worked at the pump, and I filled up (two swipes to fill). As I was doing so a trucker came over to share all about Mudflap and how I could save money and how it was better than the inflated discounted prices across street. I had already pulled up the "flap" info on my phone but it was only knocking off 10¢ off the pump price and by swiping my PenFed card at the pump I was getting 18¢ off ... almost double the Flap discount. (PenFed only discounts via swiping at the pump thus I had tried the swipe in the truck lanes). It did take about 5 minutes more to pump the fuel at the front lanes vs the faster truck pumps, but considering "pay at the pump" in the front lanes vs walking into the store to show a code and get a receipt and in the end paying more for a faster pump that burbs diesel back at me, I'd say the time factor was a wash. In either case pump access was easy in/out but I will say the front pumps were a lot cleaner than all the diesel stains on the concrete in the truck lanes & that can be a factor in tracking back into the driver's seat. Fuel is about like religion & politics... I will add that with Mudflap I can choose which payment method to use dynamically at each fillup, and that is handy for me to choose personal vs business use accounts.