Converter Replacement Suggestions ASAP

TravelTiger

TravelTiger

Founding Texas-West Chapter Leaders-Retired
All,

We think our converter has gone out (worst possible time, Friday evening when West/Central Texas is under the grip of snow and wintry mix, temps are in the 20s and essentially all roads are dangerous to drive, and an 70 miles from the nearest dealer. (And I'm 150 miles away from the trailer, so I can't be there to help.)

We've downloaded the HUG troubleshooting tips and the Converter Manual, and preliminary investigation says it's not disconnected, a fuse, or a breaker. DH will test and investigate more in the daylight tomorrow to be sure.

Our converter is a WFCO-9865 65 AMP, and is 5+ years old. In my research, I cannot find another 65 AMP converter besides the WFCO or a brand called Arterra, which clearly shows WFCO on their picture. I'd like to upgrade it to a Power Dynamics, but my choices are 60 and 70 AMP. Are there any ill effects going up or down in AMPs from the OEM?

We of course need to replace ASAP!

TIA,

Erika
 
jimtoo

jimtoo

Moderator
Go to Walmart and get a battery charger (if you don't have one) and hook up till you get time to replace converter.

Jim M
 
TravelTiger

TravelTiger

Founding Texas-West Chapter Leaders-Retired
jimtoo said:
Go to Walmart and get a battery charger (if you don't have one) and hook up till you get time to replace converter.

Jim M
Click to expand...

Jim, he hooked up a charger that we had on-hand. Not sure if it's sufficient, but it'll be better then nothing for now.

Roads are too bad now to go to WM tonight, (10 farm-to-market miles away) but probably later Saturday.


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J

Jim.Allison

Well-known member
No yours is a 75 and the PD is an 80, your converter will never draw 75 or 80 anyway, but 5 amps is not going to overload your system.

Progressive Dynamics PD9280, or the one you have are both good, but more than likely you will find that you have blown a fuse on the unit itself. Have you worked with the batteries recently? If you have then you probably blew one of the fuses on the unit itself.

TravelTiger said:
All,

We think our converter has gone out (worst possible time, Friday evening when West/Central Texas is under the grip of snow and wintry mix, temps are in the 20s and essentially all roads are dangerous to drive, and an 70 miles from the nearest dealer. (And I'm 150 miles away from the trailer, so I can't be there to help.)

We've downloaded the HUG troubleshooting tips and the Converter Manual, and preliminary investigation says it's not disconnected, a fuse, or a breaker. DH will test and investigate more in the daylight tomorrow to be sure.

Our converter is a WFCO-9865 65 AMP, and is 5+ years old. In my research, I cannot find another 65 AMP converter besides the WFCO or a brand called Arterra, which clearly shows WFCO on their picture. I'd like to upgrade it to a Power Dynamics, but my choices are 60 and 70 AMP. Are there any ill effects going up or down in AMPs from the OEM?

We of course need to replace ASAP!

TIA,

Erika
Click to expand...
 
TravelTiger

TravelTiger

Founding Texas-West Chapter Leaders-Retired
And no, did not touch battery recently--using unit as housing since July, hasn't moved. Fuses were good.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
 
J

Jim.Allison

Well-known member
A suggestion might be to look on amazon.com and order one tonight you might get monday delivery on it. They ship on saturday too, at worst you will have it on Tuesday.

If you are on pedestal power the battery charger will charge those batts tonight while the rig is dark and no DC is being used. So leave the charger hooked up no matter what as long as it is a automatic charger.

Batts are harder to charge when cold, so put a light bulb in the batt compartment to warm them up a little. Seal off the drafts to them also. The charger will increase the internal temps of the batts but not enough, so a light bulb and a blanket are in order to help out.

Good luck and let us know how you are doing.
 
brianharrison

brianharrison

Well-known member
TravelTiger said:
Our converter is a WFCO-9865 65 AMP, and is 5+ years old. In my research, I cannot find another 65 AMP converter besides the WFCO or a brand called Arterra, which clearly shows WFCO on their picture. I'd like to upgrade it to a Power Dynamics, but my choices are 60 and 70 AMP. Are there any ill effects going up or down in AMPs from the OEM?

We of course need to replace ASAP!

TIA,

Erika
Click to expand...

Why do you want to upgrade to a Progressive Dynamics? Your converter 9865 is a 3 stage, intelligent charger with a max output of 65Amps. It will regulate amps according to the charge algorithm; most of the time operating at 50-2 Amps. (Here is the spec sheet). A comparable Progressive Dynamics is the 9200 series - PD9270. Nice feature of the PD9270 is you can add a charge pendant to monitor and control the charge stage (bulk, adsorption, float). It will be fine in your installation - the wires from the converter to the battery/DC load bus should accommodate the extra 5 max amps. As mentioned the converter will usually operate around 50 down to 2 amps, depending on load - requirements for battery charging and 12V load in the coach.

Barring installation concerns, I would purchase the one that you can get quicker.

Hope this helps.

Brian
 
TravelTiger

TravelTiger

Founding Texas-West Chapter Leaders-Retired
Thanks all for the feedback.

Our battery charger maintained the battery through the night, and this AM we determined it is the converter. A new WFCO-9865 has been ordered for delivery Monday, mainly due to cost, size and location of the converter. We have limited space for it's placement behind the basement wall. Thanks to out sliding door basement wall mod, getting to it is not too big an issue. We need to get this fixed ASAP, and a different model would require relocation and wiring concerns.

I appreciated all the advice given.
 
boatto5er

boatto5er

Founding VA Chap Ldr (Ret)
Look at the bright side. Now you have another personal experience to base a newsletter article on. :angel:
 
jmgratz

jmgratz

Original Owners Club Member
Darn, I was hoping to sell my brand new Progressive Dynamics 70 amp converter that I bought 2 years ago and never used. :)
 
J

Jim.Allison

Well-known member
I have a brand new one that I took out when I installed the Xantrex inverter/charger and solar. I now intend to reinstall it on the hook up side as an aux charger in the event I have a charger failure on a cloudy day.

jmgratz said:
Darn, I was hoping to sell my brand new Progressive Dynamics 70 amp converter that I bought 2 years ago and never used. :)
Click to expand...
 
TravelTiger

TravelTiger

Founding Texas-West Chapter Leaders-Retired
Well, I forgot to follow up on this...

I ordered the converter from Amazon with next day air on Saturday, so it came on Monday. In the meantime, Tony was able to locate the plug in for the converter -- it was on the back side of the fuse/breaker box.

As suggested, he used a battery charger to charge the battery. Another issue was discovered, that the 3 year old battery would not hold a charge very long, and the charger could not keep it charged effectively. Sunday, he was able to get out (icy the day before) and buy a new battery and a better Schumacher battery charger. The new charger had no issues keeping the new battery charged and working perfectly. Tuesday after work he was finally able to switch out the converter, and it now works perfectly.

Good to know how to handle this in case it happens to you! Hopefully we'll get an article for the next newsletter.

PS, thanks to great forum info and help from some forum individuals, we never felt panicked about the situation which could have turned out much worse.


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jmgratz

jmgratz

Original Owners Club Member
We carry a battery charger around just in case the converter goes out. We think that is a good idea.
 
J

Jim.Allison

Well-known member
Glad it worked out.

Based on your experience I have decided to reinstall my progressive charger as a back up.

Amazon is a great resource, they have fulfilment centers all over the US, so an order from Amazon rarely takes more than a couple of days. I'm am an Amazon Prime member and I do not pay freight and 2 day delivery is guaranteed. Many of the people we would buy from on the internet also sell on Amazon.

Like I said its good to hear about your success story.
 
TravelTiger

TravelTiger

Founding Texas-West Chapter Leaders-Retired
Jim.Allison said:
Glad it worked out.

Based on your experience I have decided to reinstall my progressive charger as a back up.

Amazon is a great resource, they have fulfilment centers all over the US, so an order from Amazon rarely takes more than a couple of days. I'm am an Amazon Prime member and I do not pay freight and 2 day delivery is guaranteed. Many of the people we would buy from on the internet also sell on Amazon.

Like I said its good to hear about your success story.
Click to expand...

Yes, we are Prime members too, so next day air was only $7.99. Well worth it. Just so happens, package went from Phoenix AZ to Lexington KY to Dallas TX to Abilene, TX to Our location near Eastland TX. So the converter flew over a few states east, drove by on the highway for and extra 60 miles west, and then was delivered. All within 48 hours.


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