just took delivery of my new Gateway 3650. Love the trailer, however if not plugged in to AC power the batteries go completely dead in less than a week. i have checked for anything left on numerous times, nothing left on. Dealer says that's normal, lots of sensors??? should battery switch be turned off anytime the trailer sits? again the dealer says its ok to pull the batteries down to completely dead. Seems to me that will shorten battery life?
ATF: Gateway - stangermd
- Thread starter stangermd
- Start date
danemayer
Well-known member
Hi strangermd,
Congratulations on the new Gateway and welcome to the Heartland Owners Forum.
Yes you should turn the battery cutoff to OFF while the trailer is not being used. There are parasitic loads on the 12V system that will deplete the batteries. Alarms, radio, perhaps other circuit boards will all use some battery power and draw it down. And it's not good to run the batteries down.
Congratulations on the new Gateway and welcome to the Heartland Owners Forum.
Yes you should turn the battery cutoff to OFF while the trailer is not being used. There are parasitic loads on the 12V system that will deplete the batteries. Alarms, radio, perhaps other circuit boards will all use some battery power and draw it down. And it's not good to run the batteries down.
jimtoo
Moderator
Hi stangermd,
Welcome to the Heartland Owners Forum and to the family. We have a great bunch of folks here with lots of information and all willing to share their knowledge when needed.
And, Yes like Dan said, lots of little stuff to drain the battery, so turn off the switch if equipped or disconnect the battery if your not going to be using it for a week or so.
Be sure and check out our Heartland Owners Club. Join us at a rally when you can and meet lots of the great folks here and make friends for a lifetime.
Enjoy the forum and your new unit.
Jim M
Welcome to the Heartland Owners Forum and to the family. We have a great bunch of folks here with lots of information and all willing to share their knowledge when needed.
And, Yes like Dan said, lots of little stuff to drain the battery, so turn off the switch if equipped or disconnect the battery if your not going to be using it for a week or so.
Be sure and check out our Heartland Owners Club. Join us at a rally when you can and meet lots of the great folks here and make friends for a lifetime.
Enjoy the forum and your new unit.
Jim M
P
Paul.craven
Guest
Also, please note that if you have the residential refer option with inverter, this could also be a source of draining the 12V batteries? Thanks for choosing a Gateway.
Kosanko
Well-known member
Stangermd,
I have the same model gateway as you have and I am able to run a 20 Amp extension code out to it to keep the batteries topped off and the refer running without any issues, not enough to run the A/C but it keeps the refer cold and batteries charged.
Hey there, congrats on the new Gateway and enjoy the forum, a lot of good folks with plenty of knowledge they are willing to share.
I would check when manufacture date was on your rig, my 2014 was built in 2013, same year we bought it, anyway, my wife and i dry camped in Montana last summer for 10 days, we had no problem with batteries staying charged at all. I would suggest doing a load test on each battery and see if they pass. Our unit does not have a residential refer but with LED lights and stereo being used while we were not hooked up to any power, i still had enough juice left to raise the front jacks to hook up to the truck.
As a mechanic for 30 plus years i have seen new batteries fail so may be worth checking out. We do not have a shut off switch on our unit either so while at home are hooked up to an extension cord for the most part. Also after 3 plus weeks at the dealership getting some work done there was still enough power to hook up to the truck and i doubt they had the unit hooked up to any power while there.......
I would check when manufacture date was on your rig, my 2014 was built in 2013, same year we bought it, anyway, my wife and i dry camped in Montana last summer for 10 days, we had no problem with batteries staying charged at all. I would suggest doing a load test on each battery and see if they pass. Our unit does not have a residential refer but with LED lights and stereo being used while we were not hooked up to any power, i still had enough juice left to raise the front jacks to hook up to the truck.
As a mechanic for 30 plus years i have seen new batteries fail so may be worth checking out. We do not have a shut off switch on our unit either so while at home are hooked up to an extension cord for the most part. Also after 3 plus weeks at the dealership getting some work done there was still enough power to hook up to the truck and i doubt they had the unit hooked up to any power while there.......
Crumgater
Well-known member
Our little slide-in truck camper would drain the battery in a bit more than a week... but it would wake us up when they batteries died - the CO detector's low battery alarm would go off and wake the neighborhood!
It's amazing what little led lights and the safety monitors can pull from a battery over time.
We had to install a battery shut-off in our Elkridge (it didn't come with one). Best investment ever (low $$, and a simple DIY project). We leave the batteries in over the winter (4-5 months) and we still had >70% charge when we flipped them back "on" this spring.
It's amazing what little led lights and the safety monitors can pull from a battery over time.
We had to install a battery shut-off in our Elkridge (it didn't come with one). Best investment ever (low $$, and a simple DIY project). We leave the batteries in over the winter (4-5 months) and we still had >70% charge when we flipped them back "on" this spring.
