Battery Charging

My coach has a Triad-utrad convertor/charger, appear like the originals. When operating it only charges the house batteries, checked with a volt meter and got 13.57 volts at the charger and house batteries but only 12.57 at starting batteries. Does anyone know if this is by design? If the "battery merge" switch is "on" will it charge the starting batteries also and should this be done?

Anyone familiar with these charges? Are they a "dumb" charger (constant voltage) or "smart" and decrease the voltage as the batteries reach capacity.


Troy
1986 Newell 40'

[fulltiming]

Not familar with that convertor/charger but based on its age, it is probably a dumb charger. It is typical for the charger to ONLY charge the house batteries. The options are to use the battery merge switch (which should not be left in the merge position all the time or you will likely cook your starting batteries) or get a trickle charger. A neat little trickle charger is the Trik-L-Start http://www.lslproducts.com/TLSPage.html

[77neweller]

THe Triad is old and simple technology and will dewater your batteries. It didn't seem to alter its voltage depending on state of battery. I just changed mine out of my 77 coach for a Progressive Dynamics 9180 with the extra charge master controller. So far it seems to be doing a better job and it is certainly less of a boat anchor. My Triad seemed to run constantly at over 14 volts.

My charger is wired to directly power the house fuse box and the house battery. To charge the chassis battery it is necessary to turn on the "Merge Battery" switch. If you have that switch in the "on" position and you are still getting the voltage you reported that it may be that your "merge" solenoid needs replacing. Being constantly in the closed position the contacts in this solenoid tend to carbonize or something similar. I tore apart one that wasn't allowing much current to pass and found the contacts were black. In talking with Newell I was told that this was normal and periodic replacement is necessary. The constant duty solenoids are about 35 dollars.