Why is my Peugeot Boxer vehicle battery rapidly discharging?
I have a 2013 Autosleeper Broadway EB on a Boxer chassis which is our first motorhome, purchased last year.
I'm not an auto electrician but the following is my engineering head attempt at understanding the problem.
I parked it up for the winter in mid November and went to do a check on it a few weeks later only to find the battery was barely able to start the vehicle. I checked it again towards the end of December and the vehicle battery was flat to the extent that nothing on the dash would light up.
I recharged it and did a simple current drain check of disconnecting the negative terminal and putting a 12v bulb between the -ve battery terminal and the -ve cable. The bulb lit up which I believe means there is some current drain.
I systematically went through pulling fuses to see if I could isolate the cause but no joy.
On the busbar of the positive battery terminal, there are three cables. I disconnected each of these in turn and found that the light went out when I disconnected the one on the right. with that disconnected, although there is no apparent drain, I have an airbag warning on the dash.
Posting here for some your more experienced guidance on what to do next. I would be grateful for any advice you may have.
Clive
Answers
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My understanding is that most vehicles drain some battery energy when not in use either due to energising alarm systems or the ECB and of course batteries do self discharge. I would have though any of these would not light a bulb in circuit so you may have a problem? However it seems to have taken some weeks for the discharge, I think that bodes well. Without anything to sustain my engine battery, it used to discharge in three to four weeks. The only way round this is to find a way of keeping the battery topped up either with a solar panel, regular charging with an external charger or if your motorhome is equipped with the facilitiy to keep the engine battery charged when on EHU, plug into a source of supply.
peedee
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I am not a technical person but if its the original battery it might need replacing? The weather recently has been very cold which is always a bit of a killer for batteries. On both my Peugeot based motorhomes I had Battery Masters fitted to both, they basically push any excess charge from the leisure battery to the cab bsttery. I was fortunate in that I could connect to a 240v hook up at home.
David
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You don’t say how old the battery is @CliveWall but my guess is that it’s probably on the way out.
May I suggest you look at the AutoSleeper Owners Forum where there are folk with far more knowledge than I and they fully understand the brand, the models and their quirks.
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does your van have a tracker? That will take from the starter battery, and will mean your van will need charging every three to four weeks. We are fortunate to have our van at home so can hook up to mains to charge. Our 2025 Purgeot boxer drops from 12.7 to 12.4 in a couple of weeks in this weather. It does not charge from leisure battery. So you either need to find a way of charging or take it out for a good run to re charge.
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Thank you all for the prompt comments. The battery is fairly new (just over a year). Coincidentally, the solar panel is not charging the batteries. A fault that I have a booked visit to a repairer to look at, at the end of January.
The thing of note for me is that when I disconnected that third lead on the busbar, the light went out so no drain, but the airbag warning came up on the dash.
I'll take a look at the Autosleeper owners area.1 -
"I'll take a look at the Autosleeper owners area."
I think you’ll find that brand specific forum helpful.0
