We messed up and now need help

Tradiscantia

We left our RV for a few weeks at the coast and it turned into a full year away.  Before we left, my husband disconnected the solar.  Now he can't turn on the lights, and when he hooked up the solar again, he says it still isn't working after charging with shore power a few hours.  Tonight we will be plugged in overnight, getting a good 18-20 hour charge.  What else can we do to troubleshoot? Our RV has 2 PV panels, Morningstar charge controller, inverter (forgot the brand), 4 golf cart batteries (Trojan).  There were no power demands in storage but we forgot all about the need for a trickle charge as this was our first time away.

vtmaps

It sounds like the batteries might be dead.  Can you check the voltage and SG (specific gravity) of each of the batteries?

-vtMaps

Tradiscantia

I hope he knows how to do that.  I have no idea.  They are 3 years old: 2 years good work, then spent nearly a year in the desert heat. 

Mountain Don

... a year in the dessert heat... with no loads but also with no charging. I suspect they are probably dead. 

A hydrometer would be very useful right now to check the actual charge.

Have you a vehicle you can borrow a good battery from? I assume the golf cart batteries are conneted for a 12 volt system.  Disconnecting the golf cart batteries and inserting a known good 12 volt battery would allow the system to operate. Or if it did not would point out there is some other problem.  A starting car type battery would be fine for a system check like this. 

BB.

I would bite the bullet and replace all of the batteries (vehicle+house) batteries.

Lead Acid batteries, once they are taken to dead, are unreliable. Even if you get them to "work" for a few days/weeks, they will most likely "go bad" again (i.e., the vehicle will not start, the house batteries will go dead quickly one night, etc.).

It is tough when  lead acid batteries are in storage. Flooded Cell batteries cannot (usually) go for more than 1 month without charging. It would have been better to keep them on the solar charger--But the solar charger has to have good "float" charging set point. It is still possible for the batteries to lose enough water from the electrolyte that in one year, the plates are exposed to air (oxygen) and would still have gone bad (if nobody was checking electrolyte levels every month or so.

-Bill