Thread: DC-DC charger- which one?

Originally Posted by drivesafe

It is for something called the GATEWAY MODULE in newer D4s and there will be other updates as well for earlier D4s.

The dealership carried out the update and the customer rang me as he was travelling back home from the dealers to tell me his alternator voltage was now 14.7v.

This problem started in the UK early last year and is happening here now

Here is the specific Land Rover info for the GATEWAY update. This will fix any "LOW BATTERY START MOTOR" messages and should fix any low voltage problems, but double check with your dealer to see if there an other updates.

TSB Number: LTB-00667-NAS-1
NHTSA Number: 10056435
TSB Date: August 1, 2014
Date Added to File: December 2, 2014
Failing Component: Electrical System: Software
Summary:
Land rover: due to gateway module (gwm) software issue, the instrument cluster and/or eco stop/start, fails to function and displays, intermittently, Battery warning message and warning lamp. Model 2014 lr4 (la).

Tim

Is this the TSB for my vehicle, a 2013 D4?

My battery never seems to get above 12.5V, I have your system fitted and a dealer who seems to think 74% charged is fine.

Regards

Hi Wheelan here is the thing, with your system and your 100Ah battery, you had 80Ah available if you discharged your 100Ah down to it's safe limit of 20% SoC.

If you had one of my isolators, you would have had 125Ah available.

But even if you still only used the same 80Ah, then the two batteries in my system, your auxiliary and your cranking battery, will only be discharged down to about 60% SoC and this means your batteries would be fully charged in a shorter drive time than your single 100Ah battery could be with or with out your DC/DC device.

The recharge time in a D4 is even quicker with one of my isolators fitted.

Then add the fact that with short driving trips around town and my system will actually keep your cranking battery in a higher state of charge, something no other system can do.

Originally Posted by Vern

I have a friend who has the problem with his gu patrol, it runs a redarc duel battery system and charges a second battery, it also charges two batteries in the camper. It doesn't work very well.
His brother has the identical set up, but in a 100 series, his works perfectly.
From what I read, and don't really understand that well, the patrol alt works via the ecu?
Has been told to install a BC DC charger.

it not interfaced correctly int othe stystm and his chargin system is not detecting when its drawing load appropriately.

then hes got high resistance joints and incorrect wiring sizes that are causing drop from the out put of the system to the batteries

so because his systems not coming up to full voltage hes getting a lower current flow throuh his DBS to the output side of the DBS and then hes dumping a heap of that due to the resistence of his wiring.

due to the overall lowered current draw the main battery never gets drained down enough to ramp the charging system into its higher charging rate, it just sits there trying to trickle charge the battery. Of course its more insiduous than that.

the BECM knows whats turned on so it tells the engine ECU to ramp the alternator to X amps to offset the expected draw of the vehicle electrics. of course your now drawing more than that because of the unknown draw of the DBS slowly charging the batteries down the back. and since the alternators only putting out just enough to deal with the vehicle load guess where most of those amps are coming from. Yep, the main vehicle battery. so eventually the voltge drops down enough for the ECU to realise that its low so it bumps the alternator up for a couple of minutes, and the battery voltage comes back up for a little while. Eventually the batteries down the back will get fully charged, assuming of course you dont have a load on them thats drawing down the second battery.

Originally Posted by pwillo

Tim

Is this the TSB for my vehicle, a 2013 D4?

The GATEWAY Module is in 2014 and 15 D4s

Originally Posted by pwillo

My battery never seems to get above 12.5V, I have your system fitted and a dealer who seems to think 74% charged is fine.

Regards

Hi pwillo, if your battery is 12.5v in the morning, before starting, then it is at 90% SoC and that is actually above the normal voltage found on a D4 that is NOT fitted with one of my systems, so my system is working as it should be.

This chart will help with battery charge levels.

Originally Posted by Blknight.aus

it not interfaced correctly int othe stystm and his chargin system is not detecting when its drawing load appropriately.

then hes got high resistance joints and incorrect wiring sizes that are causing drop from the out put of the system to the batteries

so because his systems not coming up to full voltage hes getting a lower current flow throuh his DBS to the output side of the DBS and then hes dumping a heap of that due to the resistence of his wiring.

due to the overall lowered current draw the main battery never gets drained down enough to ramp the charging system into its higher charging rate, it just sits there trying to trickle charge the battery. Of course its more insiduous than that.

the BECM knows whats turned on so it tells the engine ECU to ramp the alternator to X amps to offset the expected draw of the vehicle electrics. of course your now drawing more than that because of the unknown draw of the DBS slowly charging the batteries down the back. and since the alternators only putting out just enough to deal with the vehicle load guess where most of those amps are coming from. Yep, the main vehicle battery. so eventually the voltge drops down enough for the ECU to realise that its low so it bumps the alternator up for a couple of minutes, and the battery voltage comes back up for a little while. Eventually the batteries down the back will get fully charged, assuming of course you dont have a load on them thats drawing down the second battery.

so dave how does one fix this? Camper batteries will have the fridge load on them when driving/charging.
Cable sizes are fine, same size cables as in his brothers 100 series, all joins are OK. When we were away last I stuck my clamp meter (never go camping without it) on the camper batteries, whilst charging and was getting 6a each into them and the batteries were low, they were charging a lot better with the solar panel.

Hi Vern, the GU and the 100 have exactly the same charging setup and voltages, so if one is working and the other is not, then as Dave has already posted, There is a problem with the wiring and/or connections somewhere in the GU.

With two batteries in a low state, you should be seeing at least 25 amps per battery, so again, there is something wrong with the setup. ( PS ) this is with the motor idled up!

How is the earth return done?

Thanks to everyone for their inputs.. that's why I love this forum

Rob - as mentioned, I regularly (at least once a month) have been charging using the Ctek MX5.0 charger through the anderson rear plug. While most trips are short (local city driving ~30mins), it usually only gets used at weekends or on longer trips about once a month.

In terms of the 2nd battery (no 3rd) it is a yellow top similar to yours as recommended by Tim when I purchased the traxide kit.

My inverter is fairly tame in terms of voltage and current draw. It is a 300W or thereabouts and only used for charging phones etc.. I don't think this is a big part of the problem here.

Tim - thanks. I had my independent (Coopers in St Peters) update the engine and gearbox software patches about 6 months ago following a Engine Fault System where the turbos deactivated while towing.

I'll definitely speak to Coopers about the software update also. Though it sounds like the symptoms here were a low voltage across the battery with the engine running. I checked this a few months ago and it was around 14.7V.

I'll also try disconnecting the traxide kit to see if I get different voltages than I have been of late.

Part of me thinks the low voltage readings will have reduced the life span of the main battery also (it's 2years old now).


Hmmm...

Hi Mijango, 14.7v is ideal and you should not be having any charging problems with that sort of voltage level.

Can you monitor the voltage while driving and see if it stays at 14.7 for any length of time, or if it drops too soon after starting?