Battery charger only charging one bank?

[koedding@comcast.net]

I just had a similar situation as Matty. We dry stack our Cutwater C-26 and have not had any issues with the three sets of batteries draining and not charging until now. At launch, the other day, our thrusters were not working due to almost zero voltage on battery #3, which supplies the power to the thrusters and the generator. We figured after a few hours out on the water, battery #3 would be charged. That didn't happen. According to the Owners Manual, the pair of house batteries #1 and the engine battery #2, are charged by the solar panel at 90% and 10%, respectively. The Owners Manual provides no information regarding charging of battery #3. Both batteries #2 and #3 have ACRs. I suspect that I'd have to have battery #3 checked for serviceability and manually charged. When I got home, I checked the wiring schematic and noticed that there is a thruster battery fuse block. Is it possible that if a fuse is blown or the ACR has failed, that this is why the thruster/generator battery #3 is not charging while underway? If I'm reading the schematic correctly, It appears bilge pumps #1 and #2 are connected to the #3 battery. Is there anything else in the circuit that could have drained the battery?

 

[Matty]

so I don't know why all three banks drained. But I now know why it did not charge. apparently the ACRs have a safety mechanism to not switch over to a battery that is so low. My fix was to jump across the ACR studs so that it would charge up a little. Went back an hour later and took the jump off and it continued to charge as normal. I used battery cables for the jump over. Have to admit I fooled around so much I cannot say why they all drained. I may have switched the parallel over to on to see if there was any impact and then forgot to turn it back. All this was done at the dock so no danger of getting stuck on the water with dead batteries. Been ok ever since.