New leisure batteries, two 105Ahs were finally purchased, in fact already in July and at the same time one main switch was replaced. Also the batteries moved from the starboard side to something like a midship on top of the water tank. The second main switch, for the engine, was now replaced in August and the old main switches were removed from the front of the engine. Of the old main switches that were in the hood wall, all that is left are the holes left, see the picture above. At some point, I cover the holes, probably while hiding the charger and seawater pump. The new main switches found their place a little lower and when recessed they aren’t too much on the way. They are shown in the pic below.
At the same time, all battery main cables and the engine battery cable were replaced. From there is the only ground cable to the hull, the others I took off. There were a few pieces of ground ground cables near the batteries and they seemed a bit suspicious.
The new main switches cut both + and – so they completely separate the batteries from everything when needed. The leisure batteries are fed to the (+ and -) switch panel and also to the six-fuse connection unit to which at least Webasto and the cigarette lighter socket of the refrigerator are to be connected. This way, they don’t have to be pulled through the switch panel and they can have their own fuses. The switching unit is located at the engine room. For its part, it makes cabling cleaner because there is no need to connect equipment cables to batteries or main switches.
The strange thing was the old minus cables. A current of 60mA flowed between the cable from the battery and the cable to the chassis. What the fuck? Should not. Here’s one concrete thing about why the new main switches cut off both the + and – sides. After some troubleshooting, I found the reason being the solar panel charging unit. Or at least it was involved in that. When you disconnected the engine battery, the current went to 0. I decided right away that the solar panel only charges the leisure batteries and now I was able to connect its charging cables directly to the leisure batteries so they are constantly charged. Solar panel charge regulator – is completely separate from everything else so it should not mess up anything anymore. The engine battery, on the other hand, is charged only with the engine charger, which should be more than enough. The leisure battery is also charged with the engine charger as long as it is switched on, the same applies to the mains charger: it charges the batteries if the corresponding main switch is on.
The wiring diagram for Ariadne’s electronic was created with Inkscape, and this time with it’s Mac-version. Worked well and the chart is still evolving for a while until all the cable runs have been documented. This is what it is like at the moment:
