Picked my new van up, advice needed

Finally got my new van, stripped the system out (came with 200l diy system tank strapped in) and the completely rotted ply lining out today!

Got 2 weeks now till I start using it as my current car insurance on the works car runs out on the 16th and the extra years no claims would be nice.

Now to the questions 

1. Controller reads bat even with a new battery on it, any ideas what the fault could be, pump still runs but cuts out intermittently

2. Now I'm down to the metal floor, what can I protect it with? I know protectacote is the gold standard, but I have heard a couple members ( @steve garwood springs to mind) using garage floor paint. It's a third the price and if it works happy days.

The grand plan is to replace the 200l tank with a 350 bolted in buti may have to put that on hold as unexpected bills have delayed that, so I'm gonna have to use the strapped in 200 for a couple weeks, which I'm not thrilled about, but needs must. 

Any advice and help would be great, thanks in advance 

Clisty1989 said:

Finally got my new van, stripped the system out (came with 200l diy system tank strapped in) and the completely rotted ply lining out today!

Got 2 weeks now till I start using it as my current car insurance on the works car runs out on the 16th and the extra years no claims would be nice.

Now to the questions 

1. Controller reads bat even with a new battery on it, any ideas what the fault could be, pump still runs but cuts out intermittently

2. Now I'm down to the metal floor, what can I protect it with? I know protectacote is the gold standard, but I have heard a couple members ( @steve garwood springs to mind) using garage floor paint. It's a third the price and if it works happy days.

The grand plan is to replace the 200l tank with a 350 bolted in buti may have to put that on hold as unexpected bills have delayed that, so I'm gonna have to use the strapped in 200 for a couple weeks, which I'm not thrilled about, but needs must. 

Any advice and help would be great, thanks in advance 

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I used garage floor paint on my last three vans. Apart from scratches every now and then, had no problems.

This is the topic to read, although personally I found I didn't need as much protectakote as advised as two good thin coats was more than ample rather than two heavy coats as the drying and curing  time is always longer andI used the accerlerator and also  I did mine on one the hottest spring weekends https://windowcleaningforums.co.uk/topic/26070-protectakote/?tab=comments#comment-378289 

Also don't underestimate how long it may take as it took me a lot longer than I expected what with prep and painting, I didn't need expanding foam as i dropped the ply-lined sides down so the gap to fill with the tiger-seal was a lot less between the ply and van floor. 

We use raptor lining. 2 litres covers a medium sized van.

Very very hard wearing.

You'll need to sand the floor paint back for the protection to adhere. Or else it'll just flake off.

Search youtube and there will be plenty of tutorials. You can just use a paint roller to apply.

Omega said:

We use raptor lining. 2 litres covers a medium sized van.

Very very hard wearing.

You'll need to sand the floor paint back for the protection to adhere. Or else it'll just flake off.

Search youtube and there will be plenty of tutorials. You can just use a paint roller to apply.

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Interesting; I thought it had to be applied with a spraygun.

Here's my take @Clisty1989.

If you have purchased one of those car derived vans then I would fiberglass the floor and a little up the sides to create a tub. We then painted the fibreglass with a non-slip topcoat.

A small car derived van still has the footwell in the chassis pan for the rear passengers. The manufacturers cover this over with a metal floor. Unfortunately, any spillages leak through the floor into the drivers cab soaking the carpet and making the van smell of wet.

The only place for spilled water to exit the van is through the back doors on my son's Citroen Berlingo. I screwed in a batton to the floor in front of the side loading door so water can't escape into the footwell from this side.

Thank you all for your input. What I've done is sealed any holes up in the floor, then painted in garage floor paint. If it works then happy days, if not when I get the bigger tank I'll either fibreglass or raptor line it. 

Anyone got any ideas about my controller issue? That's the main thing I'm stumped on now, as I've never had one before. It's a streamline controller if that changes anything. 

Here is something what I’ve found from Alex gardiner 

These controllers are designed to protect you from a battery failure situation which makes them alert to potentially dangerous (for the battery's life) voltage situations.

If it is flashing Bat then the voltage that the controller is receiving is below its cut-off point. If you have changed the battery and you know the replacement battery is in good condition then the only other thing it can be is a voltage drop in the wiring or the connections. As you are running off of an interior light you are probably using wiring and connections that are not a high enough rating. They will have worked OK to start with but with age, moisture corrosion, etc, they are causing an issue (most probably). It would be worth running a new set of wires direct from the battery to the controller (10amp minimum) and seeing if this cures the problem.

I had this myself on my van and in the end needed to upgrade all of the wiring - not had the problem again.

The newer versions of these controllers often now come with a switchable low voltage feature for those that do not mind what happens to the battery or who are using Gel batteries. This allows users to switch the feature off so that it continues pumping whatever the voltage it is receiving.

Just on a side issue on this, we all know you shouldn’t let a standard leisure battery go under 50% charge as it starts to damage it.

Well I’ve been looking online at batteries and ‘Trojan’ do a deep cycle battery that says in its description it can go down to 70-80% discharge without issue.

Wouldn’t this be a better option in our game? ?

I'll rewire it all when I reinstall the system, see if the solves it. Anything else to consider? 

steve garwood said:

Just on a side issue on this, we all know you shouldn’t let a standard leisure battery go under 50% charge as it starts to damage it.

Well I’ve been looking online at batteries and ‘Trojan’ do a deep cycle battery that says in its description it can go down to 70-80% discharge without issue.

Wouldn’t this be a better option in our game? ?

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I don't know which battery you were looking at but a T1275 Trojan Battery weighs 39kgs. Its also big at 329mm l x 181w x 283h. That's a big battery and for us would be rated at between 150 and 166 amps. That would have to have a purpose made battery box and could only be charged on board. At a price of just short of £250 I'll stick with a Numax CXV 105amp at just short of £100.

My current battery will be 4 years old in January 2020.

The 24TMX is more in line with our size but more like between 85 and 94amps in our application but its £165.

Trojan offer a 1 year warranty.

Numax offer a 3 year warranty - not for window cleaning though - or they didn't unless they have changed their policy.

There’s also a Trojan 27TMX deep cycle 105ah  at around £140.

Just doing some investigating ?

steve garwood said:

There’s also a Trojan 27TMX deep cycle 105ah  at around £140.

Just doing some investigating ?

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I didn't see that one.

Interestly, Trojan don't appear on the NCC battery list.

https://www.thencc.org.uk/downloads/NCC_Verified_Leisure_Battery_Scheme_Website_March_2019_Final.pdf

I also love the terms of warranty set out on Tanya's site

https://www.tayna.co.uk/tutorials/battery-warranty-information

If you read that you can virtually say that there is no warranty on any battery.

Here's their get out of jail card for window cleaners.


Wear and Tear, and Deep Cycling


When a battery is charged and discharged, material from the battery plates (active mass) is in motion, through the electromechanical reaction that produces electricity. Every time a battery goes through a charge-discharge cycle, a small amount of this active mass is lost from the plates. Due to so many factors impacting on the life of a battery, it is impossible to stipulate a minimum or maximum life expectancy.

Every battery has a finite number of cycles that it can go through before it loses its active mass, and in turn, its capacity. Vehicles with high usage, such as busses, taxis and trucks, will often put a battery through this finite number of cycles over a much shorter amount of time, causing a battery to show the above symptoms after only a couple of years. This is not a manufacturing fault.

When a battery is subject to a deep discharge, and/or a rapid rate of recharge, the above process is accelerated. A battery that is deep discharged regularly, or is often discharged below 50% (12.1v) in the case of leisure batteries, will rapidly lose its active mass, and capacity. An example of this is the use of a leisure battery for running window cleaning water pumps. The loss of active mass, and therefore capacity due to over/excessive cycling is not a manufacturing fault.

So no warranty on any battery used by window cleaners, even HD Trojan ones.

spruce said:

I don't know which battery you were looking at but a T1275 Trojan Battery weighs 39kgs. Its also big at 329mm l x 181w x 283h. That's a big battery and for us would be rated at between 150 and 166 amps. That would have to have a purpose made battery box and could only be charged on board. At a price of just short of £250 I'll stick with a Numax CXV 105amp at just short of £100.

My current battery will be 4 years old in January 2020.

The 24TMX is more in line with our size but more like between 85 and 94amps in our application but its £165.

Trojan offer a 1 year warranty.

Numax offer a 3 year warranty - not for window cleaning though - or they didn't unless they have changed their policy.

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I am going to purchase an electric reel, I was considering this https://www.tayna.co.uk/leisure-batteries/numax/xv31mf/#addsearch=numax cxv 105 I was thinking that I could attach the cables from both my controller and the reel to the threaded terminal and use the second terminals to attach my charger each night, I don't have a fancy charger just a Halfords charger with a charging option of standard or stop start and this battery is a combo of Deep Cycle & Starting ?

Iron Giant said:

I am going to purchase an electric reel, I was considering this https://www.tayna.co.uk/leisure-batteries/numax/xv31mf/#addsearch=numax cxv 105 I was thinking that I could attach the cables from both my controller and the reel to the threaded terminal and use the second terminals to attach my charger each night, I don't have a fancy charger just a Halfords charger with a charging option of standard or stop start and this battery is a combo of Deep Cycle & Starting ?

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I would go with that as it is a combo battery (leisure and starter.) Its isn't as good as a purpose designed starter battery and also isn't as good as a purpose leisure battery.

But it will sustain high amp draws (albeit for short periods) better than a leisure battery that 'suffers' when high demands are placed on it. Those electric reels will draw around 25 amps for 30 secs at most, but 25 amps for 10 secs is a high demand for a leisure battery.

As per the previous post regarding warranty, please don't expect there to be any as window cleaners are specifically targetted as battery abusers. I wouldn't be surprised anyone 'wild camping' in their motorhome will be 'tarred with the same brush' as well when they action a warranty request.

In all honesty we haven't had a battery failure in 12 years so am pretty confident with Numax's quality.

No problem with regard to attaching your charger to the other terminals. I have a permanently fixed cable with a Torberry plug fitted so just plug my charger in when necessary.

I have also upgraded my Voltage sensing relay to a Sterling BB1260 battery to battery charger and a Victron bwv 712 battery monitor with built in blue tooth.

So far this Sterling unit seems to charge the leisure battery (the same battery I had on my previous van with the VSR) much faster. The other day (Tuesday) the van stood in the same place for 3 hours with both hose reels on the go. We used 9 amps of current from the battery that morning and when I started the van up, the B2B charger was chaging at 34 amps. I've never seen that before.

The van worked Wednesday and Thursday but not Friday. I did 10 miles collecting last night and my leisure battery is fully charged. I've never had that before.

Its still early days. We have a school clean starting Monday so it will get a true test next week when the battery takes a hammering.

spruce said:

I would go with that as it is a combo battery (leisure and starter.) Its isn't as good as a purpose designed starter battery and also isn't as good as a purpose leisure battery.

But it will sustain high amp draws (albeit for short periods) better than a leisure battery that 'suffers' when high demands are placed on it. Those electric reels will draw around 25 amps for 30 secs at most, but 25 amps for 10 secs is a high demand for a leisure battery.

As per the previous post regarding warranty, please don't expect there to be any as window cleaners are specifically targetted as battery abusers. I wouldn't be surprised anyone 'wild camping' in their motorhome will be 'tarred with the same brush' as well when they action a warranty request.

In all honesty we haven't had a battery failure in 12 years so am pretty confident with Numax's quality.

No problem with regard to attaching your charger to the other terminals. I have a permanently fixed cable with a Torberry plug fitted so just plug my charger in when necessary.

I have also upgraded my Voltage sensing relay to a Sterling BB1260 battery to battery charger and a Victron bwv 712 battery monitor with built in blue tooth.

So far this Sterling unit seems to charge the leisure battery (the same battery I had on my previous van with the VSR) much faster. The other day (Tuesday) the van stood in the same place for 3 hours with both hose reels on the go. We used 9 amps of current from the battery that morning and when I started the van up, the B2B charger was chaging at 34 amps. I've never seen that before.

The van worked Wednesday and Thursday but not Friday. I did 10 miles collecting last night and my leisure battery is fully charged. I've never had that before.

Its still early days. We have a school clean starting Monday so it will get a true test next week when the battery takes a hammering.

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Thank you kindly Sir, @spruce do you think that my charger on a standard charging option will be suitable for this type of battery, I noticed a C-Tek charger has about 3-4 charging options ?

Has anyone got a wiring diagram for a streamline controller and a shurflo pump? The current wiring is a complete mess, which I'm guessing is the cause for the battery error that keeps flashing up.got 2 days to get it done

Clisty1989 said:

Has anyone got a wiring diagram for a streamline controller and a shurflo pump? The current wiring is a complete mess, which I'm guessing is the cause for the battery error that keeps flashing up.got 2 days to get it done

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Haven’t got a proper printed one, but this is how the wiring goes 

steve garwood said:

Haven’t got a proper printed one, but this is how the wiring goes 

View attachment 17324

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Thanks, that what I needed, finishing van tomorrow so I'll chuck some pics up when everything's in it

Clisty1989 said:

Thanks, that what I needed, finishing van tomorrow so I'll chuck some pics up when everything's in it

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No probs. I know I’m stating the obvious, but remember your fuse between the controller and battery ?

Iron Giant said:

Thank you kindly Sir, @spruce do you think that my charger on a standard charging option will be suitable for this type of battery, I noticed a C-Tek charger has about 3-4 charging options ?

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Sorry IG. I somehow missed this one.

These C-Tek chargers are pretty good but generally C-Tek make low amperage output chargers that can be used for a variety of different batteries; starter, motor cycle, leisure, AGM etc.

But if you have a relatively flat 110 amp battery, its going to take ages to charge it at 5 amps. (at 50% discharged it will probably take 12 hours to recharge the battery.)

I have found that my bog standard Numax 10amp leisure battery charger for motor homes kicks on at 14.2v for an intial 'boost' charge and quickly drops to 13.9v. These are all safe battery charging profiles for most batteries. A flooded leisure battery can be charged at 14.6v but the same maintenance free leisure battery should only be charged at 14.2v. Its all about gassing. So if I have a flooded battery my charger isn't really charging that battery to full capacity as fast as it could.

I have found over the years that after charging/float charging my leisure battery, the alterator is still able to push some more in. That's fine for a flooded battery because my alternator charges at 14.6v. If I had a sealed battery, then that should really only be charged at 14.2v. I would expect those extra charge volts to effect battery longevity. (My Sterling batt to batt charger has seperate charge setting for AGM, lead acid flooded, lead acid sealed and lithium.)

All I can say is that in the 12 years I have had this Numax charger I haven't had a battery problem. When I had my trailer system I was replacing the leisure battery every year. I was using a car charger to charge that, but the battery was also mounted on the trailer's drawbar and exposed to the elements. So I can't say if these battery failures were down to the charger or the elements or both.