Tow Secure Break Away

leestevo · Senior Member

Tow Secure Break Away

rockylizard · Guru

Gday...

It appears you are not the only one to have discovered that long stays are a problem for BreakSafe batteries.

This topic was on before - it might offer some solutions -

http://thegreynomads.activeboard.com/t61643180/break-away-brake-battery/

PS - would members who get their knickers in a twist if a previous thread is posted as a reply to a question please try to refrain from expressing angst at me.

Cheers - John

KevinC · Senior Member

G'day Lee-Ann,
Our Jayco is a few months older than yours, and like you, we were surprised that the break-away battery is only charged while towing is in progress. Seems a bit negative for folk who aren't traveling all the time. But when this same issue happened to us, we were told that the break-safe unit attached to the break-safe battery actually contains a charger. So we were advised not to buy a charger, but simply supply a 12v feed to the external terminals on the break-safe unit. We were also told not to try test the battery using the external terminals because the charger circuitry prevents an accurate indication of battery charge.
OK, so we are gullible, especially when we know damn all about electricity. We believed our adviser. We took the advice.
So now, if the van has been stationary for a while, we connect a 12v feed from the lighter outlet just above on the kitchen wall. Connects directly to the red and black terminals on the break-safe unit. We don't need to do it for long, just about the same time as cooling down the fridge on 240 before the trip. We (touch wood) haven't had an issue since.
Maybe your break-safe unit is different to ours, maybe we were led astray or maybe not. Who knows? Who cares? We can't give you a definitive answer to your problem, but we hope your issue will be solved easily as ours was and you enjoy many days, weeks, months or years in your Jayco.

leestevo · Senior Member

Thanks John & Kevin for your stories & solutions. We were never give a charger for a break away or any information leaflet on it. As I mentioned in my original post, we bought a battery charger (ages ago) and connected to the Tow Secure Break Away to a 240 volt, so its now charging all the time. My husband is an electrician by trade so he kind of knows about these things.

Thanks for sharing.
Lee-Ann

Redoctopus · Newbie

We have a Jayco Journey bought December last year and I'm sure that there is a charger for the unit plugged into mains.

It is registered in Victoria so NSW can probably not insist on the useless item. Surely you would know if you lost your van off the tow ball.

PeterD · Guru

Redoctopus wrote:
It is registered in Victoria so NSW can probably not insist on the useless item.

As the OP demonstrated, the battery monitor is not a useless item. If it had not been there he would have not known his battery was flat. He would have driven off with his van in an unroadworthy condition.

PeterD · Guru

leestevo wrote:
When we bought our new Jayco 14 months ago they fitted a Tow Secure Break Away to meet NSW rego requirements. We, including the caravan have been at one place for approx 9 months while I was working . On Wednesday we drove to a new location. Once we hook the caravan to our car the Battery Monitor inside the car was beeping loudly saying the battery is low. We thought it was constantly charging through our caravan batteries or even through our 240 volt while we were stationary, but apparently not.

The handbooks that come with the breakaway units say to connect the charging power through the trailer plug. The van manufacturers thus wire the units that way. The breakaway manufacturers keep things simple for the van manufacturers as most of them do not have electricians on staff (they use contractors to do the 240 V wiring.) The reason the instructions say to wire the power through trailer plug is that not all vans come with batteries.

iana · Guru

Couple of things to note here, some of you are referring to the "Break safe" units, while the post is about the "Tow Secure" unit. The Tow Secure unit comes with a module that is kept in the car, powered by a 12v plug that goes into an aux socket. It communicates with the breakaway unit via wireless. This module complies with NSW regulations, and was supplied with the van I brought.
What is interesting is that the wiring instructions supplied by the manufacturer of this unit say that the power source should come from the ignition supply, while Jayco's instructions say the power source should be direct from the battery. We have a conflict here in the instructions.

The operating instructions clearly say that the module in the car does a series of self tests
1/ When the ignition is turned on, the module will emit a series of 5 beeps to say all is good.
2/ If when the tow vehicle is started, there is a fault with the switch, the module an alarm and flash a warning.
3/ When the vehicle is started, and the breakaway battery is low on charge, it will sound a warning and low battery will flash.

By connecting the supply direct to the battery, the only time a person will hear the 5 beep self test, is if someone is sitting in the vehicle when the trailer plug is connected, after that it won't work. This is why the manufacturer has written "connect to the ignition source". However I would follow Jayco's wiring install, as the ignition wiring does not have the currant carrying capacity.

Another point that seems to have been missed is both manufacturers "Tow safe" and "Break safe", recommend replacing the batteries every 2 years.

GerryP · Veteran Member

Not sure what brand ours is, but it has a switch on the front to select either house batteries or tow vehicle for charging. When on the road, I switch it the car and when stored I select the house batteries as these are charged via solar.