Good deed...Nope, GREAT deed!!

hauling_ass

hauling_ass

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Mar 15, 2010
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I have to share this -

Last night, one of our drivers pulled into a truck stop off of Hwy 401. He started his bunk heater and settled in for a sleep. Three hours later, he woke to find the bunk heater had shut off. He tried to start the truck - no luck. As he had jumper cables, he knocked on the door of the truck next to him.

Keeping in mind that it was cold enough to freeze off body parts, this trucker jumped out of his warm truck, wrestled with his battery box, hooked up the cables; and then waited a bit before our truck would fire up.

When our driver tried to pay him for his trouble? Nope, this amazing trucker refused and said, "Us fellow truckers have to stick together."

Now, doesn't that just warm you up?

(On another note, the truck was in at the Mississauga Peterbilt dealership less than a week ago. Their solution to this reoccurring problem that is a warranty issue? Clean off the battery terminals because they have a little bit of green on them. Grrrrr!)
 
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Don't even waste your time...go get 4 new batteries. Good ones. You will keep having this happen on the coldest days until you do. Or your drivers will never rest worrying about the truck; and you won't either. You might be able to prolong the life marginally , but it's not worth it. Trust me....
 
Chica -

The batteries have all been tested and they are all good. Peterbilt sent the truck away because they don't know what to do next (Their words, not mine). They want the truck back when they can keep it for at least a week to try and diagnose it. Might be a bad ground... Whatever it is, it only does it when the bunk heater is on.

Any ideas?
 
Hi Hauling Ass
Sorry I missed that part of the post about the bunk heater being on....I read it to be the other truck...!
I don't know enough about the workings of the bunk heater's connections to offer any advice. They are meant to run on very little diesel and so I assume very little charge also. We have had a few trucks that have had newer batteries and once the cold snap comes they are painful to start. We have tried checking so many different things and just ended up coming to the conclusion that the batteries are just duds. As soon as we replace them, things are fine. The only small tidbit of advice I have is that those hand-held battery testers are not completely reliable all of the time. We have had batteries tested by the hand held model and passed only to fail on the bigger shop kind (that I have no idea it's called). Sorry that is no help to you. Have you ever tried calling Paul who now works at the Peterbilt in Stoney Creek? He is not a miracle worker and he works in parts, but he has been ever so helpful to us in the past. And they are not too busy at Stoney Creek right now because they just opened. Maybe it's worth calling them to see if they have more time for you? Have a great night!
 
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If you have a Webasto or Espar heater, they are programed to shut off if the battery level goes below 10.7 volts. Some of the new trucks (Int'l for sure) have this feature if drivers leave anything powered and batteries go below 11.8 volts called load shedding. Not sure why your truck wouldn't start, even in this cold weather it should maintain the ability to start for at least 6hrs with little trouble.
 
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Thank you so much for the advice. Definitely going to use Igor's suggestion.

It is an Espar heater that came installed on the truck ('14 Pete). There weren't any issues last winter. This issue just started.
bubba-one - same deal on this truck. Once the batteries go below 11.8 volts, the heater shuts off. Unfortunately, there wasn't enough battery power left to start the truck without a boost.

The truck is under warranty which is why it was in the Peterbilt shop. I'm going to have our mechanic use a 'good' battery tester.

If anyone else has any suggestions, they would be appreciated!
 
One more thing below:

ANTI-CORROSIVE BATTERY WASHERS

Anti-Corrosive Battery Washers - top post batteriesPart Number
Pricing

Our Anti-Corrosive Battery Washers are an inexpensive way to keep your battery terminals from corroding.

- Impregnated with a corrosive inhibitor

- Seal out acid fumes

- One Red & One Black Washer

TOPACBW
 
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If the Espar was installed at the factory, it is installed incorrectly. I have several. Whatever moron in Texas decided it was a good idea to wire the Espar to the accessory side of the key switch was smoking some seriously good drugs at the time. In our cases our drivers had to turn the key on, but not start the truck to run the Espar. The problem is that livens up the entire system which with the number of computers the system now needs to run suck up a lot of juice with no restorative process from the alternator. Essentially, the system is simply grounding a whole bunch of power that it cannot use. The other issue we have run across is the poor grounding system found on Peterbilts. That causes innumerable issues as well.
Good luck :)
 
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Michael,

What you are describing is exactly what we are dealing with. The truck sat in the yard last night with the key out of it and it started this morning without being plugged in - and it was minus 32 here. Me thinks the batteries are okay?

Did you fix your trucks?
 
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That is great advice from Michael, as always! What a hassle now you are going to have to take the truck in and try to explain to the Peterbilt mechanic what they have to do and have the NEW truck out of service while they figure it out.
 
No we didn't fix them. A big part of the problem is they are still under warranty. We're chatting it up with our local shop and seeing if they will affect the proper repair and still keep the units under warranty. The correct way is to isolate a single battery out of the bank of 4 to run the Espar, so the other 3 will always start the truck. However, the isolated battery still needs to be charged by the alternator. I'm sure there's an automatic switch of some sort that will accomplish this feat, but I don't want to have to pay for it ... LOL
On two of my units I have SmartAir ... the OEM battery powered air conditioning system which has its own set of 4 batteries ... however, that same Texas rocket scientist elected to still hook the Espar to the truck batteries. Those two we fixed ourselves by running new cables for the Espar to the SmartAir batteries.
 
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Our shop told us we will have to sign a waiver before they will even begin to try and fix the problem. If we og ahead and isolate one battery, the truck's warranty will be void.

If there is anyone that has had a shop fix this issue, could they please weigh in?

Michael, as always, thanks for your advice. One question though, what do your drivers do when they have to shut down for 8 hours?
 
Extended warranty because of the first round of problems we had - three years on the truck and five on the motor.
 
I would call Espar direct and get input from them, head office is in Mississauga, it has been a lot of years since we dealt with them but they always looked after us. Maybe if Espar hooked it up properly it might not void any warranty. Plus I think I would be looking for a different shop.
 
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Good suggestion lowmiler88! I'll give them a call.

Definitely changing shops for warranty work.
 
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