Carver Cascade 2. No Water from hot tap & pump on

Ryan-hiace · Nov 24, 2016

One last question for you John and then I'll be out of your hair I promise! It is an unrelated question though, so if you think it's better in a new post, please let me know.

I have a main switch in the van. In this picture all the switches are set to what I'd call the off position apart from the main on/off switch, which is on.

As I understand it, this switches from using the car battery, to the leisure battery, but I have a couple of questions about the car/van switch:

When should I use which? Should it be in the off position (van, as it is in the photo) pretty much always, unless I need emergency power from the car battery because the leisure battery is dead?

Should it be on car if I'm driving? I do have a fridge in the van which I think can be used when the engine is running? I don't need the fridge anyway, so I've left that alone and I think on the fridge itself it's just set to be off.

If I'm connected to mains hookup, I'm guessing I want the main switch to on, and the car/van switch in the van position to charge the leisure battery?

If the car/van switch is set to car, does it charge the car battery instead of the leisure battery when hooked up?

Do you know of any manuals or anything? (I looked but I didn't find anything). Sorry for the basic questions, but it's been very hard to find information using such generic keywords! Thanks a lot!

ProfJohnL · Nov 24, 2016

Hello Ryan,

It's been great to have a poster who has gone into considerable detail about the the nature of the problems and posted some useful photos. Based on them, I have been able to make what I hope are useful observations and suggestions.

It's always wise to try and obtain user manuals for appliances so you can find out how to use them properly. Its worth trying the appliance manufacturer for copies. Sadly I do know that based on the apparent age of your Cascade, several appliance manufactures are no longer active in the industry. so you have to search for specialist service companies, or look on auction sites.

You should be aware that Practical Caravan Forum is principally aimed at touring caravanners, and whilst motorhomes often use a lot of caravan components and appliances, there can be some detail differences, which can complicate diagnosis and suggestions. You might find other owners and additional information if you were to also join the Practical Caravan's sister forum - Practical Motorhome forum.

Even if we knew the make, model and year of your motorhome I do not have any information about its wiring arrangements, so I can't define how the CAR/VAN switch operates and affects the use and charging of batteries. It needs a few minutes with a multimeter to check the way the system responds to switch positions.

What does concern me is that you have brought a series of different faults and symptoms to our attention. If this is indicative of the general condition of the motorhome, I am increasingly concerned about other potentially more serious safety issues which you may not have spotted. I urge you to have your motorhome properly checked for gas, electrical and water safety, sooner rather than later.

Hutch · Nov 25, 2016

Ryan, I would like to thank yourself and the Prof,J. For your postings , I think this is the sort of help that the forum should give to the people that visit and join the site.
Hutch.

Ryan-hiace · Nov 25, 2016

Hi John, I expect I will join pratical motorhome, as quite frankly, the information given by you has been amazing - hopefully they have an equivalent to you there! Seriously, you've really been a star, patiently and clearly explaining everything and offering your suggestions and opinions, all of which have been very helpful. I'm particularly impressed considering I'm on the caravan forum!

I will get the issues checked out, unfortunately I have neither the time nor money right now, and I'm in a foreign country so there are massive communication problems, and quite frankly the locals are rip-off merchants, and lazy incompetent ones at that. Hell, I took the van to one of the better reviewed and trustworthy garages round here to get an AT gearbox oil and filter change, plus a flush of the torque converter and a clean of the sump magnets, but when i got it back I found that they demanded 150 euros just to change the gearbox oil, and did nothing else! Not only that, but they didn't even supply the oil - I had already given them enough for 2 changes! So I'd probably end up broke or dead or both if I trusted the people round here to work on it. Even with my zero knowledge I would be better off doing it myself, with hammer, in the dark!!!! But I will get it checked out as soon as I am able to, and I do appreciate your concern.

I will try not to post anything more, I'm pretty sure I have all the answers I was originally looking for, and have been extremely happy with the help I've gotten here. If I have any further questions I'll try the motorhome forum, and if I ever buy a caravan I'll be back in a flash! I'm sure the information you've given me will help others with problems similar to mine, simply due to how clearly you presented it.

Thanks again! Ryan

EDIT: Thanks EH52ARH. Yeah this sort of information was invaluable to me. Hopefully it will also help the site, as judging from the amount of incomprehensible or false information I had to go to when I first started investigating the problem was ridiculous, so the information in this thread might help attract more users as older posts did for me.

When I found this site, and had seen the level of help being offered to people with caravans and mildly similar issues (I think some of the posts were from several years ago!) - that's when I signed up and made my first post as I knew I'd get decent information back if I structured my question well and didn't waffle (very hard for me) or go off on too many irrelevant tangents (also very difficult!). So hopefully this post adds nicely to that library and the site's userbase increases!

ProfJohnL · Nov 25, 2016

Hello Ryan

Please do keep posting, There are more similarities than differences between caravans motorhomes, and we should all be prepared to learn. In particular we would like to know what has been causing the pump problem, and the feedback of how we have helped or otherwise is interesting.

Ive not been trying to shut you down, it's more that I feel I've taken you about as far as we can without getting into some quite exotic procedures, and trying to suggest them and waiting for results becomes very tedious. Its the sort of things that a professional should instinctively know and complete in minutes.

There are those that don't like my long posts, but I find if the reason for a particular procedure is explained, then its more likely to be carried out correctly and to produce more reliable outcomes.

Best of luck, and dont be afraid to ask more questions.

Ryan-hiace · Nov 25, 2016

Yeah, there are a lot of similarities. I believe it was actually information on a cascade heater that you yourself had written that bought me here! Or possibly water pumps! I don't remember now! Basically, I have a caravan with a motor in it! :cheer:

At no point did I feel like I was being moved on, I think I had come to the same conclusion. I used to work in IT for a massive company and understand that eventually you will reach a point where you can no longer help without physically being in front of the machine or being able to talk to someone with enough experience to action what you're telling them and bring prompt and progressive steps forward.

Not only do I have that career which often required me to explain complex procedures to upper managers who probably thought their CD rom was a bagel maker, but now I teach people to ski and snowboard, so I completely understand why your replies are long and detailed - if the person you're explaining to can't come to the same conclusion on their own, your advice becomes pointless to them and you can't help them.

I would suggest that those that don't like your replies fit into one of three groups: Either they simply don't want to learn, are too stupid and reading and writing are a little too much for them, or they're already experienced in all this and what you're saying is just going over information they already know (in which case why are they posting?!?). I'm all for the detailed explanations - I read too many posts that simply had the answer in conlcusion, and 90% of the time that didn't actually help me understand the problem enough to help me fix it, and ascertain how much it might cost me to fix, or whether it is worth fixing, If I had an unlimited budget and could just give it to someone to fix I would have already done it, and thus wouldn't be on the forum, but thinking about it, a lot of people do ask stupid questions they haven't thought through, so perhaps people who give very short answers have just dealt with too many of those types of person! Who knows. Anyway, now I'm the one writing essays!

Ryan-hiace · Nov 25, 2016

Oh, and as for the pump problem you will be waiting a while as I'm not planning on having a look until the spring! However, I'm a lurker by nature, so this is only really the second forum I'm a member of, so I won't forget you guys and I'll keep my problem details updated, although I may well be raising some topics from the dead by that point!!!!

20170602yuanyuan · Jun 2, 2017

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