Leisure battery rewiring

[Periscope007]

Has the wiring been altered in this van? Long story, sorry. Leisure battery under passenger seat has failed so thought time to upgrade to lithium and add a solar panel. Removing the seat and looking at the wiring I am confronted by what looks like to be a bit of a bodge job. At some point a towbar has been fitted and an accompanying Ryder 1170-3. This part was wired wrong (confirmed by Ryder) and was basically putting the leisure battery permanently in parallel with start battery. (cable and fuse they installed as in picture) There is no charger fitted from hook up location wired under driver seat to leisure battery either. The cable (10mm?) with the nut (which is free floating in the picture) shows continuity to the cable under the seat in picture
This cable appears to have been spade connected to two 6mm cables, one of which has been taped up and goes nowhere and the other goes to a glued?/crimpedconnection with 2 further wires, the likes of which I've never seen before to a fuse rack with each one individually supplying a cable. (fuse rating 15A each). The cable which goes nowhere, was this originally to the leisure battery?The Ryder vice is coming out and a Renogy DCC50S is being fitted. Please advise me if I am getting things right or wrong and what possible connections need to be made/removed. Thanks. hope the pics are clear enough T

 

[Pauly]

The crimped up taped thingy is factory fit, that how VW blank it off, the extra fuse box for the towbar circuits is also pretty standard way of doing it so don’t see anything crazy there
That feed will be fused at 100A in the e box under the battery and is ok to use to feed your dcdc charger

 

[Periscope007]

The crimped up taped thingy is factory fit, that how VW blank it off, the extra fuse box for the towbar circuits is also pretty standard way of doing it so don’t see anything crazy there
That feed will be dosed at 100A in the e box under the battery and is ok to use to feed your dcdc charger

Thanks for the info, I was just a little concerned regarding the wiring as to why someone would twist together eight individual wires and clamp them into the +ve battery terminal and bundle excess wiring finished off with insulating tape instead of correct length terminating and securing neatly. At least I will not have to run another cable from the battery. One further query if you can advise, since the dc-dc requires a feed frrom ignition fuse, can I reroute the 4mm cable that is in the battery compartment (used for tow bar) and use that? Or, might I be in luck and have that supply there also, now that would be too good to be true.
cheers
Nick

 

[Pauly]

No you wont have an ignition feed under the seat from the factory only if someone has put one in

 

[Periscope007]

thanks v. much for assistance

 

[1Pearman]

If it helps.....I used the fattest of the red cables in your images to supply the +ve input to my DC-DC charger via another fuse. The ignition wire I had to route under the carpet in the tunnel going to under the gearbox lever, and this then connected into the fuse box to the left of the gear lever just above the floor. I had to use a piggyback fuse and just tested each spare fuse block for constant voltage when the ignition was turned on.

The two 15amp fuses in the original connector block were for the two rear 12v socks in the back of my van. You can just leave these, or do as I did and cut the wires and rewire to your leisure battery +ve out with the same rating fuses for each line. Made more sense to me to have them running from the leisure circuit so I can use them and not worry about draining the van starter battery when parked up.

 

[Periscope007]

If it helps.....I used the fattest of the red cables in your images to supply the +ve input to my DC-DC charger via another fuse. The ignition wire I had to route under the carpet in the tunnel going to under the gearbox lever, and this then connected into the fuse box to the left of the gear lever just above the floor. I had to use a piggyback fuse and just tested each spare fuse block for constant voltage when the ignition was turned on.

The two 15amp fuses in the original connector block were for the two rear 12v socks in the back of my van. You can just leave these, or do as I did and cut the wires and rewire to your leisure battery +ve out with the same rating fuses for each line. Made more sense to me to have them running from the leisure circuit so I can use them and not worry about draining the van starter battery when parked up.

Have just taken everything out and upgraded with Renogy dc-dc, ac-dc charger, 100Ah lithium battery and 200w solar panel. My arm was twisted when I was unable to replace the leisure battery like with like since the required size was no longer available, only a 50Ah would fit by physical size, what use would that be? Just about to embark on a rear kitchen to make it all worthwhile.