August 10, 2021 - Maintenance and a Repair to Homer

On this nice hot morning I decided to do a little maintenance check on Homer's batteries. I checked the voltage at the batteries and they were 12.8 volts - fully charged. The inside meter only show 12.5 volts so I guess there is a little voltage loss in the wiring. I pulled the batteries out and checked the water level in each cell. The levels weren't low but I decided to add a small amount of  water in each cell before I reinstalled them because they are a pain in the neck to get out to check. 

Here is a picture of the side of Homer where the batteries are located. The red arrow points to the battery box door. The green arrow indicates where the lower part of the sidewall (blue paint) is attached to a bracket going up to the floor level (white paint). 

Upon closing the battery box door I found the lower sidewall between the generator door on the left and the battery door on the right to be loose and floppy. It is pretty important that this area be solid because the generator door lock clips in behind the area between the two doors to lock closed. I looked underneath and found that while there was a bolt in place the lower sidewall had broken loose from the plastic support bracket.  Here is a picture of the sidewall and the broken bracket after the bolt was removed.

Here is a picture of the plastic support bracket with the sidewall pulled away to show the out broken area which once held a bolt in place.

I can't believe they used plastic supports. Plastic always deteriorates over time. The plastic could not be repaired so in my junk metal pile I found this piece of lightweight metal to make a bracket to connect the plastic and the sidewall.

I cut off a piece and drilled it for the bolt hole and for two screws to go into the plastic bracket. The lower sidewall is fixed in place now and should outlast me.

I'm glad I found this issue before Homer's next trip. Nothing would have fallen off but it is never good to have things flopping around at 65 mph.