Van Diary

27/11/25

The following was observed as emailed to Milldown on the 28th:

I’ve noticed over the last few weeks (now the daylight is fading I suppose) that the LED lighting flickers and fades when other things draw power such as the fridge kicking in. This is very irritating but probably tolerable and understandable since the fridge I imagine draws a reasonable amount of power. However, I have discovered that it is becoming worse, and now the leisure battery will drain over a few hours to the point that when the gas is on if I turn on the tap it crashes the controller and the gas goes out (and it fades the LEDs at the same time). See video here. The controller light configuration upon crashing is in this image, though flashing on and off in this pattern:

It doesn’t do it immediately upon parking after a 30 minute journey. Only if it sits for a (very) few hours. You can see in this photo also that the leisure battery is showing 9.9V, which is hardly low…! The gas heater controller has also crashed under similar circumstances though I’ve not tested it thoroughly as yet.

04/12/25

Visit to Milldown. All appears fine electrically. I noticed after visiting Milldown that the LED in the Sargent switch only illuminates when hooked up. I thought it was illuminated when the box was on regardless but perhaps I was wrong.

09/12/25

Switched on fridge

10/12/25

Two 2-hour drives. Minimal electrical use.

11/12/25

Two 45-minute drives. No electrical use.

12/12/25

One hour-long drive to Peterborough; parked for 2 hours while working, then sat in van for 90 mins with warm LEDs on and Propex heater. After 1h the gas controller was in error (and needed to be reset), and the tap made the warm LEDs fade to off as before. The cold round LEDs fade only slightly, but the warm ones CONSIDERABLY. See videos of tap affecting the warm counter lights here, not really affecting the cool lights here, and the voltage indicator when the tap is turned on here.

Cloudy all day. I wonder if this problem only sometimes manifests because when it is sunny the solar panel keeps the leisure battery topped up.

Have driven home (one hour) and turned off everything (including fridge) except the Sargent box. Presumably all nicely charged up.

(To add insult to injury today the bloody bed has come away from its frame and squeaks like hell at motorway speeds. I will try to fix.)

13/12/25

Covered solar panel this morning with towel. 9:30 confirmed everything switched off except Sargent and warm counter lights. 1:30pm those lights are showing dim. Turning on panel showed voltmeter at 10.1V and LED scale at one red dot. Turning on tap dimmed lights to near darkness and crashed the gas controller. Video here.

1:40 hooked up to electric to fully charge for further testing.