Bus has electrical "tick"

[Buffalo SpaceShip]

We're in Dallas for a week, visiting my folks before heading back to CO. My wife flew back home to make $... so me and the kids can spend it.   We went by way of Iowa and St. Louis, then down to here where it's warm (but presently WET).

Anyways, when we camped for the night near Branson, the bus elec. horn started chirping intermittantly, every 20-30 seconds. The best way to describe it is a "tick". The only way to get it to stop is to hit the master disconnect. Driving the next day, I discovered it affects the whole front panel of the bus... the gauges jump, and the lights even flash. There's a click sound down in the panel, then a split-second "tick". It doesn't affect starting or stopping the DD (yet), and the signals and lights seem to work OK. It ticks whether the "ignition" is on or not.

I'll be digging into the panel today and seeing what's up. Any ideas where to begin? It would figure that I left my big box of books and manuals in the garage back home (I thought they were in the bay), including all of my diagrams. Arghhhh

Thanks!
Brian B.

[larryh]

Brian I take it your bus is a 12 volt system. It sounds like the constant voltage reg on rear of dash is giving up on you the tick should be all you get and erroneous readings from gauges enjoy the rest of your trip and check out when
you get home.

LarryH

[H3Jim]

If it stops when you hit the master disconnect, I'd check that out pretty throughly.  maybe its giving everything a pulse whcih causes the ticks

[Buffalo SpaceShip]

Larry, the bus is 24v. Is there still something under the dash for those? The stock volt gauge reads ~24v when stopped, about 28V when running.

Thanks, Jim. I'll start my troubleshooting there.

Brian

[Len Silva]

Brian,

Does the voltmeter fluxuate with the ticks?  Colud it be an auto reset circuit breaker somewhere? If that's the case, I would look for it now and at least disconnect the offending circuit at the breaker.  Just a wild guess.
Len

[larryh]

Brian I just went through parts manual and could not find a constant voltgage reg. so you must have a circuit breaker resetting and resetting over and over if I can provide anymore help let me know.

LarryH

[Buffalo SpaceShip]

Thanks, guys. To start, I guess I'll stick a DVM at various places "downstream" and see where it starts the ticking. The horn ticks, as does volt gauge, tachometer, and even headlights. I don't know if all of those would be on a breaker someplace. Strangely, the 24v to 12v converter for certain gauges, radio, and bakup cam doesn't tick those items.. but maybe its able to hold the "ticks" without flicking  Based upon my semantics, obviously, electrical isn't one of my strong suits! 

I'll keep ya'll posted!
bb

[Jerry Liebler]

Brian,
    I vote for a circuit breaker feeding a short.   Each time it resets, the system voltage drops as the short is applyed until the breaker opens again.   There are very many 'abandoned' circuits in most conversions.  The abandoned circuits for lights, air conditioning etc  are often cut and the wires taped and left connected to circuit breakers.  I'd open the driver's electrical panel, where many of the breakers are, and listen, then with the manual in hand, take off wires from abandoned circuit's breakers.
Regards
Jerry 4107 1120

[Ace]

Probably doesn't mean anything but when we had a gmc 4107 we had exactly the same thing happen to us or so it sounds and I found that we had a faulty flasher under the dash. I very simply  replaced the flasher and never had the problem again!

Ace

[Buffalo SpaceShip]

And the cigar goes to... a few of you, really. It was a circuit breaker... for the elec. horn. Mmm-beep. Sparks flew when I removed its nut off the breaker. No big loss, since I prefer the air one anyways. Wahoo!

Now I get to troubleshoot my Jakes and/or that went out on our last trip.

You guys rock... as always!
Brian "Tickless" Brown

[RJ]

Brian -

Jakes are pretty easy to troubleshoot.  Switch on dash, microswitch on governor housing, inline fuse somewhere, leads going from microswitch into heads.

IIRC, often it's just the microswitch on the governor housing that's slipped out of adjustment that causes the jake to fail.

Have fun!

[H3Jim]

My jake "failed" when the micorswitch in the throttle pedal stopped working.  The Jake didn't turn on because it didn't know I was off the throttle.  Not I place I loooked first.

[bigtim44]

2 weeks ago the horn switch on the floor on our 102A3 decided to let the smoke out of itself,it too was accompanied by the ticking circuit breaker.The wife said she's never seen me move so quick when I ran for the master disconnect switch next to the batteries.

[gumpy]

And the cigar goes to... a few of you, really. It was a circuit breaker... for the elec. horn. Mmm-beep. Sparks flew when I removed its nut off the breaker. No big loss, since I prefer the air one anyways. Wahoo!

But you didn't cure the problem, only the symptom of the problem.  Somewhere there's a short, which is tripping the circuit breaker. Could be in the horn, could be in the horn wires.  Could be in the button.

I guess if you remove the horn completely, you might cure the problem.

craig

[Buffalo SpaceShip]

You're right, Craig. Right now the elec. horn is like all of the other switches, breakers, relays, mag. switches, etc. in there that go to non-existent coach items... lav. circuits, general and reading lamps, and so on. I need to go through the system and remove what's no longer needed for bus-as-RV.

Truly, the elec. horn was always whimpy and tinny. But it could be because it's always had some sort of elec. problem... and finally shorted out. If I can get my Jakes and other issues sorted out this week, I'll look into it. The elec. horn button on the wheel is much easier to find in an emergency than the foot switch on the floor for the air horn.

It's sure nice to have 80deg weather in November to work on the bus... a luxury seldom found in CO. Or MN, eh? 

bb