I recently bought a 1999 Wanderer Fifth Wheel.  This past weekend we took it out for the first time.  Everything worked fine, but we learned that the fridge really drains the batteries.  We don't have a generator and the our camping spot didn't have hook ups.  After 24 hours the batteries (2 12 volt) were dead. I forgot to pack my voltmeter but they were drained to the point that the interior lights were at about 25%. 

 

The fridge is a 3 way Norcold 9162 freezer on top and fridge on the bottom.  It was doing fine in AC mode at home and LP mode for the first 24 hours.  I noticed that all of the lights on the fridge were blinking/flashing indicating that something was wrong.  I couldn't get it to work in LP mode until I plugged the truck in--everything worked as advertised.  According to the fridge's manual, the fridge will not work in any mode if the battery drop below 10.5 vDC.  I thought this strange as I was in LP mode and didn't imagine the small lights on the display required that much power to operate.

 

Going through the manual and the Interwebs I found that this fridge has a Moisture Reduction Heater between the freezer and fridge portions and pulls as much as 2 amps when in use.  As far as I can tell, there is no switch to disable this, but I imagine that I can either unplug the element or cut a wire to get the job done. 

 

Does anyone have experience with this?  Would there be adverse consequences for disabling the heater?

 

I am certain the fridge is the culprit of the dead batteries.  As soon as I turned off the fridge the interior lights in the trailer got brighter and it has been parked in my yard with the fridge off for 3 days and the batteries are holding solid.

Thanks for the help.

Looks like a control center for a nuclear power plant.

 

Not quite but its the control center for my hydro/solar system. My house is just a bigger scale of the RV system that's all.

 

So I always use the LP mode  even while traveling, but, shut it off before fueling the truck. A post-it note on the steering wheel always reminds me to turn it back on.

saying that.

I leave mine on LP too, but I don't shut it off when I fuel up. Diesel fumes won't ignite and the chances of gasoline igniting while outside are just about 0% too. That's like the internet rumor of using a cell phone while pumping gas. Many years ago we used to pump gas with a cigarette in our mouth.