What should I do if the fridge, water pump, or battery isn't working in the campervan?

Most of the time this is quicker to fix than it looks — and often all three are the same issue. The fridge, water pump, and interior lights all run off your leisure battery (the separate "living" battery, not the engine one), so if that battery is switched off or run down, they can stop together. So start there: 

 
Battery
  1. Make sure the leisure battery / power switch is on (usually on the main control panel). 
  2. Check the charge level on the control panel. The leisure battery recharges while you drive and when you're plugged into mains at a campsite — so if it's low after a still night, a few hours of driving or an evening on mains will usually bring it back.
Fridge
  1. Check it's switched on and set to the right energy mode. Many of our fridges can run on 12V (while you drive and only maintain the current temperature), 220V (when you're plugged into mains), or gas (on some models) — so make sure it's on the mode that suits where you are: mains when you're hooked up, 12V or gas when you're off-grid.
  2. Give it time, and load food that's already cool where you can. Camper fridges are designed to keep food cold rather than to chill warm food quickly — so if it's holding a cool temperature rather than getting ice-cold, that's usually normal, not a fault.
Water pump

Check both switches: the leisure power needs to be on, and the water pump switch on too. Make sure the fresh-water tank actually has water in it — the pump runs dry and goes quiet when it's empty. Then open a tap and listen:

  1. If you can hear the pump but little or no water comes out, it's usually an airlock — air trapped in the pipes, common just after the tank has run empty or been refilled. Open one tap at a time, starting with the one furthest from the tank, and let it run for a minute or two to push the air through.
  2. If you hear nothing at all, the pump probably isn't getting power — check the water-pump fuse (your vehicle guide shows where it is).

Your vehicle guide in the Client Area has the control-panel layout and the checks for your specific model.

If you've been through these and it's still not working, don't worry — contact our on-trip support team, ideally on WhatsApp for the quickest help, and we'll get it sorted.

 
 
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