Campground Power Testing

[RnRCycloner]

Questions on campground power:

1. Has anyone experienced power problems at campgrounds?
2. If so, did you discover it before or after hookup?
3. What damage occurred?
4. Do most folks check before hooking up?
5. Who uses surge protectors or autotransformers?

I'm sure it is always good to check campground power before hooking to it. I'm buliding a simple test rig to do a quick check before hooking to power. Not my design, but easy to fab. I found it on the web..

Here's the link if interested.. http://www.myrv.us/electric/

Happy Camping

 

[creeper]

Yes I have had problems. One campground fried my transfer switch.. That's not what it's called, but I'm suffering from brain fry right now.

After that I got a surge guard and won't hook up without one. I bought a 50 and 30 amp.

 

[RnRCycloner]

Yes I have had problems. One campground fried my transfer switch.. That's not what it's called, but I'm suffering from brain fry right now.

After that I got a surge guard and won't hook up without one. I bought a 50 and 30 amp.

Hi Crepper,
Do you check the power before hooking up or feel with the surge guard, there's no need to..

 

[jmgratz]

This should answer your question. We just recently had an experience where we were staying at a place that we had stayed at several times without incident. They had just recently upgraded their power from 30 to 50 amps. (within the last couple of years) Since we never had any problems we did not install our surge protector/power monitoring device. Sometime during the late afternoon we noticed our clock radio in the bedroom went out. Later during the middle of that night our fan we use in the bedroom made an awful noise waking us up. We smelled the smell of something burning, got up checked and found no fire. I saw the refrigerator was on gas and not electric so I checked the breaker on the pedistal ourside. It was not tripped. I put our surge protector on the circuit and found a low power on leg 2 of 103 volts. I reset the breaker and everything worked okay. The next morning when we got up we discovered our Micro/Convection oven was burnout, Converter out, a TV which we use in the basement compartment was messed up, and central vac out. I cannot prove it was a power problem because I checked with all of my neighbors and they had not experienced anything, I also called the park electrician and he checked and could not find a problem. So the moral of this story is, even if you know the power is okay, you cannot control what the power company is delivering, so from now on I will use the surge protector. Incidently, once on the road at a new park we had never stayed at the surge protector burnt out saving our coach from damage. GET ONE AND USE IT ALWAYS, is my advise. We use the Electrical Management System by Progressive Industries, Model EMS=PT50C. Their web address is www.progressiveindustries.net and I would highly recommend them. They have an excellent product and they stand behind it.

 

[caokgafamily]

This past June we were at Jellystone park in Madison Fl for Memorial weekend, It was packed. I had a power surge or low voltage problem. Our converter,fridge and micro all got fried. Had to repace the converter and micro. The fridge works fine on LP, I'm still trying to fix the electrical side of the fridge. I havn't bought a surge protecter yet, I need to though.

 

[mrcomer]

Thanks for the link. I will be making my own 50 amp tester.
I do have a 50 amp Surge Guard which has already helped us with a campground with low voltage. It will cut-out when the voltage drops below 102v. Works really well.

Good luck,
Mark

Questions on campground power:

1. Has anyone experienced power problems at campgrounds?
2. If so, did you discover it before or after hookup?
3. What damage occurred?
4. Do most folks check before hooking up?
5. Who uses surge protectors or autotransformers?

I'm sure it is always good to check campground power before hooking to it. I'm buliding a simple test rig to do a quick check before hooking to power. Not my design, but easy to fab. I found it on the web..

Here's the link if interested.. http://www.myrv.us/electric/

Happy Camping

 

[cookie]

I use the Progressive Industries EMS. It pretty much covers all that you were looking for other than it does not boost or reduce power like an autoformer. It will not allow power to the coach in the event of a open ground or open neutral. It protects against over and under current. Only one time did it trip for me. The cause was under current. There is a remote module to monitor your current. Check it out their web site and read all about it.
http://www.progressiveindustries.net/ems_hw50c.htm

Peace
Dave

 

[SmokeyBare]

Ron & Rhonda,

Twice I've experienced electrical problems... but thank goodness it did not cause damage to the RV. Each time It turned out being low voltage on only one of the two 110 Volt feeds.

I first discovered this problem after I had completely set the RV up. Legs down.. unhooked from the truck...

I switched A/C... I always turn the fan to "ON"... before I switch the A/C unit on... The fan came on as expected... but when I moved the switch to A/C... all power in the RV went out... the Power to the Refrigerator & Micro Wave... everything dead.

Turning off the A/C and the blower again... out to the post to reset the breaker.. and trying once again... same results. The electrician found the power going to one side of the 30 amp connection was low...

Reading the others posts... I believe I should be getting a Surge Protector as well. I procrastinated buying tires as well... and that came back to bite me... Time to get one before I need to Kick my self again !!

 

[Peteandsharon]

Here is another thing to consider regarding campground power. I had a situation a couple of years ago with a previous rig (a Sunnybrook travel trailer). I was working on something under my slideout when I realized that I was getting a bit of a shock every time I touched a part of the frame. I spent a lot of time checking the electrical system trying to determine what was going on. Only by accident did I finally realize that the issue was in the plug itself. The ground prong on the 30 amp plug had been fried and it had effectively lost its ground. While purchasing a new plug to splice into the end of my electrical cable, the salesperson gave me a good explanation as to what probably happened. He said that over time many campground outlets go bad. When people jerk their plug out of the outlet they often do so roughly and over time the outlet gets looser and looser. When your plug does not fit snugly in the outlet the connection is less than ideal and it causes you to draw more current than a good connection would draw. This causes the plug to overheat. In my case you could actually see where the ground prong had blackened from the heat. Not sure what the lesson is here except to check whether your plug fits snugly in the outlet and to check your plug for signs of overheating.

 

[RnRCycloner]

Thanks to all for your replies.. Sorry that any has had bad experiences, especially incurring damage..

It appears important to test power before hooking up, but even more important to invest in a surge protector and use it all the time.. Even if power checks good, there's no guarentee it will stay good..

Thanks for the links to recommended surge protectors, I will curtainly purchase one in the very near future..

Happy Camping

 

[jpmorgan37]

Having spent a fair amount of time is Texas and Florida and experienced a number of electrical storms, our surge protector has saved our appliances and electronics a number of times with close lightning strikes. I don't even think about hooking up without it.

John

 

[cdbMidland]

What to do, what to do.

With limited finances and with all the tire and wheel tires I have had, I was trying to justify the Pressure Pro monitoring device. Now, for about the same money, and since I winter camp in Florida with its lightening storms, now its the surge protector. Whick one is the most important for me?

Is there a cheaper device that allows one to check the campground plug that might cut down the possibility of part of this problem?

 

[ct0218]

There are inexpensive polarity testers, and multimeters for checking voltage. The pair can be bought for as little as $15. Now, the 15A plug-in polarity testers can check a 30A pedestal plug if you plug in a 30A to 15A adapter, then plug in the tester. It cannot check both hot legs of the 50A outlet. It takes a little fancier unit to do that, and that is why they tend to cost somewhat more. I guess you could plug in the coach, then use a 15A polarity tester in 2 different coach outlets that are on different legs BEFORE powering up anything inside. I would think loose connections or just low voltage would be the primary cause of pedestal problems. Florida does have a lot of lightening, and if I had to choose between the surge suppressor and the Pressure Pro--it would be surge suppression. A major surge can be very expensive, as can low voltage. I have surge suppression and a Hughes Autoformer.

 

[jmgratz]

Well lets see, the micro/convection oven costs about $890, the converter $375, the central vac $200, the TV $395, and when you add that up the surge protector is very cheap.

 

[jbeletti]

Chuck,

I agree with Clark - especially since you will be stationary in FL for a while - go with the electrical protection.

I too use the Hughes Autoformer.

Many others out there. Some just suppress surges while others provide a bit of under/over voltage correction. Hughes does both. And it is HEAVY and $$$.

Makes a nice Christmas gift (for you!). But get Saundra something she'll enjoy more

Jim

 

[RnRCycloner]

Chuck,
You can fabricate a tester that will verify the campground pedestal power is OK to start with for around $50.00, and is good to do. Here is a link to build one http://www.myrv.us/electric/

However this will not guard against surges and sages..

Ron

 

[JohnDar]

Chuck,

I agree with Clark - especially since you will be stationary in FL for a while - go with the electrical protection.

I too use the Hughes Autoformer.

Many others out there. Some just suppress surges while others provide a bit of under/over voltage correction. Hughes does both. And it is HEAVY and $$$.

Makes a nice Christmas gift (for you!). But get Saundra something she'll enjoy more

Jim

Hey, Jim,
Just how do you use that autoformer? Do you plug it in at the pedestal or is it installed in your coach? If installed, where and how? Curious, since the BH3670 has a marine shore power plug on the outside. Looking at the limited information for those units, and the installation kits they sell, I'm unclear as to how it gets connected internally. I would not want to leave an expensive unit like that sitting on the ground, padlock or not.

 

[jbeletti]

John,

The Hughes Autoformer I have is designed to be plugged in at the power pedestal.

Then the 50 amp shore power cord plugs into the Autoformer.

That said, if you liked this specific product, there is no reason why you could not semi-build it into the coach. Others have done this and done so, such that the Autoformer could be removed in the event you sold the coach or the Autoformer required repair.

Bear in mind too that there are several other brands and some of them offer inline units and built-in versions.

Jim

On edit: Looks like Hughes offers an install kit to install these inline units inside the RV:

 

[ct0218]

In my Landmark I cut the power cable running from the connection outside to the distribution panel (in the access area next to the basement). I added 1 male and 1 female 50A receptacle to the cable ends, and put the autoformer in there and plugged it in. It is safe, out of the weather, yet easily accessible (even though it works automatically). It has been there for almost 3 years now, works great. The CG we had it parked in had very low voltage in the summer, 101V to 108V quite often, and this took care of that. Two of my neighbors lost various appliances in a storm but we were unharmed. I believe in them.

 

[JohnDar]

In my Landmark I cut the power cable running from the connection outside to the distribution panel (in the access area next to the basement). I added 1 male and 1 female 50A receptacle to the cable ends, and put the autoformer in there and plugged it in. It is safe, out of the weather, yet easily accessible (even though it works automatically). It has been there for almost 3 years now, works great. The CG we had it parked in had very low voltage in the summer, 101V to 108V quite often, and this took care of that. Two of my neighbors lost various appliances in a storm but we were unharmed. I believe in them.

Once again, the light goes on in my head. You wired the female to the cut end of the cord and plugged the autoformer into that. Then using the cord (like the installation kit picture), you connect the ends to the distribution panel and plug the male end of the cord into the autoformer.
I'm going to have to take out another loan just to buy all the accessories I've been reading about. And my BH3670 is still sitting at the dealership until spring