Anyone have any suggestions for troubleshooting/fixing this problem?
All electrical circuits worked fine during PDI and 2 nites of camping while bringing new camper home from dealer in late March '08 (470 mile trip). Since then we've had slides out and in 5 or 6 times while cleaning, loading, admiring, showing off to friends, etc. THEN, last weekend when on our first camping outing, circuit #4 (labeled "slides") in the 120v panel was not working. The breaker for that circuit will not reset when shore power is present but will reset if I disconnect shore power, until I restore shore power and then it trips again. This effects the outlet under the upper cabinet between fridge and microwave, the a/c power to the fridge, also the near-floor outlet in lounge chair slide, the outlet to TV and tuner in rear entertainment center and the near-floor outlet in big door-side slide.
I am fairly familiar with electrical wiring and so far I have opened up the circuit breaker panel box, and all outlet boxes and found no obvious problem, opened 3 junction boxes (one each under kitchen and lounge chair slides and one next to the outlet in the lounge chair slide... again no obvious problem. I also went to what I believe is the first outlet box in the circuit (next to fridge/microwave) and disconnected the wires (thus isolating the portion of the circuit past that point away from the circuit prior to that point). The breaker still trips when shore power is applied thus telling me the short is somewhere between the circuit breaker panel box and that first outlet. The GFCI outlets work fine and apparently are not part of this circuit.
At this point I believe I have either a faulty breaker (I intend to call Heartland customer service today to request a new breaker) , or a pinched wire (bared conductor touching/grounded to frame), perhaps caused by the action of the kitchen slide. I ran out of time last night, but my next step is to remove the fabric covered panel in the storage area allowing access to the area behind the electrical panel to see if I can track the wire from main panel to first outlet box to find a short.
Having said all that, does anyone have any thoughts on what else I can do to trouble shoot this problem?
P.S. The two closest Heartland dealers are 90 and 93 miles distant, so I'd just as soon fix this myself, if I can.
All electrical circuits worked fine during PDI and 2 nites of camping while bringing new camper home from dealer in late March '08 (470 mile trip). Since then we've had slides out and in 5 or 6 times while cleaning, loading, admiring, showing off to friends, etc. THEN, last weekend when on our first camping outing, circuit #4 (labeled "slides") in the 120v panel was not working. The breaker for that circuit will not reset when shore power is present but will reset if I disconnect shore power, until I restore shore power and then it trips again. This effects the outlet under the upper cabinet between fridge and microwave, the a/c power to the fridge, also the near-floor outlet in lounge chair slide, the outlet to TV and tuner in rear entertainment center and the near-floor outlet in big door-side slide.
I am fairly familiar with electrical wiring and so far I have opened up the circuit breaker panel box, and all outlet boxes and found no obvious problem, opened 3 junction boxes (one each under kitchen and lounge chair slides and one next to the outlet in the lounge chair slide... again no obvious problem. I also went to what I believe is the first outlet box in the circuit (next to fridge/microwave) and disconnected the wires (thus isolating the portion of the circuit past that point away from the circuit prior to that point). The breaker still trips when shore power is applied thus telling me the short is somewhere between the circuit breaker panel box and that first outlet. The GFCI outlets work fine and apparently are not part of this circuit.
At this point I believe I have either a faulty breaker (I intend to call Heartland customer service today to request a new breaker) , or a pinched wire (bared conductor touching/grounded to frame), perhaps caused by the action of the kitchen slide. I ran out of time last night, but my next step is to remove the fabric covered panel in the storage area allowing access to the area behind the electrical panel to see if I can track the wire from main panel to first outlet box to find a short.
Having said all that, does anyone have any thoughts on what else I can do to trouble shoot this problem?
P.S. The two closest Heartland dealers are 90 and 93 miles distant, so I'd just as soon fix this myself, if I can.