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High campground voltage issue
During my last camping trip over the 4 July holiday we were at Jetty Park campground at Port Canaveral, Fl. We had full hookups with 50 Amp power. The volatge ran 124 to 127 volts all weekend. Besides the Aqua Hot issue I had decribed in this post:
http://prevostcommunity.com/forum/threaddetails.asp?Category=HVAC&ThreadID=556
I had another issue that may be releated. When we tried to use the washer and dryer we discovered they would not work. If we turned them on, they would not run and would trip 2 GFI breakers on the panel that feeds inverter power to several circuits. Now the washer and dryer are NOT powered thru the inverter panel. They have there own circuit breaker on the main power panel. That breaker did not trip.
To make a long story shorter, I disconnected shore power and started the generater. Everything worked fine. When I got home, plugged into my 50 Amp plug and everything worked fine.
So I have a couple of questions.
1. I assume it has something to do with the campground power but what, high volatege, bad ground.., ???
2. Why did the inverter circuit breakers trip and not the circuit breaker that actually feeds the washer dryer.
The dryer is 220 volt if that makes any difference. This is the first time I have seen this type of problem.
Any ideas on the cause?
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22 Replies
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Sounds like a neutral problem Andre, but maybe someone else with
more AC knowledge will jump in here. -
Alternating current such as 120 or 240 as provided by a utility is deemed within acceptable limits if it is within a range of plus or minus 10% of nominal. The voltages cited are well within the acceptable range and if I always had electric power within that voltage range I would do a happy dance.
All UL listed or certified products are tested to that standard so I doubt if the issues are voltage related. If a GFCI trips it is not an overload or voltage problem, but a problem with continuity to ground.
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I was in a campground and one leg was running as low as 106 volts. As soon as this happened the inverters would go to invert, raise the voltage to 120 and return to float. Then back down to 106 and back to invert for several seconds up to 120 and float again. My question is does this hurt anything or is the system doing what it’s designed to do. It made me nervous watching switch back and forth every few seconds so I went to one A/C and only ran it while I was there.
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Scott, I would not my inverter supplied appliances subjected to switching back and forth between commercial power and inverter power. If I had 106 volts and my inverter toggled between being on and off I would force it to off. This would keep everything on commercial power and ensure the battery charger stays on. I’m assuming there was no other reason for the inverter toggling besides the voltage.
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I only partially agree with Gil. 106 is too low and to continue to run the coach on 106 volts might cause ACs to drop out. The amperage is certainly going to rise.
I would leave the inverters on and start the generator until the campground power is in a more normal range.
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Some inverters have a Low AC voltage setting that you can
adjust. The inverters were doing their job adding voltage when seeing
106 volts and you could possibly increase that setting to 110. The
function of adding power happens so fast, I doubt there is any danger
in harming your AC loads.As Jon mentioned, the generator is the other option if it’s
practical based on your location. -
Jon, Everyone on my street were having the same problem. I just used the rear air and left the main A/C off when the voltage dropped because at that time the generator wasn’t running. Prevost fixed that so now I have that option.
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I have no clue about your specific model inverters, how they are set up, or their operating limits. But assuming I understand the issue properly your shore power voltage is low. Your inverter may be set up to drop off line as a pass through device and battery charger at some low voltage limit and switch to inverting.
Under normal voltages within an acceptable range inverters that are supplied shore power are functioning solely as battery chargers and an internal circuit (usually a relay) is closed so shore or generator power goes directly to the 120 volt devices. But when the voltages go out of range on the low side the inverter goes nuts because if it jumps between inverting and passing through shore power your 120 volt devices are possibly getting power interruptions or fluctuations. I don’t see any advantage in ignoring what is happening. Even though we may not be aware of what is happening in the background with power to the 120 volt devices I cannot believe it is good for the inverters or the 120 volt devices, not only from voltage fluctuations, but possible phase issues.
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The most effective fix is to use a line monitoring product like those sold by Progressive Industries and others. These devices are often marketed as surge suppressors, which they are. Don’t get just a surge suppressor! Those with line monitoring include voltage and polarity monitors. If the commercial power is too low or too high they will not supply power to the coach. To guard against toggling on and off they also have a delay circuit, 3 minutes I think. Power must be good for the full period of the delay circuit before power is supplied to the coach.
106 volts is low, but it should not be too low to safely operate your coach. The low voltage drop out for the Progressive Industries monitor is 104V. The safe operating voltage of most appliances is 100V, some even less.
It’s likely the problem was really related to nuetral. Low voltage will not trip a ground fualt circuit breaker.
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At 106 volts some AC units will drop off line. Some inverters will switch from pass thru devices that are charging the batteries to inverters. They usually have a delay, but never the less they are jumping back and forth.
We have generators. Big capable generators that are used so infrequently they will rust out before we wear them out. If we have shore power voltage issues why beat our batteries up when all we have to do is start our generators and exercise them as they should be anyway?
I hate to travel in the summer because campground power is so lousy and our needs for power is at its greatest. If we have a high dollar coach it makes no sense to suffer with one or two ACs running through the inverters when we can run our generator, prevent possible damage to batteries, inverters or devices that need good power and stay comfortable with everything runnning in our coaches.
I guess its a personal choice, but I vote for comfort and if I have to add hours to my generator I’m going to. At the rate I use a generator it will be a long time before I approach the 30,000 to 40,000 hours of service they provide in entertainer coaches so I look for reasons to run the generator and to run it hard.
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I agree with you now that my generator is running again. It wasn’t during that stay. It does seem alot of campgrounds have power issues. That is something that should be mentioned in campground reviews.
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Good point about mentioning power issues in campgrounds.
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As Jon says, The problem seems to arise more in the summer when energyb consumption is at it’s peak in these parks, I too like to travel any time, but summer, seems to bring out the demons in mechanical things.
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Jon makes great points. For the life of me I can’t understand why AC units would ever be run through inverters. Frankly, AC units just draw too much power at start-up, especially if compressor head pressure hasn’t come down before the compressor cycles again. How long can you really run an AC unit off of batteries? I know Liberty ran the AC units through inverters, did any other converter do teh same?
Many of the older campgrounds just can’t handle the AC needs of today’s RVs if their park is anywhere near full. Yet another reason to have a good power monitor. Just a few weeks ago my power conditioner shut my power down in the heat of the day. My neighbors didn’t even know there was a brown out; I’m sure their appliances did.
Wouldn’t it be great to let our generators work when campground power is bad? Unfortunately, most campgrounds forbit the use of generators. If you were enjoying a day with your windows open and your neighbor started their generator you wouldn’t be too pleased. Even were I am today here in Fairbanks AK it’s 60-70 degrees out and our neighbor has his AquaHot operating on diesel–why! When the park is low voltage you have little choice other than accept it or leave. Low voltage is no stranger to many marinas. At least at the marinas, at least the ones I’ve been at, they don’t restrict generator use.
I still stringly encourage the use of power monitoring devices rather than relying on inverters to make the switching decisions. Another plus to some of the power monitoring devices is that they will raise a code telling you what the actual failure is.
That reminds me I need to exercise my generator.
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As a former manufacturer of shore power boxes (temporary power outlets oultified to UL 231) we dealt with a lot of campgrounds. If I had to point fingers at why campgrounds have power issues I would never point them at the RVs.
It is typical or common to find the power outlet provided for hookups in an RV park are going to be a 50-30-20 meaning there are breakers and receptacles for our 50 amp plugs. As I have pointed out previously we can expect to load both legs of a 50 amp service with 40 amps continuous. Anything over that is a gift. If we get 120 volts our power is being delivered according to “standard”. It is within an acceptable range if it is as low as 108 volts or as high as 132 volts. If we draw 40 amps per leg at 120 volts, we will draw 44.4 amps at 108 or 36.4 at 132 volts. As the voltage gets lower the amperage gets higher. The point is that low voltage results in greater amperage. That affects the loads we can impose on the system.
When problems start we have found they relate to how the RV park has wired the power outlets. If all power outlets were wired direct to a distribution panel we have found less issues because there are fewer connections between the distribution panel and the outlet. That type of wiring is called “home runs” with each outlet provided its own breaker in the distribution panel.
The alternative way to wire outlets is to have a row of outlets fed from a single large breaker feeding a power outlet, and then from that power outlet the cable goes to the next outlet, then to the next and the next. That method of wiring is called a “loop feed”. The power outlet at the end of that row of outlets has multiple electric connections along the way to getting its power. The problem is over time electrical connections loosen and loose connections create resistance which in turn drops voltage. The utility supplying power in the summer is loaded and may have low voltage so when additional connections are added and more feet of cable are between the transformer and the RV receptacle it is no surprise we are faced with lousy electric power. Add in power hungry RVs at every site and it is no surprise when voltages drop.
The RVs are not the problem however. They are only going to draw whatever power the outlet box circuit breakers allow. It is the responsibility of the RV park to have a system designed and capable of delivering the power the boxes are capable of supplying to the RV.
Whether to run the generator or not is another whole topic for debate.
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