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Equalizer arced, sparked and smoked….what the?
Ok, I recently had the life scared out of me with our relatively new to us Marathon conversion. We returned from our third short shakedown trip (had the coach 2 1/2 months at the time) and had brought the coach back to her garage. I returned 4 days later to leave something in the garage for my friend who owns it. I just happened to be thirsty, so I walked over to the coach, went inside and retreived a bottled water out of the fridge. As I came out the door, I heard a strange popping sound coming from the rear of the coach. I walked to the side engine compartment door, and that’s where the sound was coming from. I opened the door and started trying to locate what was making the sound. To my complete shock, I looked up around where the air filter is and saw arcing between what looked like a battery equalizer and where it was attached in the engine compartment. Within seconds thick acrid white smoke began shooting from the area, as more arcing, then sparking and what I believed to be small flames started to occur. I quickly realized this was about to potentially be a catastrophic situation. I immediately flipped the chassis 12 and 24 volt switches off, then ran to the house and flipped those off as well, then ran to the other side and unplugged the coach from 50 amp service. By that time, the garage (3 bays and work shop area) was completely filled with that horrible thick white electrical smoke so I grabbed the fire extinquisher, opened the 3 bay doors and ran out. Thankfully, either I stopped the situation from escalating, or it burned itself out…either way, it progressed no further than what I have just explained. So right after this happened, I had surgery, nothing major, but I have been totally out of commision for 3 weeks since it occured. I have been scouring any information I can find to try and figure out what made this happen. The 2 days before this happened, I went to Interstate Batteries to get info on ordering new house and chassis batteries since they all were close to, or needed to be replaced (the previous owner wouldn’t replace them all at the same time, so some needed it and some didn’t. We wanted them to all rotate out at the same time so we wouldn’t worry about one bad battery spoiling the bunch). Anyway, all I have been able to do is lay around and try to figure out what the heck happened. I am at a loss, as I haven’t yet been able to find anyone else that this has happened to. The picture below shows where the battery EQ is located, and where everything happened.
Here is a pic of the actual battery EQ:
I’m not sure what the oily substance is, it apparently leaked out during the incident, as well as the brown area on the corners that you see. Anyway, I am hoping someone can shed a little light on what might have made this happen. I already felt the effects of the learning curve in trying to learn everything I can about the operating systems of chassis and house, but now I’m scared that something I did, or didn’t do may have inadvertently caused this….and if it wasn’t me, I certainly want to know, so that it doesn’t happen again. Fire in the coach is one of everyone’s big fears, and now mine too.
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8 Replies
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The first step is to get that out of the coach, and it will likely show something within the equalizer burned.
I don’t believe that was original equipment (could be but I never saw one used for the chassis) so I would look to Inverter Services for a Vanner 100 amp replacement. They could look at your existing one and possibly assure you the entire issue was internal to the equalizer and a new one will cure the problem.
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There was a recall on the Surepower equalizers some time ago and I had to do mine. Surepower sent me a new Equalizer at no cost. Mine was on the chassis, but some got mounted for the house as well. Marathon has changed out many that were for the house.
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Thanks Jon….
If I’m feeling up to it, I’m going to try to start putting the coach right tomorrow. I believe (according to what I have gleaned from reading all my coach specific material) that particular EQ was put in by Marathon to supply 12V for the trailer towing package. The location of the main chassis Vanners and Isolator is below that area where the chasis batteries are.
Thanks for the suggestion to have the old unit looked at, I will def do that and hope that the issue was in fact isolated to that singular part. Is there anything I could do to insure that that didn’t happen again? I can’t help but feel like if I hadn’t been there, we may have had a situation that would have been difficult to recover from.
Robin
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Thanks for the info Tom.
I am going to look at some of the other pics of the Sure EQ that I have and see if I can match a number. The previous owner was pretty particular about the coach, so he would be mortified if he knew he had missed that, or any other recall. Reading the recall info however sounds an awful lot like what happened.
Robin
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From looking at teh picture and a lttle research the device you are showing is a power converter, not an equalizer. It takes 24 volts and converts it to 12 volts. Thus the large cooling fins on the device. Marathon may have installed these to give you a separate, good 12 volt supply for the trailering package. It is rated at 20 amps.
So there may be an isue with the internal conversion device. The fluid you see may just be oil that they use internally to remove heat from the devices that convert the voltage. Either way there is either a very heavy load on the 12 volt side that keeps the converter working and building heat.
Check with Leon at Marathon (800-365-0156) and let him explain its use and possibly get you a diagram of the wiring both on the input and on the output (if it does go to the trailer plug). You may have a short or a harness rubbed through and it finally touched the chassis and shorted the device. Use Marathon for finding the purpose of the device and you will find your problem.
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Oops, posted same time as Prevost Service, so this may not apply, but is good info anyway.
Robin,
FYI, if it’s the chassis Equalizer, it was likely changed out by someone in the past coach history. When I did mine, I had several conversations with Prevost and they did not use Surepower in favor of Vanner. That’s what happened to mine, someone changed out the original Vanner to the Surepower.
Here’s the updated version:
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Thank you Prevost Service –
So appreciate the insight, and contact info for Leon at Marathon. I will reach out to him tomorrow and get his take on what the device is for, how it works and any wiring info that may help chase the in’s and out’s.
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Tom –
Thanks for your post and pic (I love when people put pics in with posts!). Even if i figure out that your info isn’t applicable this time, I am sure that some time soon it will come in handy for myself or someone else who may stumble across this thread.
It has been tough not being able to get back to the coach, and trying to figure this out with just a few pics, a scary video, old service records, some Marathon materials, fabulous Prevost materials and any info I could find on the web. After getting the input from everyone today, I feel ready to tackle this and get our beloved coach back on the road!! Thanks everyone for your time and expertise…….just makes you feel better when other eyes are looking at it with you!!!
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