Air Conditioner on the Generator

Sorry, but I have no answers to any of your questions. When he returns from his second camping trip I will pass the info/questions on to him. Thanks very much for your responses.

Tough to help when you don't respond to questions

Not enough info to try and help after 14 hours.

First of all, an Adventurer only has one house air conditioner and it is in the basement right rear compartment. Second, if you neighbor doesn't have a manual, have him go to winnebagoind.com/resources and download the manual. Everything he needs to troubleshoot the electrical system is in that manual.

Now to address what he should do first is determine if his generator is working or not. He should start by turning on on a 120vac appliance and other than the AC. It is also nice to have a non-contact voltage checker. If at this point you or he is lost or wondering what to do next, get on site help.

If you're comfortable doing more, start as recommended earlier in this thread with checking the generatorbreakers, ect.

The Adventurer uses an automatic transfer switch to go from shore power to generator. . If there is 120vac out of generator check the house circuit breakers.

In addition to the owners manual on line, there is a full set of electrical schematics and a very detailed list of almost every single thing used to build the house with the Winnebago part numbers.

With all this in hand, he should have as I mentioned before a non-contact voltage checker, a DMM(digital multi meter) a 12vdc test light with about a six foot cord (two is better, one long cord and one short cord) all these things are available from Harbor Freight Tools and about three million other stores including Lowes, Home Depot and AutoZone and ... Simple hand tools also but you knew that.

If at any time either of you feels nervous about checking circuits, get help from a pro!

Good luck and tell you neighbor I think the Adventurer is a great rig.

Portable generator or class A with built in
Portable: Primary suspect: Generator too small

Installed In "line" order

Circuit breakers on Generator
Manual Transfer not plugged in
Auto transfer not working (Do other 120 volt things like MIcrowave work?)
Generator losing capacity due to age and lack of exercise. Generator output voltage.

Something I've not seen before

NOTE: Air conditioners are also "Variable" on mine if I park under the cottonwoods in cottonwood season, or if for some other reason the condensers start gunking up... with "Cotton" the system gets hot, pressures rise, the compressor works harder and CLICK goes the 20 amp breaker.. The bigger A/C draws less than 14 amps normally.. A quick trip topside and they work great again.

Two Hands wrote:
Anyone have an idea of what might be wrong?

The only thing that "we" know for sure is that you haven't provided enough information to even make an educated guess.

Some simple tests with a multimeter and circuit breaker checking comes first.

I think it is voltage problem.... your generator is not supplying the required power to your AC... try to measure the power supplied by your generator.

Admin: http://bakingreview.com/

Three things come to mind.
1. On the generator with the cover removed you will find 2 breakers, make sure both are flipped to On.
2a. If the RV doesn't have a transfer switch, then the cord needs to plugged into a receptacle in the same bay. That's how it is on my 2007 Sightseer.
2b. If you need to plug it in, as above, then inside the RV there should be a switch that toggles between Generator & Power Cord.
3. It is possible your Transfer Switch, which automatically switches between generator and the power cord, is either bad or dirty. Knowing what he has can help to further diagnose the issue.

check the breakers on the generator itself

Will anything besides the ac run on the generator? Like the water heater? Microwave? Toaster?