Help Wiring New Converter to Motorhome

The 120 volt circuit breaker should feed the 120 volt side of the converter. Didn't the converter come with a pigtail for the 120 volt?
The 12 volt output should go the 12 volt power distribution section fused with about a 60 amp for your new converter.
#10 wire is not large enough for you 60 amp new converter. In place of the afore mention 60 amp, you could install a thirty amp fuse.
You need to trace out the white wire. If it goes to chassis ground it should not be an issue.
The red wire could be a charge wire from the chassis. You need to trace it out.
Black wire going to rear needs to traced out. It could be for power to a toad or ?.

Motorohme is a 1986 glendale sterling and the allanson convert is an all in one unit. It appears as though I can unblock the 120 volt portion withe the fuses...although I have not yet tried. The charge converter is hooked up to a 15 amp 120 volt breaker which I assume goes to the transformer on the 12 volt side. Regarding the 12 volt side it has 15 amp bus fuses directly on the front panel and it's wired in. Once removed I'm left with the white 10 awg ground going to ground in the engine chassy not the negative terminal, and a red 10 awg going to the battery solenoid aswell as the five 10 awg wires on all the 12 volt appliances and the green ground which is to ground the converter chassy to the frame under the motorhome. This part i did not mention but there is a black 10awg from the 12 volt positive tied in going somewhere to the back of the motorhome with no fuse....it appears as someone ran this for the rear lights and a quick connection to the battery, either way i will leave that and just hook it up to the dc distributuon block on a 15 amp fuse. I will try and upload a wiring diagram later tonight so show what I plan to do.

Somewhat confused here on what you are trying to do...

Your motorhome should a 120VAC/12VDC Power Distribution Center somewhere were all of the 120VAC Circuit breakers and 12VDC Circuit Fuses are located.

This Distribution Center usually has a Converter/Charger unit installed in the bottom compartment.

This is basic RV TRAILER Wiring Configuration that is most likly the same for the Motorhone with a few exceptions...



I usually don't respond to the Motorhome post but it seems to me you are going off into left field by saying you want to get the PD9260C Converter/charger unit and then start talking you just want to add a few 12VDC fused item to it...

I need a little more info with model numbers to understand what you are replacing maybe...

I've never heard of an ALLANSON Converter...

What is the year and Model of your Motorhome... Does it have a 120VAC/12VDC Power Distribution Panel where all of the 120VAC Breakers and 12VDC ATV fuses are located...

This is something the Power Converter feeds along with the Battery connected to the same lugs on the Distribution Panel. Then the Converter supplies 12VDC to the Power Distribution Panel when you are connected to shore power or running off generator and the the 12VDC from Battery is also present at this same connection to provide 12VDC to the Distribution Panel. When connected to shore power then the Converter is also a charger now and keeps your battery charged.

Note the 12VDC side of the Power Distribution panel powers up all of your 12VDC item including the ceiling lamps etc...

I just can't think why you want to install the PD9260C 60AMP Converter/Charger unit and only want to connect it to a couple of DC items and a battery???

If you remove the old ALLANSON Converter/Charger unit your 12VDC side of the Power Distribution Center will not work unless the PD9260C converter unit is connected to its DC Power connection points???? The Power Distribution Center is already connected to your frame grounds on the 12VDC side where needed.

Just confused what you are doing here...

Roy Ken

It's OK for the converter negative output to be connected to the frame (chassis ground), or for it to be connected to the negative battery terminal which, of course, is also connected to chassis ground. If the battery is a long distance away, a nearby solid chassis ground saves on wire and may well be a lower impedance current path. My converter is wired with the negative output going to chassis ground, in fact.

The converter's chassis bonding lug must be connected directly to a chassis ground. This is a safety connection, not a current carrying connection. The instruction manual for the converter covers this pretty clearly. (This is needed to carry ground return current in the event of a converter or wiring fault, rather than having the full 60A converter output going through the AC input ground wire which is in no way sized to handle that current.)

The positive would normally pass through a battery disconnect relay.
The converter could be connected directly to the frame as well as the negative from the battery. The frame of the rig would act as the negative path rather then a wire.

enblethen wrote:
There should be two grounds. They are not the same.
One is a safety ground for the 120 volt AC system that connects to the metal housing of the converter.
The second one is the negative for the 12 volts DC output from the converter.
See page 6 of installation manual

It looks like the battery's positive is hooked up to a solenoid (assuming an isolator from the starting battery), can I just plug the negative output directly into the battery or does it need to go through the solenoid?

I understand they are not the same…my old converter now has a chassy ground for the 120V side to the chassy but the output negative terminal appears to not be connect to the house battery in any way it appears to be connected to a ground point in the engine chassy…is this normal? I know a lot of people messed with the wiring in this unit before me.

There should be two grounds. They are not the same.
One is a safety ground for the 120 volt AC system that connects to the metal housing of the converter.
The second one is the negative for the 12 volts DC output from the converter.
See page 6 of installation manual