New class A owner (Electrical cord)

The 50A cord would be the best choice. However, think about what you are going to plug it into. Even with adapters down to common household plugs which will work, remember that the house wiring to the plugs may only be 12G or less. A 6G cord plugged into an outlet with only 14G wire is the same as 14G all the way to the RV. An outlet in a shop should be a 12G/30A circuit. That is fine to keep power on a 50A rig for lights, battery charge, occasional TV use. One AC sometimes. Water heater?? if AC is off. Just don't get carried away and overload. Watch your plugs and connectors for overheating.

Seniorfirsttimer wrote:
Jerry, what about a 30', 50 amp cord as sold by Camping World? It's the same large size as in the MH. It would double the length of the cord.

Time-to-go-now, it is a 50 amp and that is pretty much what I want to do but I would like to go down to a 15-20 amp cord. I have a 30 amp to 15-20 amp adapter. I could then use the 2 adapters together, 50 to 30 and 30 to 15/20. I just don't know why the book says no extension cords.

jhilley, could you expand on your reasoning.

Thanks to all.

I would see no problem with the 30' 50 amp cord. We're setting in an RV park in northern Michigan right now with our original 50 amp cord connected to the same extension cord. The 50 amp outlet is nearly 50 feet from the coach so an extension is required.

According to the spec sheet if this is the one you're looking at it has 6 gauge wires which should be plenty.

http://www.campingworld.com/shopping/item/power-grip-heavy-duty-50a-extension-cord-30-ft-/37814

The larger the wire, the more current carrying capacity, and the longer the extension cord can be. A 12 gauge wire extension cord may be fine for 50 feet where a 16 gauge cord, which is a very common light duty extension cord around the house, should not be used at all.
A 14 gauge extension cord, should be limited to 25 feet maximum.
The wire size of the cord will be marked on the package as you buy it or will be stamped/embossed on the side of the wire. It may be something like this: 12 AWG, 14 AWG, 16 AWG. AWG means American Wire Gauge.
In any case, you should not try to use more than 15 amps total when you are hooked up to a standard 120 volt outlet. This means that you cannot use the AC and the microwave at the same time, etc.

With my Progressive surge protector I have a read out of the voltage and amperage inside the MH. I have used a 115v extension cord on occasion with the adapter to 30 amps with a minimal loss of power reading on the meter.
It would depend on how much power is needed to run anything inside.

Jerry, what about a 30', 50 amp cord as sold by Camping World? It's the same large size as in the MH. It would double the length of the cord.

Time-to-go-now, it is a 50 amp and that is pretty much what I want to do but I would like to go down to a 15-20 amp cord. I have a 30 amp to 15-20 amp adapter. I could then use the 2 adapters together, 50 to 30 and 30 to 15/20. I just don't know why the book says no extension cords.

jhilley, could you expand on your reasoning.

Thanks to all.

You can do exactly as before. As long as you don't over load the extension cord you are using. Use at least a 12 gauge extension for a 15 amp or 20 amp circuit.

I'm assuming your rig is 50 amp (50 amp will have 4 prongs on the plug). If so, they make a 50 amp to 30 amp connector. This will plug into a 30 amp RV plug. This is exactly what I do at home. Only drawback is that you can only run one A/C unit. Everything else works fine.

Good Luck.

The problem with extension cords is that the longer they are, the more resistance in the cord. The higher the resistance means the more the voltage drop is. What that means is that your 115VAC after it is dropped by the resistance in the cord may only be 95 volts (depending on the actual voltage drop or length of the cord.) Once voltage drops 108 or so (not sure of exact low voltage) electronics may start to be damaged. So I guess it would depend on the length of the cord. One alternative would be to just run a extension to a battery charger to keep batteries topped off. Then you could run 12VDC items with no worries.