How to check electricity at a campground
I just read a campground review where the RV-ers checked the electricity at 3-4 sites before they found one that was good. We have been RV-ing for many years. We don't check but I think it is abou...
Forum Discussion
Gjac wrote:
If voltage is less than 107 v I would look for another site if you want to run AC.
The problem with that is you are measuring open circuit (no load) voltage and it can plummet out of sight once you plug in and start turning loads on. Doesn't have to be anywhere near 107 to do that either. In some cases, just the charging current from a converter can cause an EMS to cut your power off due to low volts. You *could* spend lots of time squeezing your RV into a really tight/small site only to find the voltage is cr*p after all that effort...
If a pedestal looks suspect and/or the CG is old, you could take a coffee maker or electric heater and plug into the pedestal and see what the voltage does.
Older campgrounds are usually the ones with low voltage problems because they can have long individual 30 amp (and 50 amps if they have many or even any) runs to pedestals and the wiring wasn't required to be sized for the high demand from RVs that exists nowadays with so many AC units and other high demand appliances. Newer CGs/RV parks with their loop-fed pedestals are much less likely to have voltage issues. If you are at a pedestal with 30 and 50 amps you are even less likely to have low voltage.
In the face of adversity due to low voltage, there's always the Hughes autoformer... :)
