Things are looking a bit better after my original post about mice chewing my power cord - this is only a part of the damage:I was having nightmares about the entire 110v system looking like this :-(I always thought that the cord was stored in a small box pretending to be a narrow "end table" at the back of our 5er; so I was surprised to find this after taking the paneling off the side of the "table" (and destroying it and the corner trim pieces with it)The "mouse hole" for the cord and the storage are actually BELOW the floorSo a previous reply to my first post was correct: the "tasty" insulated cord is expensive and the RV builder won't run it any farther than they have to. My biggest fear was that it entered the trailer, then ran under the floor, where the mice had clearly been; and it was decimated right up to the electric panel about 12' away :-(The truth is that it comes into the junction box; then goes overhead from this point using "regular" wire. There was no sign that the mice had entered this box (and yes, we now there was some old water damage, probably from a leaking taillight. Since we have an aluminum-frame trailer - we're not too worried about it; and everything has been resealed).So I'm assuming I should be able to cut the power cord where it comes through the floor; and wire it into a Marineco 30-amp power outlet installed inside this box, so we can utilize a detachable cord.I'm not home free - there's a bunch of 12v wires coming up from below. I might be missing some tailights or marker lights; but now that I know the higher-voltage wire goes UP, not below, I think I'm feeling braver about not having this thing catch on fire....

I would route the orange NM cable down through the hole and mount your Marinco shore power cord connector right on the end of it. If there enough slack to do this.

Not knowing how far back the main power cord is damaged, if it were me, I'd simply pull the cord up through the inside of the box past the last bad area. Then cut the cord, strip the wires, and then just re-attach in the metal junction box. Simple, but it will shorten your on-board cord. Then go out and simply purchase a ready made 30 or 50 foot RV extension cord with proper 30 or 50 amp plugs (depending upon which system you have.)Don't know about the other wires for you lights, those will have to be checked one at a time. The good thing is though, they are all 12 volt DC. A bare wire is much safer than AC 120 volt, unless they touch each other and short out your power supply.Just an idea, pull the cord up past the last bad part, cut, strip and reattach at the metal junction. Not a difficult fix at all.

DutchmenSport wrote:Not knowing how far back the main power cord is damaged, if it were me, I'd simply pull the cord up through the inside of the box past the last bad area. Then cut the cord, strip the wires, and then just re-attach in the metal junction box. Simple, but it will shorten your on-board cord. I thought about putting a new plug on the end of it (the damage is from the middle, out to the plug) - but in cold weather, stuffing this cord back into the "mouse hole" is a real nightmare (pulling it out isn't easy, either); plus using the marine outlet doesn't provide entry for the rotten little critters. I'll just jam steel wool into the old mouse hole.

enblethen wrote:I would route the orange NM cable down through the hole and mount your Marinco shore power cord connector right on the end of it. If there enough slack to do this.Good point!

Mice are very smart buggers. My brother in law's home a/c quit last summer. I pulled the cover off the power side of compressor and the mice had eaten all the insulation off the low voltage lines and I had to replace the whole wire harness as an assembly! About to the tune of $500.....

Power cord replacement w/pics | Good Sam Community

19 Replies

RoyB
Explorer II
Dec 11, 2014
I am planning on doing the same replacing my pull-out 30AMP Shore Power cable. I will add a second flip lid 120VAC 15AMP outside receptacle that is fed by my on-board 1500WATT PSW AIMS INVERTER.

My plan is use an short adapter to power up the new 30AMP outside receptacle from the 1500WATT AIMS Inverter. This will be my poor man 120VAC transfer switch... This can also be used for extension cords I may want to run inside my house when needed...

I also already have a AIMS 600WATT PSW Inverter feeding two 120VAC Drops one at the home entertainment area and the other back by the bedroom area for more emergency 120VAC items.

I am working on something like this floor plan for my OFF-ROAD POPUP camper. Most of it already done.

I also had a bad case of ANTS and other critters climbing up the pull-out shore power cable. I got into remembering to fill in foam around the cable filling in the hole real good which helped a lot...

My current cable lid has the slide down metal piece around the cable coming out of the hole. This pushes down on my piece of foam I have around the shore power cable.

My shore power cable resembles a 6-lane highway going both directions with the small sand ants when camping on the east coast at Myrtle Beach.

Roy Ken
Caveman_Charlie
Explorer II
Dec 11, 2014
Deb and Ed M wrote:
And the final post: it was sunny today, so we hauled the 5er OUTSIDE, and plugged in the 30-amp power cord. No sparks/smoke/flames. One breaker was tripped, but that breaker seems to trip from jostling down the road, has happened before. All the various lights and appliances work. I think our mice simply had a taste for that big fat power cord sheathing and not much else, and I'm eternally grateful for that!

From now on (now that the Class C has been sold) - the 5er gets to live in the heated building, instead of sitting outside in the grass. No more mice!

Heck if it lives inside a building , heated no less, put a cat in the building. No more mice worries after that for sure.
Deb_and_Ed_M
Explorer II
Dec 10, 2014
And the final post: it was sunny today, so we hauled the 5er OUTSIDE, and plugged in the 30-amp power cord. No sparks/smoke/flames. One breaker was tripped, but that breaker seems to trip from jostling down the road, has happened before. All the various lights and appliances work. I think our mice simply had a taste for that big fat power cord sheathing and not much else, and I'm eternally grateful for that!

From now on (now that the Class C has been sold) - the 5er gets to live in the heated building, instead of sitting outside in the grass. No more mice!
Deb_and_Ed_M
Explorer II
Dec 07, 2014
westend wrote:
A staple (or other attachment hardware) is required within 6" of every box or device when installing 120v NM wire. It is not only residential code but a damn good idea.

BTW, you'll really like the power inlet, it makes using the cord much less frustrating.

Thanks! The cable clamp screwed to the wall is just out of the picture :-)

I pulled an additional 10' of old power cord from INSIDE the 5er, that had become knotted around itself and unable to be pulled out from the outside. Our Class C at least had a 6" x 6" door, so you could coil the cord a bit as you shoved it in it's compartment. The 5er's "mouse hole" was simply a torment in cold weather, so yes, I'm pretty excited about the detachable cord!
westend
Explorer
Dec 06, 2014
A staple (or other attachment hardware) is required within 6" of every box or device when installing 120v NM wire. It is not only residential code but a damn good idea.

BTW, you'll really like the power inlet, it makes using the cord much less frustrating.
Deb_and_Ed_M
Explorer II
Dec 06, 2014
And ta-da! It's done. I used #8 x 3" machine screws, with washers on the backside to keep it from getting yanked out. My power cord is now an easily-looped item - NOT the beast that fought tooth and nail to be stuffed back in its compartment!

The outside:

The inside:

While this was a VERY simple electrical connection and I'm sure it works - I am NOT going to plug it in until we've got it outside. I haven't seen any more chewed wires - but figuring these things go up like a tinderbox once ignited - I'm not going to risk burning our business down!
Deb_and_Ed_M
Explorer II
Dec 06, 2014
ol Bombero-JC wrote:
.

"Mouse proofing" is more than stuffing the hole with steel wool, checking for other holes, etc.

You need to try ALL the remedies on the various "anti-mouse" threads to deter the critters from entering.

IMO - you will *never* get all the entry points!

~

Holy Cow - you are SOOOOO right!

Today's project was "looking at wires" with my handy-dandy lighted scope. I cut off the rest of the old power cord (some of it remains in a hopeless snarl - doesn't matter, I'm not using that storage compartment any more) But knowing that the streetside taillight wiring runs up from that area, I was looking carefully around the inside. The good news is that everything looks unchewed.

The bad news: at one point, I realized I was looking at a shop vac. "WHAAAAT???" It turns out, there is an opening to this compartment at the rear of the 5er, big enough for a muskrat to climb in. And the cord compartment has lots of holes - mice entering pretty much have free rein to wander anywhere between the floor and the bottom cover to the trailer :-(

I know this isn't a good picture, but I'm crouched at the rear streetside corner of the 5er (and part of the opening is blocked by the garage door) - but the opening is easily 6" x 6"
Deb_and_Ed_M
Explorer II
Dec 05, 2014
OK - world's slowest repair job....LOL! Today, I located a spot for, and created the hole for the Marineco fitting. I wasn't planning on mounting it this high; but my stud finder kept telling me there was something "solid" immediately below this point and it ran all the way to the floor. This spot is fine - it's still inside the little compartment disguised as an end table at the rear corner of the 5er. The new plug location is at the top of the pic.

This is a darn fine hole! I cut it using my Skill saw. I'm too cheap to buy a hole saw/arbor for one use.

And that's it for today. I wasn't anticipating my walls being almost 2" thick (pleasant surprise!), so now I need to go to a hardware store for some long skinny bolts. Since my wall is basically 1/8" plywood sandwiched over foamboard - and I just KNOW Ed is going to walk up and try to pull the plug out without unscrewing it.... I want bolts with washers, or else it's going to get yanked out of the side of the 5er at some point or another...
BarneyS
Explorer III
Dec 01, 2014
camperforlife wrote:
I found that we had mice entering through the very hole the cord enters. They were coming right up the cord and in the trailer. Since I started stuffing the hole when the cord is out, no more mice.

We use one of these to keep pests from entering our rig through the power cord. It works very well.
Barney
camperforlife
Explorer
Dec 01, 2014
I found that we had mice entering through the very hole the cord enters. They were coming right up the cord and in the trailer. Since I started stuffing the hole when the cord is out, no more mice.