smoking converter

vickish1 wrote:
We have no intention of towing trailer. Just living in it. We have electricity plugged in at all times. Worried the Air conditioner may be damaged due to the cause of damage to the converter (still don't know what happened to cause it). But strange if it's just a damaged AC then why don't the overhead lights work? All of the rest of the electric outlets are working fine.

Guess you only read part of my post 'about towing'

The 12V DC system....runs your lights, the power to t-stat for A/C & furnace etc.

2 separate systems..
120V AC & 12V DC

Oh.never mind.

We have no intention of towing trailer. Just living in it. We have electricity plugged in at all times. Worried the Air conditioner may be damaged due to the cause of damage to the converter (still don't know what happened to cause it). But strange if it's just a damaged AC then why don't the overhead lights work? All of the rest of the electric outlets are working fine.

vickish1 wrote:
This is crazy, but we never could find a battery anywhere in the RV. We had planned on just plugging in and living in it while we build. So didn't worry too much about it

The battery should be on trailer tongue behind the propane cylinders.

First Off....you need that battery to provide power to trailer brakes via 'emergency brake switch' when towing in the event trailer becomes disconnected from tow vehicle.......you are illegal and unsafe towing without a good functioning trailer battery.

Secondly.trailer battery provides all 12V DC power when not connected to shore power.
With a smoked converter you have no 12v DC to operate control circuits for fridge, A/C-Furnace t-stat, lights, water pump etc.
And your converter may have needed a battery to act as a load.

Get a battery......make sure you connect it up properly. Trace cable to trailer frame.that is battery neg.cable. Color of cables is not standard so check first.

Then you need a new converter.........and a portable charger in the mean time to keep tha new battery charged.

This is crazy, but we never could find a battery anywhere in the RV. We had planned on just plugging in and living in it while we build. So didn't worry too much about it

Do you have a battery in the trailer?

Is it possible that someone took out the battery, and now that terminal is touching the metal frame, and is grounding out the system? This would explain why the converter failed.

Have you been adding water to the battery on a regular basis? If the battery shorted due to lack of water, then that can also destroy the converter, but normally they do not smoke, just blow a fuse.

The converters are fairly easy to replace yourself, just two wires in addition to plug it into the 120 volt receptacle. http://www.bestconverter.com/ is a good place to check for a good price on one.

For now, you might need to visit a local auto parts store, and pick up a replacement battery - if yours is bad. And a battery charger if you want to keep using the lights over the next few days while the converter arrives. A 10 amp model charger should work out well. At times you might be using more than 10 amps, but overnight when the lights are off, the charger should fully charge the battery, and the next day you will be good to go.

Carefully remove the battery caps. If you can see the lead plates under the caps, then you have not added enough water to them. Add only distilled water to the battery. You should see water. If you see dry tops of the inside of the battery, might as well replace the battery. Normally you should see water inside, up to near the top of the cells.






Fred.

It is going to get dark on your guys pretty quick. You need to have the working battery and a way to keep it charged.

Like stated above it could be you now have both the Battery and the Converter fried.

Determine if the battery is OK and then I would go to local autoparts places or big box stores and pick up a Black N Decker VEC1093DBD 40AMP portable battery charger. You need one of these anyway if you are serious about camping in your RV unit. You may have to purchase a new 12VDC deep cycle battery as well. I would also pick up a couple of regular house 120VAC lamps too and a 120VAC fan. We have the O2COOL 10-inch portable fan that runs on AC-12VDC-D CELLS. Another great item to have around for PLAN Bs...

These items should keep you going until you can get a converter/charger on order from AMAZON or local RV PLACE if you are close to one and they have one in stock.

Take a good luck at the block diagram I just sent - Note most of your essential items are mostly 12VDC powered and you may not have 12VDC to use now with both the converter and the battery failed.

Like I said it may get dark on you pretty soon and all you will have is flashlights and candles if you brought along any hehe...

Roy Ken

Your situation concerns me a bit. The Converter has the job of taking 110 volts (either from your generator or from a campground electrical pedestal) and using it to keep your batteries charged. If the converter went smoking, it could signal something seriously wrong with your batteries (converter tried to supply too much current to a failing battery and ended up smoking itself). So the first thing I would do is disconnect my batteries and then measure their individual voltages. If you have 12v batteries, you should be measuring something in excess of 11.8 volts. If you measure less than 10v, you may have a bad battery. If you see any cracking of the battery case, any acid leaking onto the battery compartment, or a strong sulphur spell, then you do have a battery issue. But, if your batteries look good visually, then I'd put a battery charger on to the disconnected battery and let it sit for 4 hours. See if the battery takes a charge. If it does, reconnect it. If not, replace it.

The fact that you do not have 12v for your lights also points a shaky finger in the direction of your batteries. So that is somewhat consistent. Your A/C "might" have a thermostat that requires 12v to operate so that could be why it is not working. If your thermostat does not require 12v (and if the A/C doesn't need 12v for anything else), then the fact it does not turn on would also point to an A/C issue. I assume your microwave and TV work fine when plugged into shore power. If so, your A/C would be getting power unless you flipped the A/C circuit breaker when your converter fried.

There are lots of opinions here about converters. A good 3 stage converter is usually recommended by folks on this forum. Your challenge, unless you are handy doing your own maintenance, will be to select the appropriate converter and get it installed. Perhaps others will offer opinions on doing that as I've never replaced a converter.

Happy trails once you get this issue fixed!

Several things are 12VDC and gets its DC power from the converter/charger unit when plugged into shore power power. Also the Battery is connected to the same 12VDC Power Distribution panel so your ceiling lights should have stayed on but apparently your battery must not be connected or dead or switched off...

The other very important thing will be your on-board batteries will not be charged when plugged into shore power without the working converter/charger unit.

This is s simplified RV 30AMP Wiring Configuration diagram showing the 120VAC and 12VDC controlled items.



As you notice all the essential appliances are wired to 12VDC so that the camping off the power grid concept can be achieved. Only a few non essential appliances are powered only by 120VAC.

Roy Ken

The converter.

vickish1 wrote:
Once we unplugged it the breakers stayed on.

What did you unplug?

Bruce