Forum Discussion

JimW123's avatar
JimW123
Explorer
May 22, 2016

Electical Questions

Hello Woodall's Community, I have a 21' Jayco Travel Trailer. Year 2010. I took the family camping at a State Park for our first venture of the summer. We "Dry Camped". Remiss in testing every little thing, I made sure the trailer was loaded with fun, the two deep cycle batteries were fully charged, and the Honda Generator started. Off we went. After setting up camp, I connected the "Knife Switch" near the Batteries (Sorry, I'm sure I am calling everything incorrectly), and attempted to turn on the interior lights. There was No Power inside the trailer.

To Troubleshoot, I tried cleaning the knife switch with a wire brush, swamping out the fuses, ensuring the batteries truly had power. I looked at the connections on the Terminals and they were clean (etc., etc.) ((Interesting note, the Electric Jack worked off the Battery)) I also tried leaving the main power between the trailer to the electrical of the truck connected, still no internal power...

I was told to try replacing the GFI Outlet, and did. Still nothing. I fired up the generator and connected the main power cord of the trailer - Wha-la' everything worked. Full power in trailer. Here is where it gets really weird - - - When I would turn off the generator, the Power would continue to run off of the battery. Yet, as soon as I opened up, then reclosed the Knife Switch, you would be back to a "No Power" scenario, under both Battery Power or Connection into the Truck. Only until you got things going again off of the Generator and Main power Cord of Trailer, would it continue to run off of the battery, once the generator was turned off. Am I losing my mind. I wrote down everything so I could ask if anyone has ever encountered this, or knew where to troubleshoot.
Thank you, Jim
  • Sam_Spade's avatar
    Sam_Spade
    Explorer
    May 23, 2016
    JimW123 wrote:


    KD4UPL, I did not have a Voltmeter to test the Batteries,


    Every RV'er needs one. Really.

    And when saying that some electrical things are dead, you need to specify if they are on the 12 V system or 110 V.
  • B-n-B's avatar
    B-n-B
    Explorer III
    May 23, 2016
    I would suspect the knife switch. Just remove it and rewire it the way you had it and see if the problem goes away.
  • JimW123's avatar
    JimW123
    Explorer
    May 23, 2016
    Thank you all - - - I will have it looked at with this feedback.

    KD4UPL, I did not have a Voltmeter to test the Batteries, but had the a 12V Deep Cycle Battery Charger, registering 100%. Batteries were new last year. I will get a Voltmeter for future use. I should have re-worded my post, I had the Knife Switch connected during 3 hr. drive up the camping spot. Just Disconnected / Reconnected when trouble was realized. Maybe some combination of what Westend and Lynmmor suggested - - especially if the Voltmeter shows batteries are ok (which I think they are). Thanks all...
  • KD4UPL's avatar
    KD4UPL
    Explorer
    May 23, 2016
    First off this had/ has absolutely nothing to do with a GFI outlet. They are 120v AC, not 12v DC.
    Why did you not connect the knife switch until you arrived at camp? This switch should likely only be opened when you are storing the camper for a while with no AC power to keep the battery charged. Otherwise, sitting at your house plugged in, towing, camping, etc. it should be on.
    You "ensured the batteries truly had power". How? With a voltmeter? What was the voltage? If your batteries are bad and/or dead then a brief recharge from from your generator may have made them work again briefly. If you've had the battery isolating knife switch open for a while the batteries have probably not been charged in a while.
  • westend's avatar
    westend
    Explorer
    May 23, 2016
    Auto-resetting circuit breaker between the battery and the distribution panel. It may be just the breaker or there may be a combination of devices that exceed the ampacity of the breaker.
    When the converter is powered by a generator it does the heavy lifting for the 12 V system. When unpowered and the knife switch is disconnected/reconnected, the batteries are doing the work and the draw exceeds the circuit breaker's ampacity.
  • WyoTraveler's avatar
    WyoTraveler
    Explorer
    May 22, 2016
    Sounds like you found the problem. When the problem occurs jumper around the knife switch. Most likely a bad switch.
  • Lynnmor's avatar
    Lynnmor
    Explorer
    May 22, 2016
    My GUESS is that you have a malfunctioning auto-resetting circuit breaker. They are often installed on the frame near the battery.

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