Help with inverter wiring

[stef57]

I am installing an inverter in my 5th wheel. smallish one, 1200watts. basically only used to fire up the entertainment system on rainy days and coffee maker in the morning....
I have it hooked up to the batteries via a 200A fuse, have a 12AWG SOW wire running from it to the converter.
the plugs I want to run with it are split between 2 breakers, both are 15A
#1 has reefer & GFI plugs (kitchen, bath & outside)
#2 has converter and utility plugs
my plan is to switch the converter and the GFI plugs around so that my converter will only have to be hooked to 1 breaker to run the plugs. (GFI's and utilities)

Now my issue is, how do i make this work??:@
I want the inverter to run my plugs when i am dry camping but I want shore power to take priority when it is plugged in...
If I hook the inverter to the breaker, I will get power going back to it when shore power is hooked up right?
I thought of hooking the inverter to a disconnect switch it off before i plug in the shore cord but I guarantee that at some point I will forget to do so....:S
There is gotta be a safer and more foul proof alternative.:h
Any help would be greatly appreciated:)

[Tom_M1]

The best option is installing an automatic transfer switch. You can purchase one such as this: Transfer switch.
I initially started out by manually unplugging the inverter prior to running the generator or using shore power until that time I forgot and blew up my inverter. I made my own transfer switch using a relay that I purchased at Grainger.

[pianotuna]

Hi,

I'm not a fan of transfer switches.

I installed a female 30 amp outlet which I power with my inverter.

Turn off the converter, and set the fridge on propane.

All outlets will be powered.

[64thunderbolt]

I use a 300W pure sine wave to power the tv/dvd. Anything else gets the gen or shore power.

[Golden_HVAC]

Another question is how many batteries do you have? If you have less than 4, I don't think you will be happy with the installation, as just after making coffee or toast, you will need to spend the next 2 hours recharging the batteries.

My toaster takes 150 amps from my battery bank (4 of them) and it really depletes it. If I was running the engine anyway, it all comes from the alternator and the #2 wire recharges the battery fairly quickly. If it comes from the solar system, it would take about 8 hours of good sun to replace 150 amp hours, or about 2 days with my small 415 rated watt solar system.

I rarely use my built in 1,500 watt inverter. After using the microwave on the inverter a couple of times, less than 5 minutes total, I had to replace it, the cooking speed was very long, due to it cooking very slowly, I think the modified sine wave power damaged it.

For watching TV, it was always much more energy efficient to run the smaller 150 watt or 300 watt portable inverter. With those, I installed a new cirgarette lighter receptacle near the TV set, and did not need to run extension cords or anything, it powered the TV great, and only used about 6.5 amps instead of 10.5 when using the larger inverter to run the 19" tube type TV and Direct TV receiver.

Fred.

[Golden_HVAC]

You need something called a transfer switch. Then you figure out what circuit breakers you want to have powered up while on inverter power. Then make SURE the converter is not going to end up plugged into any of those circuits (even if you need to install a new dedicated 120 volt feed to the converter from the main panel.

Lets say that you wanted to connect circuit breaker #2 and #3 to the inverter power output. Disconnect both of those wires from the respective circuit breaker, and lable them as #2 and #3. Then install the transfer switch with the "Gen input" connected to one of those circuit breakers (lets say #2). Output of the transfer switch will go to both wires (#2 and wire #3). You also connect a white wire to the transfer switch input.

To the "Line input" wire of the transfer switch, (it is not going to waste power energizing the transfer switch using up valuable battery power) you connect the output of the inverter black and white wires.

You are done with the high voltage wiring to the inverter.

If the converter has no place to get plugged in, now is a great time to install a new 120 volt receptacle for the converter, and you will have a empty circuit breaker #3. Wire it the normal way. If you don't know how, seek help in completing this project.

Basically you never want to hook up the output of a inverter directly to a energized power source, such as the circuit breaker, but run the power through a transfer switch instead, that will prevent backfeeding power into the inverter, and also prevent it from blowing up.

Good luck,

Fred.