Power (charging) problem with pre-owned Host camper

[thejustin]

Sold my Lance 1161 and was able to get a Host Tahoe 1050 DS Dry bath. Gave it a brief shakedown but was having problems with the power side of the camper. I tried plugging in the shore power cable to my garage power outlet and it immediately trips the test/reset circuit and I cannot get any power inside the camper, and as a result, unable to charge the batteries. I tried several outlets in my house with a long extension cable, and none of them worked. Now these same outlets all powered my 5 other RV's/trailers without issue. Now oddly, it will not work plugged into my garage, but I tried plugging directly into my portable Yamaha 2000W generator and everything inside powered up fine.

Another thing I am not sure of, on ALL of my other RV's, when the generator was running the monitor panel would show the battery being "full" or 100% (even if it wasn't) so as to indicate the fact that the battery was currently being charged. Now when I plug into my Yamaha generator, or if I run the onboard Onan LPG generator, the battery is still at 75%, it does not jump to 100% leaving me wondering if the battery is even charging. I suppose I will need to go get a cheap Voltmeter and see for myself but it just seemed off to me. I should mention this is the first RV I have had with 6V batteries but not sure if that would make a difference or not.

Lastly, when I picked up the camper, I noticed the seller was using a portable battery charger wired directly to the battery terminals. I had asked why he didn't just run the shore power cable and have it charge that way but he didn't really give me an answer (I suppose he was most likely having the same problem I am).....


Any ideas?????

[mark_be]

popeyemth wrote:
GFCI's are well known to trip when fed from another GFCI

Sorry about that. I didn't know. We have a different system in Europe and thought it worked by the same principle. Here we have GFCI's in the fuse box and have 2 in a row for the bathroom (the 2nd is much more sensitive) and they don't trip because they're one after the other.

Thanks for that info! I've learned something more about my rv this way. 😉

[popeyemth]

GFCI's are well known to trip when fed from another GFCI
Very complicated reasons as to why they sense a fault but its commonly accepted that you can't feed one from another .
Change to a different plug in the house and it will work just like it does on the genny.
Whoever set this up was likely unaware of the potential problem
You don't find this in a factory or licensed electrician work
Good Luck, Mike

[mark_be]

thejustin wrote:

mark_be wrote:
Found anything yet?

Here is what I have found....

The converter is indeed charging the house batteries when either the onboard generator is running or plugged into my Yamaha generator. The GFI on my garage outlet trips as soon as I plug in there. I opened the electrical access panel and see the power converter is plugged into a GFI outlet in the access panel under the camper. If I unplug it from there, and run an extension cord and plug it into a different outlet and then connect my shore power, everything works fine. Going to try replacing the GFI outlet under there and see if that fixes the problem....

Do I understand you correctly? This is how I understand it: you unplug the converter at the GFI socket and use an extension cord to another socket inside the RV where you plug in the converter? Correct?

And if it's correct, do you reset the GFI socket before plugging the RV back into shore power?

If you didn't reset it, then my idea is that there is something else on the same circuit that trips the GFI inside the RV. In that case should the garage GFI trip as soon as you reset the GFI inside the RV while testing with your extension cable.

If all what I'm saying is still correct, then is the biggest suspect still the electric water heater IMO.

Would it be possible to measure volts between the 2 wires and the ground wire somewhere while running the generator? You should measure zero volts ON GENERATOR (*) if there's nothing wrong, but you'll probably measure 110 volts between one wire and the ground wire. (You can measure at any free socket, if you'd like)

(*) that's why the GFI doesn't trip when testing on generator, because your generator is not actually grounded, unlike your garage socket. FYI: it is not unsafe when your generator is running while you have an earth fault in your system. Your generator works by the same principle as an isolation transformer.

[billtex]

thejustin wrote:

mark_be wrote:
Found anything yet?

Here is what I have found....

The converter is indeed charging the house batteries when either the onboard generator is running or plugged into my Yamaha generator. The GFI on my garage outlet trips as soon as I plug in there. I opened the electrical access panel and see the power converter is plugged into a GFI outlet in the access panel under the camper. If I unplug it from there, and run an extension cord and plug it into a different outlet and then connect my shore power, everything works fine. Going to try replacing the GFI outlet under there and see if that fixes the problem....

How many amp is your garage outlet?
20 amp may not be sufficient...

[thejustin]

mark_be wrote:
Found anything yet?

Here is what I have found....

The converter is indeed charging the house batteries when either the onboard generator is running or plugged into my Yamaha generator. The GFI on my garage outlet trips as soon as I plug in there. I opened the electrical access panel and see the power converter is plugged into a GFI outlet in the access panel under the camper. If I unplug it from there, and run an extension cord and plug it into a different outlet and then connect my shore power, everything works fine. Going to try replacing the GFI outlet under there and see if that fixes the problem....

[mark_be]

Found anything yet?

[kennyzzz]

i had a problem with my trailer. it kept blowing the fuse at the battery, pulled all 12 fuses, still blowing the fuse at the battery
is was
turned out the converter was shot, but thing was that the 12 volt fuses on the converter were not blown , was shorted out on the inside..
it gave me fits...

[mark_be]

thejustin wrote:

mark_be wrote:

thejustin wrote:
I tried plugging in the shore power cable to my garage power outlet and it immediately trips the test/reset circuit and I cannot get any power inside the camper, and as a result, unable to charge the batteries. I tried several outlets in my house with a long extension cable, and none of them worked. Now these same outlets all powered my 5 other RV's/trailers without issue. Now oddly, it will not work plugged into my garage, but I tried plugging directly into my portable Yamaha 2000W generator and everything inside powered up fine.

I had the same thing when my electric water heater element was broken. Even when it was turned off. To test, remove the wires from the heater element and plug it into the plug that was tripping the first time.

Where are the wires to the element located? Do I need to take out the water heater?

Not all rv's have this, but if yours does, it's located outside behind the water heater door. Open this door and look behind the gas burner if there is a plastic cover of about 2 by 2.5 inch. Mine is black. You'll probably have to remove the gas burner to get access to the electric water heater. Under this cover you'll find the electric connections. Remove both of them and tape them with electric tape. After that, plug your shore power cable in again to test.
AND REMOVE THE SHORE POWER AGAIN BEFORE REINSTALLING EVERYTHING!!!!

You can leave the heater element in place for the test. If you have to replace: buy a removal tool together with the new element and don't forget to drain the water heater first. Also make sure that the heater element is turned off inside, or you'll be killing the new element as well. You also should have a small rocker switch outside under the water heater cover, which you can also turn off, just to be sure.

Edit: found this video.

[thejustin]

MTRhino wrote:
And GFI outlets can be placed in strange places. We had a Terry 5th wheel at one time and the outlets on the curbside of the kitchen didn't work. I replaced both and still no juice. One day was repairing a couple of broken drawer slide brackets and looked under the bathroom sink to make sure that drawer was not needing repair, and found a GFI outlet under the sink. It ended up being DOA so replaced it and all the dead outlets came to life! Who would have guessed a GFI under the bath sink in the middle of the trailer would be the first outlet in a curcuit going to the rear kitchen? Make sure you have found all the GFI's to test them!

I am on my way out to fiddle with the camper right now. +1 on the GFI outlets can be in odd places. The inverter is located in the access panel underneath the inside entry door step. It is plugged into a GFI receptacle there in that little compartment. I would have never thought to look there for one.

[MTRhino]

And GFI outlets can be placed in strange places. We had a Terry 5th wheel at one time and the outlets on the curbside of the kitchen didn't work. I replaced both and still no juice. One day was repairing a couple of broken drawer slide brackets and looked under the bathroom sink to make sure that drawer was not needing repair, and found a GFI outlet under the sink. It ended up being DOA so replaced it and all the dead outlets came to life! Who would have guessed a GFI under the bath sink in the middle of the trailer would be the first outlet in a curcuit going to the rear kitchen? Make sure you have found all the GFI's to test them!

[ticki2]

Just a thought but GFI outlets do go bad . Or perhaps on the new camper the neutral and ground are bonded together which will trip a GFI .

[thejustin]

mark_be wrote:

thejustin wrote:
I tried plugging in the shore power cable to my garage power outlet and it immediately trips the test/reset circuit and I cannot get any power inside the camper, and as a result, unable to charge the batteries. I tried several outlets in my house with a long extension cable, and none of them worked. Now these same outlets all powered my 5 other RV's/trailers without issue. Now oddly, it will not work plugged into my garage, but I tried plugging directly into my portable Yamaha 2000W generator and everything inside powered up fine.

I had the same thing when my electric water heater element was broken. Even when it was turned off. To test, remove the wires from the heater element and plug it into the plug that was tripping the first time.

Where are the wires to the element located? Do I need to take out the water heater?

[mark_be]

thejustin wrote:
I tried plugging in the shore power cable to my garage power outlet and it immediately trips the test/reset circuit and I cannot get any power inside the camper, and as a result, unable to charge the batteries. I tried several outlets in my house with a long extension cable, and none of them worked. Now these same outlets all powered my 5 other RV's/trailers without issue. Now oddly, it will not work plugged into my garage, but I tried plugging directly into my portable Yamaha 2000W generator and everything inside powered up fine.

I had the same thing when my electric water heater element was broken. Even when it was turned off. To test, remove the wires from the heater element and plug it into the plug that was tripping the first time.

[popeyemth]

Unplug the inverter