I have a 04 trail bay travel camper and I'm having some problems. I disconnected the battery and put it in the basement for charging after last year season. I plugged the camper into my 30amp plug and plugged it into my outlet in the house. I went into the camper to check to make sure everything is working before the season starts. Everything worked, lights,refrigerator,microwave,radio,ect. I replaced the overhead lights inside with LEDs and everything still was working. My wife wanted to see the new light the next day and when we got in the camper some of the accessories won't work. There was one set of overhead lights and two lamps that are plugged into outlets that came on but none of the other lights. The microwave and the coffee maker are working but the rest of the lights,radio,outside spotlights won't turn on. It sounds like the power converter is working because I hear a humming sound. I have checked all the fuse's and breakers, they all check out fine. Any help would be great, thank you

The microwave and coffee maker are on the 120V side of things, and the other items you list which aren't working are on the 12V side. The first thing I'd do is make sure your battery terminals are tight. If they are loose and not making good contact, it would cause your problems. Second, if the terminals are tight, I'd disconnect from shore power and use a volt meter to measure the battery voltage and make sure you have 12+VDC. It could bad battery. Also, while you're at it, plug back into shore power and see if the voltage at the battery terminals jumps back up to about 13.5VDC. This will let you know your converter is working correctly.

did you turn the battery disconnect on

When you put the battery back in... did you reverse the cables by chance?

TucsonJim wrote:The first thing I'd do is make sure your battery terminals are tight. If they are loose and not making good contact, it would cause your problems.:h. The OP said he removed the battery but nothing about reinstalling it. Obviously if there's no battery but some of the 12 vdc system still works with the trailer plugged into 120 vac shore power the converter itself has to be working. Who knows, perhaps a fuse or two has blown on the converter, perhaps he was careless and allowed the (disconnected) positive battery cable terminal to touch the frame of the trailer and short out. Without having more specific information about exactly what he did it's impossible to say what actually happened when we can't lay eyes on the situation. The solution is to grab a voltmeter and start probing but that won't do any good unless the OP has some degree of electrical knowledge and a grasp on how his trailer's electrical systems are designed to work. Meanwhile WAGs based on incomplete information are unlikely to help the OP to resolve this ... he needs to be more specific about exactly what he did and didn't do.

SoundGuy wrote:TucsonJim wrote:The first thing I'd do is make sure your battery terminals are tight. If they are loose and not making good contact, it would cause your problems.:h. The OP said he removed the battery but nothing about reinstalling it. Obviously if there's no battery but some of the 12 vdc system still works with the trailer plugged into 120 vac shore power the converter itself has to be working. Who knows, perhaps a fuse or two has blown on the converter, perhaps he was careless and allowed the (disconnected) positive battery cable terminal to touch the frame of the trailer and short out. Without having more specific information about exactly what he did it's impossible to say what actually happened when we can't lay eyes on the situation. The solution is to grab a voltmeter and start probing but that won't do any good unless the OP has some degree of electrical knowledge and a grasp on how his trailer's electrical systems are designed to work. Meanwhile WAGs based on incomplete information are unlikely to help the OP to resolve this ... he needs to be more specific about exactly what he did and didn't do.I agree and often there are unique things trailer specific on how things are wired up with little consistency between trailers or even manufacturers. Often high amperage items such as slides do not run thru the converter, but come directly off the battery thru a CB often mounted near the battery. The converter only supplies power to that ckt via the charge wire from the converter to the battery. I could see where lights and 12V items in a slide might also be powered from this same ckt. and hopefully they would also be fuzed at an appropriate level somewhere. Thus in this configuration you have to have either the battery installed or at least the cables going to the battery if more than one connected together to get power to that ckt from the converter. Larry

Some of my accessories are not working | Good Sam Community

YC_1
Nomad
Feb 25, 2016
As a suggestion take a picture of the battery and cables. It is so easy to get a battery in backwards or to drop a cable.

Electrons are color blind so never expect a black wire to be a negative. They all to often are positives. I believe this is a throw back to AC wiring where black is usually the hot line.
JWRoberts
Explorer
Feb 25, 2016
Thanks for reporting back your findings so that we may all learn.

LarryJM wrote:
SoundGuy wrote:
Rjwarfield wrote:
I just took the cover off that junction box and I don't see any buttons I can press

:h. Have no idea what "junction box" you're talking about but if you're referring to the resettable circuit breaker it's auto resetting, no buttons to push. That said, it could be faulty but it's simple to check by just probing each side of the CB with a volt meter ... the side connected to the battery will obviously show 12.x volts but if the CB is open it won't show anything, in which case you want to replace it.

SoundGuy,

On many trailers a junction box usually the size of a double outlet deep one to connect the 7 wire trailer to TV cable to the trailer wiring. Just makes it easier to replace the 7 wire cable when needed and provides a waterproof connection area. My CB were mounted to the floor of the trailer open to road grime just behind the A-frame. They corroded out and failed after only a couple of years and once I replaced them I entombed them in 3M Scotch-Kote to try and seal them and make them last a little longer.

Larry
LarryJM
Explorer II
Feb 25, 2016
SoundGuy wrote:
Rjwarfield wrote:
I just took the cover off that junction box and I don't see any buttons I can press

:h. Have no idea what "junction box" you're talking about but if you're referring to the resettable circuit breaker it's auto resetting, no buttons to push. That said, it could be faulty but it's simple to check by just probing each side of the CB with a volt meter ... the side connected to the battery will obviously show 12.x volts but if the CB is open it won't show anything, in which case you want to replace it.

SoundGuy,

On many trailers a junction box usually the size of a double outlet deep one to connect the 7 wire trailer to TV cable to the trailer wiring. Just makes it easier to replace the 7 wire cable when needed and provides a waterproof connection area. My CB were mounted to the floor of the trailer open to road grime just behind the A-frame. They corroded out and failed after only a couple of years and once I replaced them I entombed them in 3M Scotch-Kote to try and seal them and make them last a little longer.

Larry
AmericalVette
Explorer
Feb 25, 2016
Rjwarfield - No need to feel dumb. There is not one person on this forum (or world) that is mistake free. For what it's worth; I'm just glad that you are up and running again. Best wishes to you and happy camping!
SoundGuy
Explorer
Feb 25, 2016
Rjwarfield wrote:
**** I feel dumb. For some reason I thought I had the neg. battery cable connected but it was the cable for the power jack ...

So in other words the battery's negative terminal was never connected to the trailer frame ... wow, can't say I've heard of anyone making that mistake before! Glad to hear you've now got it resolved. :)
Rjwarfield
Explorer
Feb 25, 2016
**** I feel dumb. For some reason I thought I had the neg. battery cable connected but it was the cable for the power jack ( not sure why it's a black cable instead of a red cable ). Tested the battery again with out the camper plugged into a shoreline and still got 12.53. Tested the battery after plugged into shoreline and got 13.58 so I guess everything is working as it should. Thanks again for all the help.
SoundGuy
Explorer
Feb 25, 2016
Rjwarfield wrote:
I just took the cover off that junction box and I don't see any buttons I can press

:h. Have no idea what "junction box" you're talking about but if you're referring to the resettable circuit breaker it's auto resetting, no buttons to push. That said, it could be faulty but it's simple to check by just probing each side of the CB with a volt meter ... the side connected to the battery will obviously show 12.x volts but if the CB is open it won't show anything, in which case you want to replace it.
YC_1
Nomad
Feb 25, 2016
Any chance you dropped a wire when you changed the battery? That seems to happen often enough.
LarryJM
Explorer II
Feb 25, 2016
Rjwarfield wrote:
Sound guy I did see something like that in a junction box. I did no that was a resetable breaker.

That CB was what I was talking about and they can go bad. They should have voltage on each side and if there is more than one then you might have a situation like I described in my prior post that could complicate troubleshooting electrical issues.

Larry
Rjwarfield
Explorer
Feb 25, 2016
I just took the cover off that junction box and I don't see any buttons I can press

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