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Old 09-03-2017, 12:45 PM   #1
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2018 Forest River Cherokee limited 26DBH

Okay, rookie here...
Did a ton of research and purchased a Champion generator,3400 watt inverter. Now if I'm correct this unit should run my 13.5 unit. I turned of the circuit breakers for the inverter and the fridge. I do not have my battery connected ( garage on charger ) . The trailer was plugged into my truck. With all this, I turn on th AC and it trips the 20A breaker ( overload ) on the generator. I had nothing on and was only trying to cool the trailer. No lights, radio, nothing. Any ideas, thoughts ? A power draw from something ? Please help.... or did I just throw away $900...
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Old 09-03-2017, 12:48 PM   #2
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Why did you remove battery and why is the trailer plugged into the truck?

Radio and lights are 12v and you turned the converter off that powers them, when plugged into the generator or shore power.

Are you sure that the a/c is 13.5k and not 15k?
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Old 09-03-2017, 12:51 PM   #3
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I have the batt on a trickle charger while the trailer sits at storage. When the trailer is plugged in , it provides the 12v to charge the batt and such. Supplies 12V to the trailer basically, without the battery.
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Old 09-03-2017, 12:53 PM   #4
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Originally Posted by Stumpy1969 View Post
I have the batt on a trickle charger while the trailer sits at storage. When the trailer is plugged in , it provides the 12v to charge the batt and such. Supplies 12V to the trailer basically, without the battery.
But you turned the converter off, which supplies the 12v when you removed the battery.
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Old 09-03-2017, 12:56 PM   #5
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Based on a recommendation I saw. The trailer inverter draws watts . Therefore turning it off lowers the load on the gen. I had thought maybe the water heater was drawing ? Not sure, trying to figure it out.
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Old 09-03-2017, 01:00 PM   #6
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Stumpy turn Everything OFF,start Gen now turn on A/C,it should work 13 or 15! Youroo!!
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Old 09-03-2017, 01:02 PM   #7
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So Kill all the breakers but the AC ? I was just looking through my notes ( at pick-up ). And the tech told us the AC would not run without a battery. Any truth to this ?
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Old 09-03-2017, 04:24 PM   #8
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Based on a recommendation I saw. The trailer inverter draws watts . Therefore turning it off lowers the load on the gen. I had thought maybe the water heater was drawing ? Not sure, trying to figure it out.
Stumpy, just to clarify, it's a CONverter, not INverter.
All RVs have CONverters, few have INverters.
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Old 09-04-2017, 02:36 PM   #9
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Yes turn off all breakers accept the ac. Yes you need 12 volts for the thermostat to control the ac. If the generator has an Eco mode turn that off till you know it works
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Old 09-04-2017, 02:56 PM   #10
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I have a breaker marked " main " , turn off ? I've been getting the 12 volts to the thermostat via havin the trailer plugged into my truck. And the generator has not been in "eco" mode yet. Fans work on the AC , however when the cooling unit kicks in, the gen overloads.
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Old 09-04-2017, 07:09 PM   #11
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Sorry yes. Leave the main breaker on. I am assumming your unit is 30 amp. Turn off all other breakers accept the a/c. If your a/c is a 13,500 btu unit it should start up. If you your a/c is 15,000 btu your generator is too small
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Old 09-04-2017, 07:23 PM   #12
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Okay, rookie here...
Did a ton of research and purchased a Champion generator,3400 watt inverter. Now if I'm correct this unit should run my 13.5 unit. I turned of the circuit breakers for the inverter and the fridge. I do not have my battery connected ( garage on charger ) . The trailer was plugged into my truck. With all this, I turn on th AC and it trips the 20A breaker ( overload ) on the generator. I had nothing on and was only trying to cool the trailer. No lights, radio, nothing. Any ideas, thoughts ? A power draw from something ? Please help.... or did I just throw away $900...
If the gen is new you may need to be broken in, I had to break my yamahas in for about 10 hours each on a 50% load before they would power my TT. When they weren't broken in and I would start the AC they would immediately overload. After I broke them in I never had a problem. Depending on which AC you have its pushing that gen to max anyway so a break in wont hurt. On a side note (which I dont know much about) my gens were 4000 watts and 3600 continuous watts but they were barely enough (it seemed). I know others have used 3100-3400 watt gens though.
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Old 09-12-2017, 01:59 PM   #13
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I have a champion 4000/3500 (open frame). I plug it into the RV and start it up. I don't turn anything off. Runs my AC, televisions(2) and 110 outlets (laptop plugged into one). Use propane for the fridge and never fire up the microwave, but will set the time and use it for a clock, LOL
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Old 09-12-2017, 02:16 PM   #14
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You said you trip the 20 amp breaker... is this on the generator or in the trailer?
if on the generator you need to plug into the 30 amp outlet on the generator.
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Old 09-12-2017, 02:27 PM   #15
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I have the 3400w champion and a 15000btu Coleman mach III. It can power the a.c. and inverter without issues even on propane (3040 watts). If you are using the 30amp plug then you may need a hard start capacitor.

The first time I tried mine I kept the battery hooked up but turned off all breakers but the a.c.. Got generator running for a few min. Then I turned up a.c. higher than ambient temp to keep compressor off. Turned the fan on high or low and let it run 2 min. Then I lowered the temp to kick the compressor on. It worked so I slowly turned on breakers to make sure and then cycled the ac compressor to be sure it would not trip.

I found out before that I had the hard start capacitor installed already before trying this. They are $10 or so on Amazon if you don't. They just lower the starting draw for the compressor.

If that does not fix it then go into troubleshooting mode.
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Old 12-03-2018, 11:43 PM   #16
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You said you trip the 20 amp breaker... is this on the generator or in the trailer?
if on the generator you need to plug into the 30 amp outlet on the generator.
X2 a generator that big should have a 30amp
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Old 12-04-2018, 01:33 AM   #17
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X2 a generator that big should have a 30amp
redskins, this thread is over a year old and the OP hasn't posted since September 2017.
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