Scary Moment with furnace need helpful opinion

[Camperfamily5]

I have a 2015 Heritage Glen by Forest River travel trailer. We have taken it out several times over the past year but never used the furnace until this weekend. The camper was ran off a generator and the first night we had no problems other than running out of gas on the generator. The second night however i woke up in the middle of the night and noticed the furnace was not on and the generator was off.

After filling up the generator and starting it back up the furnace wouldn't start not even the fan. I pulled the fuse it looked good so I put it back in and it started back up and ran through the night. That morning i turned the generator off and the furnace never came back on then i noticed white smoke coming from inside under the fridge I turned off all the power and the smoke increased, it wasnt until i turned the furnace off from the thermostat that the smoke stopped.

I was hoping for some input bc the dealer always just tells me to bring it in so he can look at it but it is such a far trip that I would like to avoid bringing it in if possible.

[cdog7201]

sounds like a loose or shorted wire or maybe a mouse got fried, hope no mouse but would check the burner on the furnace before using it again or take it to the dealer with a pocket full of money, you might be able to see in the heat exchanger from out side if you take the furnace grill off and look inside.good luck.

[Flybob]

Check battery. If generator stopped ( out of gas) and the furnace ran a lot on battery, you may have depleted that battery. The furnace shut down due to low voltage. Removing the fuse reset the furnace and it ran again on the generator. Seems like the same thing happened the second night. It could be an electrical issue with the converter trying to charge a low battery and run the furnace,

[KyDan]

Anything we tell you from here on is just a guess....

1st do you have a battery in your trailer??? You say you're running the furnace
off a genny but furnaces are 12v so if you have a battery on board the
furnace won't be powerd down just because you shut off the genny.
If you don't have a battery then I don't know how the smoke could have
gotten worse with the genny off.

Do you have a battery in your RV??
I'm gonna pass on the mouse theory for now since it did work 2 nights...

[Camperfamily5]

Yes you are right the furnace is powered by the battery which is why i couldn't figure out why it was off. We were packing up so it wasnt until I turned the generator off that I began to notice the furnace hasnt ran in awhile. Not long after that the smoke began to appear from the furnace unit under the oven.

[Camperfamily5]

Thanks Flybob, that makes sense but what about the smoke from the unit itself?

[Crusadernoob]

Just remember, where there's smoke, there's fire! It shouldn't be too difficult to find the source once you get into it.

[brookstone345sa]

I'll just throw this out there. Just got home from week long trip. Wednesday night main propane tank ran out. Heater tried to come on 3 times. After 3rd time it shut down. I switched tanks and still no heat. The heater would not come on until I shut down my master disconnect switch. I shut it off for a couple of minutes, turned it back on, and then the heater kicked right on.

By the way thank goodness for electric fireplace, it was 29 degrees outside. Did not figure out the disconnect until AM

[cdog7201]

one more thing is there a battery disconnect switch and was it turned off some how. that would have shut off your 12 volt supply from the battery.and the furnace would have stopped working unless you have another 12volt power supply. just guessing at this point.

[Camperfamily5]

I am not sure about the disconnect switch but since it started back instantly after I reinserted the fuse I am thinking it had something to do with draining the batteries. I will have to pull the unit out to see where the smoke was coming from.

[KyDan]

If your battery was very low the furnace blower might have been running
too slow and the burner over heated.
Did you have lights on? Were they dim?

Once or twice I've ran my furnace until the battery was nearly dead.
The furnace blower was trying and the furnace smelled like a new hot furnace even though it wasn't new. It didn't smoke tho...

It might be time to pull the furnace and do a visual inspection.

Be really careful out there! Anything that smokes in an RV is real cause for
alarm!

[Camperfamily5]

Thanks for the advice, I believe you are right and once I pull it out and see I be able to tell more.

[northstar1960]

Originally Posted by Camperfamily5

Thanks Flybob, that makes sense but what about the smoke from the unit itself?

What did the smoke smell like? white smoke sounds like a wire shorted .

[boondocking]

Originally Posted by Camperfamily5

I will have to pull the unit out to see where the smoke was coming from.

That would be he best thing to do. Do not try and start it up again and risk burning up your RV.

[rockfordroo]

Originally Posted by Camperfamily5

I have a 2015 Heritage Glen by Forest River travel trailer. We have taken it out several times over the past year but never used the furnace until this weekend. The camper was ran off a generator and the first night we had no problems other than running out of gas on the generator. The second night however i woke up in the middle of the night and noticed the furnace was not on and the generator was off.

After filling up the generator and starting it back up the furnace wouldn't start not even the fan. I pulled the fuse it looked good so I put it back in and it started back up and ran through the night. That morning i turned the generator off and the furnace never came back on then i noticed white smoke coming from inside under the fridge I turned off all the power and the smoke increased, it wasnt until i turned the furnace off from the thermostat that the smoke stopped.

I was hoping for some input bc the dealer always just tells me to bring it in so he can look at it but it is such a far trip that I would like to avoid bringing it in if possible.

I wonder if this has nothing to do with the furnace. You say the furnace wasn't running, but then you saw white smoke. You say the white smoke stopped when you shut off the furnace at the thermostat. It MAY have just been coincidence that the smoke stopped at the time you shut off the furnace at the thermostat. You don't say what model TT you have, so we don't really know what's under your fridge.

[SidecarFlip]

Sounds like BBQ'd mouse to me.

[Danesville]

White smoke, is it possible that what you saw was steam due to a possible leak from the fridge landing on the furnace heat exchanger? Just a thought .