Learn from my mistake on a number of different levels

[Trewblue1]

My trailer is 30 amp. When home, I use a dog-bone to hook into a 20 amp in my garage. Doing this for 3 years. When home I will turn on the AC when hot outside and it has always worked. Last outing, we came home and I plugged it in as usual. Went shopping and when I came home the garage door would not open. The garage circuit breaker was tripped in the basement. This had never happened before the last 3 years. Reset it and things were fine. About 1 hour after I went back into the garage and everything was dark again. Reset the breaker one more time. Again, things were fine. Two days later it was tripped again. Investigating the problem reviled the hot water electrical had not been turned off when breaking down camp. So, when the AC and hot water were trying to run at the same time it was tripping the 20 amp breaker. My problem is that I have a DC only refrigerator. When not plugged into electrical, the battery runs down. By the time I found out I had no shore power the battery on the camper was down to 11 volts.
Eliminated this oversight by problem by running a 30 amp line to the garage this weekend for aground $200 for parts and no labor, just sweat.
I had no problem for 3 years. I had someone help me during teardown, which has turned into another problem again. Shortened the battery life on my trailer. Cost me $, but more peace of mind when home for these oversights as I am getting older. I am sure there will be more.

[lwbfl]

Originally Posted by Trewblue1

My trailer is 30 amp. When home, I use a dog-bone to hook into a 20 amp in my garage. Doing this for 3 years. When home I will turn on the AC when hot outside and it has always worked. Last outing, we came home and I plugged it in as usual. Went shopping and when I came home the garage door would not open. The garage circuit breaker was tripped in the basement. This had never happened before the last 3 years. Reset it and things were fine. About 1 hour after I went back into the garage and everything was dark again. Reset the breaker one more time. Again, things were fine. Two days later it was tripped again. Investigating the problem reviled the hot water electrical had not been turned off when breaking down camp. So, when the AC and hot water were trying to run at the same time it was tripping the 20 amp breaker. My problem is that I have a DC only refrigerator. When not plugged into electrical, the battery runs down. By the time I found out I had no shore power the battery on the camper was down to 11 volts.
Eliminated this oversight by problem by running a 30 amp line to the garage this weekend for aground $200 for parts and no labor, just sweat.
I had no problem for 3 years. I had someone help me during teardown, which has turned into another problem again. Shortened the battery life on my trailer. Cost me $, but more peace of mind when home for these oversights as I am getting older. I am sure there will be more.

No worries on that battery, if 11 volts hurt them none of them would last a week.

[Bob K4TAX]

We have all had these mistakes. Personally, I prefer to go "solo" when breaking down and getting ready to move our trailer. Thus I rely on myself to do everything that needs to be done. I don't have to depend on someone else to do things the way I do and I don't have to follow up to see that they are done. That's just me.

In fact, I have a nice printed and laminated checklist which I made for our departure and another for arrival. This is the discipline part of my 2500 hrs in the left seat of an airplane. In other words, you forget once, you die once. At least the RV's and TT's, incidents aren't usually that serious.

As to the expense to correct these oversights, I refer to that as "education expenses".

Bob