Excessive power usage.

10Ranger

Senior Member
Joined
Feb 9, 2018
Posts
134
There is a group of 4 of us who have seasonal sites together. All of our sites have metered electric. Our monthly power bills average from around 35 to 75 dollars per month except one that consistently runs around double of the rest even though they are here less often than the rest of us. They turn off all appliances such as hot water heater and AC that would use power while away. The only thing left on is the refrigerator.

Does anybody have any suggestions of why their electric would run so much?
 
Faulty meter.

I would complain to the CG AND the Electric company. If they have fewer items turned on than the rest of you and are being charged more, something's wrong.



go through the camper with them just to make sure they dont have a deep freezer they forgot about (or whatever). Then if their bill is still higher you know theres a meter issue.
 
Maybe the high usage is due to dead batts and the charger is running like crazy trying to charge a junk batt.



Maybe their fridge is over working and not as efficient.



I would track kwH usage vs cost. That would be more effective way to compare usage.


Maybe the guy made the electrical company billing dept mad?



Maggot
 
We have gone through the trailer and checked to make sure everything is off. The battery checked out ok, 12.5 volts under load with inverter off. We read our own meters monthly and report it to the office. Their usage is well above everybody else's. Thinking it may be either the refrigerator, faulty meter or maybe faulty inverter.
 
Their EMS should be displaying how many amps are being drawn.

Bruce
 
Is it possible to swap power sources between two of your units, and see if they still continue to outdraw your monthly charges as much as you say?

It still sounds like a faulty electric meter to me.
 
Could get a clamp-on ammeter from Harbor Freight to check for abnormal draw. Or maybe get a Kill-A-Watt meter.

Could shut of all breakers in the panel except for the converter and fridge circuit and see if a change. Fridge on electric has a small heating element that runs on 120 volts but only draws a few amps. Turn inverter off when not there.

But yes, contact the poco.
 
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Faulty meter.

I would complain to the CG AND the Electric company. If they have fewer items turned on than the rest of you and are being charged more, something's wrong.



go through the camper with them just to make sure they dont have a deep freezer they forgot about (or whatever). Then if their bill is still higher you know theres a meter issue.
X2.
I had a letter along with the bi-monthly electric bill for $260 from the campground owners a few years ago after the cg was closed for the season. They suggested we check it out. I was sure I had disconnected the power cord but to be sure I went up there and the camper was not plugged in and the breakers were turned off. The meter was spinning like crazy, so I tracked down the owner and told him I couldn't understand how the person reading the meters missed that nothing was plugged in. The breakers and outlets were right under the meter. I also told him I had seen a meter short out many years ago. He said he knew meters did not go bad so I had him go back to the site with me. He couldn't believe how fast the meter was spinning.
 
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Do you all have a residential fridge or does this one have an RV fridge?

RV fridges use alot more power ....our bill is about $55 a month and neighbor has residential fridge in a larger camper with two AC’s and their bill is only about $30 a month ....

Our RV fridge is also in a slide so it works harder
 
Do you all have a residential fridge or does this one have an RV fridge?

RV fridges use alot more power ....our bill is about $55 a month and neighbor has residential fridge in a larger camper with two AC’s and their bill is only about $30 a month ....

Our RV fridge is also in a slide so it works harder

The rv in question does have an rv fridge and it is in a slide that faces the sun most of the day so that is probably a contributing factor. We did pull the vents on the outside of the trailer and clean behind the fridge this past weekend. We'll see if that makes a difference.

Thank you all for your ideas and suggestions. The KW monitor sounds like a good idea and we'll explore the possibility of swapping power supplies. I'll post the solution if we figure out the problem.
 
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The RV refrigerator will run several weeks on propane. Try that and see how -- or if -- the AC power consumption.

-- Chuck
 
The RV refrigerator will run several weeks on propane.

Shockingly, that depends on the fridge. I always believed the same until this new double-door Norcold. I go through a 30 lbs. tank of propane weekly with it. I contacted Norcold and asked if that was excessive- they said it was normal and expected.
 
The rv in question does have an rv fridge and it is in a slide that faces the sun most of the day so that is probably a contributing factor. We did pull the vents on the outside of the trailer and clean behind the fridge this past weekend. We'll see if that makes a difference.

Thank you all for your ideas and suggestions. The KW monitor sounds like a good idea and we'll explore the possibility of swapping power supplies. I'll post the solution if we figure out the problem.

Try to get the outside of the slide that is in the sun shaded. Also might look at adding a computer fan to circulate the air more through the exhaust area (search fridge cooling mod). I think you may have found the reason for the difference if it is not a faulty meter.
 
Maybe....

Someone is plugging in while their gone and stealing electricity.
Sorry had to say it.
As far as using lp for the fridge, years ago we had a trailer delivered to a campground. Plugged it in and filled the fridge with food. Had a great week. Came back 2 week later and found all our food spoiled and oh what a smell.
Now I'm not a fridge repairman but am fairly handy guy. So I took off the panel just to see if something was wrong. Found a 110 plug with a cord hanging next to it and not plugged in.
Also found 2 empty 30 lbs tanks.
I called the place where we bought it and told him what I found.
He replied.....
Sounds like I owe you money for 2 30 lbs tanks and I'll give you an extra $100 to cover food loss and mess you had to clean.
I couldn't have expected any better treatment.
The dealer iwas American RV in Grand Rapids Michigan which is now ( not then ) owned by camping world.
Greg in Michigan
2019 rockwood 2606ws
2018 Nissan titan xd Cummins turbo diesel
 
In any given setup there can be power leeches, if it has a remote it is drawing power on standby.

Why not shut down everything and unplug for a month or 2? Or swap campers on the site for a while. Or run a line from the source to only the essentials like the refrigerator.
 
If gone for more than a week or two I'd be pulling all the food out of my refrigerator. Saw a news report just recently where a representative from the CDC was going over some food precautions for the July 4 "Weekend".

Leftovers put in a refrigerator should be consumed within 7 days or discarded. Packaged food that requires refrigeration has varying "Use by or best by" dates but can spoil quickly if the power fails for any length of time.

Frozen foods should not be re-frozen if they thaw due to a power outage.


Unless it's something that's inherently safe, like a jar of pickles, Ketchup, Mustard, etc, I'd be loading it up in a cooler and taking it home. Would also turn off the Refrigerator while gone.

FWIW, state laws vary but in our state if you sell something to customers that is "measured", like gasoline from pumps, produce by weight, etc, the "device" used to measure has to be regularly certified. Power companies regularly change out meters so they can be re-certified but chances are the power meters in campgrounds are owned by the campground and the power company just charges based on a single meter coming into the campground.

The person experiencing the high bill should make a formal complaint (that means in writing) to the campground and if they fail to take action (like having the meter tested) then move to the next level, usually a state's consumer protection division of their AG's office.

If nobody has a Kill-a-Watt meter, just plug in a hot plate or heater that draws a known amount of power. Start a timer when it's turned on and run it for an hour. Read meter before start and at end. See if there's an error.
From what I read it should be easy to see how much the error is and after converting it to a percentage, see if it coincides with the percentage the bill is greater than others.
 
Using a Kill-A-Watt, I learned that my Dometic RM1272 uses about 7.5kw per day which at ~17c per KW works out to almost $40/mo. As I recall, that's about a 40% duty cycle.
 

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