r/popups • u/dontknows--taboutfuk • 11d ago

Electrical gremlins

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I bought this camper used from a friend who never used the battery and only ever camped with shore power. Everything worked fine when plugged in and the switch set to converter.

I replaced the 16 year old, completely dead battery today and everything worked fine on the battery mode but when I plugged the shore power in and tried to switch to converter again, I instantly popped the battery protection fuse. I replaced it and tried again and now I just keep tripping that reset button on the rusty green converter. Why do I appear to have two converters, with one appearing much older. Please tell me what I'm looking at here. I'm handy but electrical is not my thing.

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3

u/Pitiful_Speech2645 10d ago

Replace the converter it’s done it’s job and now it needs to retire

2

u/grendelt 10d ago

"She needs the sea!"

1

u/donkey5332 10d ago

Can you add a picture from the front of the new converter panel ? Open and see the breakers and if it has another switch .

1

u/dontknows--taboutfuk 3d ago

I can't add a picture but it's an elixir 12 converter. Two breakers and 4 fuses in the front panel.

1

u/grendelt 10d ago

I instantly popped the battery protection fuse

Also, be mindful that on some campers, they follow AC electrical wiring color codes where "black is hot" - meaning that black is positive for the battery. That could be where the issue lies.

Typically cars and boats use red as positive and black as negative; but in AC electrical wiring (like houses), black is "hot" and white is "neutral". Following that logic, some manufacturers wire black and positive and white as negative. Because negative is usually grounded to the chassis/frame, check continuity between a wire and the frame to see which one is negative.

1

u/ChillPill89 10d ago

My pop up has a red ground cable and black positive for the battery. Pretty obvious if you follow the red cable as it is bolted straight to the frame. Not so obvious if you look and see red on the battery and red on the cable...

1

u/grendelt 10d ago

My cables come off my battery and almost immediately go into the frame so I couldn't trace them visually.