How To Protect RV Electrical! EMS Surge Protectors And More!

how's it going i'm jared gillis welcome to another all about rvs today we're going to be looking at the rv electrical system something that we do very commonly we take it for granted plugging in our rv there's a lot of things that we can do to protect our rv and really be able to stay safe protect ourselves uh using the rv electrical system so there's a lot of things to look at from surges low voltage miswired pedestals to to hot skin conditions really there is a lot to cover here so uh let's dive right into the topic let's start off with the really simple end of things it's actually a really big problem on this end but we're going to work our way to the more complex uh bigger issues i i say bigger this first one is actually a pretty big issue if you've ever seen a melted end melted end of your cord the plug where you're going to be plugging it in well there's several things that can be a contributing factor too a lot of it is usually due to loose connections or bad connections i'm sure if you've been rving for a while and you've pulled into a campground or an rv park and you plug in your rv and the the plug just like wants to fall out because the outlet's just been overused and there's just so much looseness and slop when you go to plug in your rv that is a really bad thing because if you have a loose connection and you try and pull a lot of power through that it's going to be a massive amount of heat so if you have a bad pedestal it's best to alert the campground or the rv park so they can get that swapped out because it's just a ticking time bomb somebody pulls enough amps through it it's going to heat up it's going to melt it's not going to be good for the campground and it's not going to be good for your rv but we can't blame this all on the rv park or the campground we're the ones using this equipment and what are some of those things that we can do to take responsibility to make sure that we're having the best possible connection on our end and our equipment to connect to their equipment so number one you want to make sure that your end is is very secure so if you've replaced uh the plug on the end of your cable uh are your terminals locked down nice and tight is there any corrosion in there so you want to to make sure that your plug end is very secure the wires aren't trying to pull out that everything's tightened down really well the second thing like i mentioned is how clean is the metal on your plug so does it look like it's oxidized or has a black buildup on there is it is it dirty so it's not going to make a good connection so something that i like to use is this deoxit it does a great job of cleaning up the metal on the end of your plug so you can have the best connection possible it's also supposed to protect it too so if you don't have this and you want to clean the end of your your plug there you can use vinegar vinegar is acidic and it'll help clean it up and really shine those things so you can have a good connection so if you wanted to take it a step further some people use this like little dielectric grease or even some spray on lubricant put a link down in the description i can't remember the the name exactly right now it's crc you can check that out but the point is you want to have the best possible connection on your end so that you're you're not doing something to create that heat and the third thing we can do is plug in our rv properly you want to turn off that breaker plug in your surge protector or whatever device you're going to use to to test to make sure that plug is wired properly and if it is then you turn that breaker off plug in your rv to that surge protector and then turn that breaker back on it's the safest way you can and it's better for the campground and for the rv the the breakers at the campgrounds are supposed to be the ones that you can use like that it's gonna not create that spark when you're plugging it in like i said better for them better for you but with that thought of testing the outlet before we plug in the rv we see the first benefit to getting a surge protector is one of those portable surge protectors you can you can plug into the pedestal you can find out is this thing wired properly should i ask for a different site or do they need to come repair something here or am i good to go it's going to give you if you have an open ground open neutral reverse polarity it's going to tell you those kind of things to let you know if it's wired properly that's the the first level of knowledge that we need to be able to plug in safely so let's look at surge protectors because there is a whole lot of information along with surge protectors and a lot of options for what kind of level of protection would you like for your rv electrical system so this is the surge protector that we use it's the power watchdog it gives you a lot of the basic information that we've been talking about uh it indicates if you have the power on if there's an open neutral open ground uh if the line one and neutral is reversed and if there's no power and it gives you information if the surge protection unit in this has been used and it needs to be serviced so that's typically what you're going to see on like a typical 75 to 100 surge protector this one gives you a few more things this one's actually bluetooth so you can log into there and you can see how many amps are going through here what your voltage is on the system um it's kind of an interesting device you can even use it as like a meter to see how much power is going through here and how much you're using in the rv so if you're looking for a surge protector to use one of these portable ones where you can plug it in out there we have a 30 amp rv so we have a 30 amp surge protector if you have a 50 amp rv get a 50 amp surge protector and if you need to use an adapter and then install the surge protector then that's what you do you don't need to buy a 30 and a 50 so that you can have the option to plug in different ways at the rv park just get the one that matches your rv now this next step up in protection would be an ems device so the biggest advantage that we're going to see from this is it's actually going to monitor and make changes if problems come up so an ems is going to actively continue watching your system and if something changes let's say the voltage drops and gets too low it's going to turn off the power to your rv so things don't get damaged if the wiring gets changed maybe they come and do some maintenance done on a pedestal and it messes up maybe um something in your pedestal and where you're connected to it will actively protect you from those things and shut the power off to the rv so that those things can be fixed so this goes from just telling you something to actively helping you out this is our ems that we use on rrv we did it because it's probably the most budget-friendly ems that you can get for your rv of course like i said we're a 30 amp rv so this is a 30 amp unit and it's just under 200 you can buy additional accessories like a bypass switch but what you get with this one is this is where the information is going to be displayed um you get your error code chart so normal it's going to read that reverse polarity open ground high voltage low voltage high frequency low frequency data link down and replace the surge so if this thing's taking a surge and you need to replace that portion it lets you know that so typically this is installed in the rv hardwired in there but i pulled it out just to be able to kind of show you guys the unit like i said links down in the description to different ems units um some are portable you can just plug them in at the pedestal some are hardwired in if you just rather always be on there and then it's safe from theft um so there's a lot of options out there for different ems's but 200 and up is going to be what you're you're looking at this is extremely helpful in a park that's maybe overloaded with uh inadequate wiring and we see that voltage drop so the problem is is when the rv park or a campground is really full and everybody's using their their acs or a lot of electricity and the wiring's not that great the voltage because everybody is using so much the voltage will drop low voltage is actually really bad for your ac unit it's bad for electronics you don't want low voltage destroying your ac and to where you have to replace it that's the worst case scenario in between is your ac is going to be working a lot harder it's going to be hotter it's not going to be as efficient it's going to be pulling more amps it's really not good to have low voltage especially for your ac in the rv so the ems rather than letting your ac go through that and possibly get damage it's just going to shut off the power so that you're protected from it i mentioned the bypass so if you have something like a an inverter generator where you're plugging in for your rv the ems is going to detect an open neutral or an issue between the neutral and the ground and it's going to block any power from entering your rv just by using an inverter generator if you have an onboard generator like we do ours is fine with that it's already wired properly but the inverter generators they're fine the way they are you do not need to ground these for them to work with your rv it's an issue with not having a neutral and a ground bond this is really simple it's just a standard plug we're just tying the neutral and the ground together so we put a wire in there we tighten it down and i put a little cap on the back here so that nothing can get in there it's protected and nothing absolutely nothing is going to be connected to the hot leg where the power would be coming into this we just want to bond that neutral and the ground and it's really that simple you plug it into the the generator and it gives it that bond and then your ems sees it sees that bond and then it knows that it's safe to send power to your rv it's safe either way if you bypass the ems to do this you can do that but then you're losing any of the benefits of having the ems on there for anything else so a little plug like this clears it and lets you use the ems for the rest of your system while you're plugged into that inverter generator now if you're not a fan of having your ems turn off the power to your rv when you hit low voltage and it does happen at campgrounds to get low voltage um there is another highly controversial device called the called the hughes autoformer well it's not just hughes autoform it's auto transformers so i'm just going to say autoformer from here on out it's just easier for me because that's the one that we have but let me try and explain the device and what it does and the problems associated with using it in the future so the autoformer is really it's it's like a surge protector it is a surge protector and it has a lot of those features built into it but if it sees low voltage if the voltage drops below 113 volts it's going to use some of the available amperage to boost your voltage so that the voltage coming into your rv is the much better usable for your system for your ac for your electronics it's better for your system so it changes that relationship so that we have better voltage so the problem that comes along with the autoformer really isn't with you and your rv that's not where the danger is the danger is what it does to the entire system the more people use autoformers so the problem is usually a place that you're going to have bad voltage the rv park is going to have inadequate wiring the wiring probably should be updated because they can't handle the amount of load that's going out so the voltage is dropping so as people plug in their autoformers they're like hey i got great clean power now so i'm just gonna use more power so the more power they use the lower the voltage drops for everybody else so the more people that have autoformers the more voltage gets dropped so uh that causes a big strain on the rest of the rv park or campground on the wiring there and over stressing that wiring that is already inadequate is where the danger comes in that's where we don't want to be stressing bad over used inadequate wiring and cause a problem so that said with the nec 2020 code coming out they're banning the use of an auto transformer so anywhere that that code gets adopted you shouldn't use this device i will never tell anybody to go against the adopted code for that area or if an rv park is requesting or telling you that they are not allowed in their rv park i'd recommend not using it in their rv park um but that being said we do use ours where it is allowed so this is just my two cents in my opinion is i think rather than the nec just coming out in 2020 and saying we're gonna ban this thing i think it would have been better to regulate how much power gets used i think that would attack more of the problem rather than just saying you you can't use this where this code is adopted so the way that that works out is i actually self-regulate when we use the autoformer we use 12 amps and below we don't always use 12 amps we'll use less than that but we won't go over 12 amps when we're using the autoformer because we don't want to cause more of a voltage drop for everybody else so this could have been very easily regulated inside the device we could have a breaker that it'll trip if you go over say 20 amps or 15 amps or something like that so you regulate how much power is being used which is going to be better for everybody in the park i would much rather use good clean power that's better for my devices than as much power as i can squeak out unregulated and not good for my devices i think that would be a much better system if it was put into the device when you buy it that way it's put on the person that wants to use it and not put on the campground or anybody else in the system so i think that would have been a much better solution okay moving on from surge protectors ems and auto transformers there's a few other things we can do to stay safe with our rv electrical system there's a thing called hot skin conditions now i can't i don't think i could go over all the different crazy variables that could cause a hot skin condition which is a really strange term for meaning that your rv is basically has power running through it so there's voltage going through your your rv so if you were to touch the rv while touching the ground you could get shocked so one of the best ways to to test for this so that you can be as safe as you can is to get one of these non-contact voltage testers and i like the ones that go from 40 volts and up so uh if we have more than 40 volts going through the rv and we use this tester up against it it'll give us an alert that hey there is voltage going through this rv you should disconnect it and find out where the problem is you do not want to get shocked it should never be okay to get shocked by your rv so once you clear the problem you can use the non contact voltage tester and you can touch the the side of the rv or the stairs and it shouldn't give you a reading of any voltage there so very simple i'll put a link down in the description to a voltage tester like this you can even buy it in a kit if you wanted to get like an outlet tester one of these non-contact voltage testers and a multimeter it'll go a long ways now if you wanted to test the pedestal or maybe the outlet at your house to make sure that it's wired properly before you plug into it for the first time because some of these things do get wired improperly even by electricians that come like the 30 amp plug that you at the pedestals the outlets that you're going to plug into for an electrician it looks like a dryer plug so it's easy for them to think i'm going to put two hot legs in there and if you do that it's going to fry everything in your rv quicker than you can unplug it so uh it's a good idea to test it when you plug into it for the first time so if you want to use your multimeter to test it out uh if i'll put a link down to our website to give you these diagrams you could you could download them you can use them so that way you can remember how to test the voltages to make sure that it's it's wired properly if you wanted to use a multimeter to take that extra step if you go between the hot leg and neutral on the 30 amp outlet it should give you 120 volts and if you go between the hot leg and the ground that should give you 120 volts and you should get zero volts between the neutral and the ground connection on that 30 amp outlet and on the 50 amp outlet we now have two hot legs so from line one we should test to neutral we should have 120 from line one to the ground we should have 120 and from line one to line two we should have 240. we should have double what we have on line one uh that's because it's a split phase system if you're getting zero there that means they're they're bootlegging they're kind of cheating let me try and explain the split phase here so on line one you have 120 volts in line two you have 120 volts it's on a split phase system so as that power comes if you're only using line one that power is going to come in on the hot leg and then that neutral is going to carry the load also so if you're using 20 amps in your rv only on line one there's going to be 20 amps going on that neutral wire so let's say you have 30 amps on line one and 30 amps on line two those because it's split phase they're going to cancel each other out nothing actually has to go on that neutral wire but if they bootlegged it and you have 30 amps on line 1 and 30 amps on line 2 it's going to try and put 60 amps on that that neutral wire which is going to melt it that that neutral wire is meant to take 50 amps and at 60 amps it's going to ruin the system so um having the split phase being able to test 120 120 and check between those and get 240 is what we want to see that's a properly wired outlet so both those diagrams will be on the website you can check those out download them use them if you wanted to test outlets that you're plugging into it's a it's a not a bad practice to do typically what we do is we use that surge protector to test the line to see if that outlet is working and wired properly if the voltage is low in that park we'll use our hues autoformer if it's allowed to be used there if it's not we don't use it but then we also have the ems device that's plugged into the rv that's going to monitor and to protect us so we use that portable one to be able to check to make sure everything's done right and then we use the ems to monitor and protect us from anything that might change or we might need to shut the power off for any kind of dangerous scenario i know that's kind of an overkill to the system but for us it works really well we're covered in just about every situation and circumstance well i know that this has been a ton of information so remember we got the whole web page dedicated to this so if you uh got a little bit of it here and you read up on it there it would really help solidify it if you needed brushing up on any of these these ideas and topics um it is a good idea to have some kind of protection for your rv electrical system so there's links down in the descriptions to all those things so i think that's going to do it for today i hope you guys enjoyed this video if you liked it give it a thumbs up if you want to see more videos about rving and how to and diy hit that subscribe button because we got more videos coming your way all the time so if we don't see you on the road hopefully we will see you next video [Music] you

Channel: All About RV's

Views: 133,719

Rating: 4.9637976 out of 5

Keywords: RV Surge Protector, RV Electric, How To RV, RV, RVing, RV life, RVers, Jared Gillis, Less house more living, DIY RV, Learn to RV, Motorhome, Class A, 5th wheel, RV Electrical, RV Repair, RV America, All About RVs, Learn To RV, RV Knowledge, Hughes Autoformer, Nec 2020, NFPA, RV EMS, EMS Protection, RV Melted plug, RV Electrical disaster, Progressive Industries, Southwire EMS, South Wire Surge, Camco Surge Protector

Id: z-ATOr25oxs

Length: 19min 18sec (1158 seconds)

Published: Sun Nov 10 2019