Quote:
Originally Posted by xrated
I'm not as experienced of a camper as a lot of you guys/gals on here, but I've been an Electrician since 1980 (that officially makes me an "old fart"). From my limited experience at campgrounds, many of the problems lie with the campground itself in the fact that their electrical systems have not been maintained as well as they should and that they have not updated their systems for higher power consumptions that they are experiencing vs. when they were built, sometimes many years ago. As I understand it, the 30A systems were pretty much the norm years ago. Now, many of the campers/trailers/coaches/etc are 50A systems and there is obviously a lot more power being used/consumed at the campgrounds. It is analogous to the days when all the houses had either a 60A service.....or if you were very modern, a 100A service. Now days, 200A services are the norm and 225 and higher are quite common. The utility companies have obviously had to upgrade their equipment....transformer sub stations, switchyards, distribution lines, and more power generation plants. Unfortunately, not all of the campgrounds have kept up with the "power demand" that the modern camper want/need to keep their campers happy. And of course, there are many that have, and they are the ones that we all want.
|
THIS is a problem so many run into. Just because there's a plug there doesn't mean a lot. It could be anything anymore. Some of the biggest problems are in government ran campgrounds and older RV parks. The newer ones I've gone to all have up to date peds, power etc. The older ones are hit and miss. Xrated made the point; so many of these locations had a power grid installed in their park "back when". As time progressed they may/may not have added lots of 50A plugs. If they did, and didn't upgrade the incoming power you will have issues. The park we stay in for the winter just had to upgrade ALL of the transformers and feeds into the park a couple of years ago due to the increase power draw from the campers.
As far as the plug in tester; it's fine if you want to run around the trailer plugging it into receptacles to check the voltage...even if it's 50A. It will tell you the voltage at that point no matter which leg it's on. Problem is...which leg is it??? That's another great point of the sophisticated EMS systems. It does all that for you real time...every minute. You don't need to check for problems; wait for them; worry about them;....it just shuts it down and tells you what the problem is. "Don't leave home without it"
