GFI question

thanks for your indeas.

John

I have a hard-wired Surge Guard that has about 2 feet of wire between it and the main breaker. I shut off all the breakers which should eliminate all potential appliances that are plugged in or otherwise connected. I still get the ground fault. I wired the Surge Guard myself and was fairly certain that all was correct, but I need to assume that the problem is between the Surge Guard and the main breaker. I will pull the breaker box out of the cabinet and recheck all the wires again when I get some time.

If I am missing anything I would love to hear it.

John

Chip

Try taking the surge protector out of the loop.

When I first plug in to the GFI outlet (any GFI), the outlet does NOT trip. That would indicate that all is fine through the cord, adaptors and plugs up to the Surge Guard. It is only after the 2 and a half minute delay when the Surge Guard allows the power to flow through does the GFI trip.

I will first unplug all appliances and disconnect all AC devices including the Water heater (on its own breaker), refrigerator, and converter. I have no transfer switch.

If that fails to solve I will proceed to bypass the Surge Guard which might have some leakage, by putting jumpers around the unit to allow voltage to flow to the coach immediately, without the delay. If I get the GFI trip then I have eliminated the Surge Guard as a problem.

I will then proceed to remove the neutrals one at a time to attempt an isolation to a specific circuit. It is my hope that I should find the problem this way. Until I asked the question, I didn’t know that a neutral to ground short would trip a GFI.

I have not done this work yet and it will not happen in the next few weeks or so because we are traveling and I don’t have all the necessary tools. I hope that I do not hit any campgrounds that will present a problem and keep me from plugging in. I like my heat to work too much.

Is your shore power true 50 amp 220? I haven’t seen those as gfi yet.

Are you talking about one of those jumper boxes where you plug one end into a campground’s 30 amp, another into the campground’s gfi 20 amp, and you plug your rv 50 amp cable into the jumper box?

JohnD222 wrote:Notruffinit,

Is your shore power true 50 amp 220? I haven’t seen those as gfi yet.

Are you talking about one of those jumper boxes where you plug one end into a campground’s 30 amp, another into the campground’s gfi 20 amp, and you plug your rv 50 amp cable into the jumper box?

Thanks for the input I have owned my coach for 2 years now and I have plugged in to the 50 amp plug only a couple of times and that was only with an adaptor so that I can use my 30 amp cord. I have only 1 AC unit and that is all that I need. It is also much easier to handle the cord. But to your point, I believe that you are correct in saying that the 220V plugs are not GFI protected. I know of no such connection. To date, I have only encountered 1 campground that had the 30 amp plug with a GFI. I have tried to plug in to GFI plugs in friends and acquaintances garages and have had the problem each time.

For the sake of safety, I feel I need to find the voltage leak and correct the situation.

Is your surge guard a 30 or 50 amp model?

The only function of the delay feature is to protect air conditioners that do not have internal safety delays built into their compressor circuits. Most now do, but you should check before turning on the ac without the delay function.

If you turn off the delay feature does the gfi pop immediately? Does it pop at all? Do both tests with all 5er circuit breakers off. Do it again with only the 5er master and hot water heater breakers on (you want the heater to have cold enough water in it so it immediately demands power, so run a bit of water if the water is hot).

Yes it could be in the 5er, but my thought is that the fault is in the delay function, over sensitive gfi maybe, but the delay, plus resistance in adapters and long power cord all add up to fool the gfi.

Does the gfi pop just once, and if reset, all is well?