Hooking up

[wandering1]

If you have questions about what you read in the owners manual call the manufacturer that published the owners manual and ask. Get the facts and forget the personal opinions, they wont cover the damage you may have by following the opinions.

[wa8yxm]

It does not matter if you plug into shore power while still hooked to the truck or hook up the truck while plugged into shore power.. They two systems will not fight each other.

The problem with the big inverter and the residential fridge is this. Though the Truck's alternator may be able to generate enough power.. When you add in the truck's needs you are going to be running it at near max rating for far longer than they are designed to operate.. Plus the wire from the Truck isolator relay to the jack in the back (the 7 pin connector) may be a bit..er.. anemic, this can cause overheating and bad things... I've seen those bad things.. The trailer had smoke damage. The tow vehicle was a total loss.

The residential fridge, with the door SECURED shut... Should keep food cold for at least eight hours.. Few folks can drive that long without a stop over.. When you stop for lunch/dinner.. Fire up the Honda and plug in.

[ruffian]

If you have a 1500W inverter, and you start your microwave, for example, you will put a draw of 120 to 150 amps on your trailer battery, which is hooked to your truck thru a small charge wire from your alternator/battery. After a very short time of supplying 120 amps from the trailer battery, your trailer system will begin to try to maintain voltage by taking amps from your truck system. This could overload your truck wiring.

This is one possible reason they want you to disconnect from the truck before using the inverter.

Just something else to keep in mind.

[jesilvas]

Hopefully the truck's fuse would blow before melting wiring.

[wa8yxm]

Originally Posted by tuffr2

I am also looking at getting a residential refer in my next 5th wheel. I expected to tow the 5th with the refer and inverter are on. I thought the truck hook-up would be connected to the Converter to charge the batteries and the Inverter would pull from the batteries to run the refer.

If this is not the case I gotta know...yikes.

Truck hooks direct to the batteries via fuses or breakers, Converter does too so it would be proper to say they hook together but .. No that's not quite right, When you are towing the converter is idle, it does nothing but sit there and possibly blink a light.

As I posted somewhere.. The problem is two fold, ONE the trailer charge wire may not be up to the current needed to power the inverter.

And the $200 plus alternator may not be up to the job either. They are designed to put out their rated output only for brief periods of time, Pull an extra 100 amps off them too long and they fry.

[caissiel]

That is the reason 120 volt fridge work much better in MH then trailers. On MH the house batteries are much closer with no voltage lost for high amp draw.
I have 2 alternators and increased the battery line size to 10ga. The max amps I ever saw was 23amps while the 30amp circuit breaker never jumped.
But if the truck batteries are charged and the only voltage in the line will be 13.6 and the charging amps to the trailer will be reduced. And even more considering the voltage lost on the 20 ft long distance to the trailer batteries. 13.6 volts is sustaining voltage and takes a long time to charge or produce enough amperage to supply power required for the load to run the fridge.
I never could keep my trailer batteries charged on an extended road trip until I installed solar panels. No fridge but furnace use in cold weather trips.