Community Forums

Sclanton · 12-01-2018, 10:45 AM

This may be common knowledge but I didn't see it anywhere. Hopefully this will help someone else.

My gauge panel has freshwater, gray, black, propane, and battery indicators. I have been noticing that they were all showing full or almost full
when I knew they were not.. and then sometimes they were accurate. I eventually realized if all the interior lights were off the gauges would read accurate and with all the lights on they would read full. These are LED lights by the way. So I began testing each light independently and most of them had no effect on the gauges but 5 of them did. It did not matter where the 5 bad LEDs were installed, they effected the gauges. These bad LEDs still shined fine, but for whatever reason they were emitting radio noise or some kind of electrical interference. Replacing them solved the problem.

nothermark · 12-01-2018, 10:56 AM

RFI/EMI radiation has been a known problem for a long time. Countries like the US and most of Europe have laws against excessive noise generation. The problem is when folks get lights supplied by cheap vendors overseas they don't include the extra circuitry to reduce/eliminate the noise because it adds to the cost and there is little recourse against them. If you have a new unit I would be complaining to the maker and asking for new parts. If it's an older unit you are stuck.

Sclanton · 12-01-2018, 11:13 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by nothermark

RFI/EMI radiation has been a known problem for a long time. Countries like the US and most of Europe have laws against excessive noise generation. The problem is when folks get lights supplied by cheap vendors overseas they don't include the extra circuitry to reduce/eliminate the noise because it adds to the cost and there is little recourse against them. If you have a new unit I would be complaining to the maker and asking for new parts. If it's an older unit you are stuck.

The RV is a 2012 and originally came with all halogen bulbs. I replaced them all with LEDs myself in 2014. I don't know if the 5 bad ones were bad at the time of purchase or if they went bad later. I decided to keep the bad ones for use as spares in the basement storage lights, since they aren't usually on anyway.

nothermark · 12-01-2018, 11:32 AM

Sounds like as good an answer as you can hope for. Thanks for filling in the blanks.

Unicorn Driver · 12-01-2018, 11:37 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by nothermark

RFI/EMI radiation has been a known problem for a long time. Countries like the US and most of Europe have laws against excessive noise generation. The problem is when folks get lights supplied by cheap vendors overseas they don't include the extra circuitry to reduce/eliminate the noise because it adds to the cost and there is little recourse against them. If you have a new unit I would be complaining to the maker and asking for new parts. If it's an older unit you are stuck.

Hi Mark,

So do LEDs from overseas vendors sold on Amazon etc in the US have to adhere to those laws?

Cheers,

nothermark · 12-02-2018, 09:27 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Unicorn Driver

Hi Mark,

So do LEDs from overseas vendors sold on Amazon etc in the US have to adhere to those laws?

Cheers,

As I understand it they have to meet US requirements if they are sold in the US. The problem is trying to enforce that against a company located in a city you cannot pronounce located somewhere in foreign country that does not care about your problems.

This is a problem that Amateur Radio and to some extent AM radio users have been dealing with since it started. The noise generated wreaks havock with communications sometimes up into the low end of the TV spectrum and FM radio. The same problem exists with cheap solar controllers and similar devices that use pulse width modulation without filtering the output.

Unicorn Driver · 12-02-2018, 09:34 AM

Cheers Mark,

MSHappyCampers · 12-02-2018, 10:34 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Sclanton

This may be common knowledge but I didn't see it anywhere. Hopefully this will help someone else.

My gauge panel has freshwater, gray, black, propane, and battery indicators. I have been noticing that they were all showing full or almost full
when I knew they were not.. and then sometimes they were accurate. I eventually realized if all the interior lights were off the gauges would read accurate and with all the lights on they would read full. These are LED lights by the way. So I began testing each light independently and most of them had no effect on the gauges but 5 of them did. It did not matter where the 5 bad LEDs were installed, they effected the gauges. These bad LEDs still shined fine, but for whatever reason they were emitting radio noise or some kind of electrical interference. Replacing them solved the problem.

Hi !

Welcome to IRV2! We're sure glad you joined the gang!

Thanks for the heads-up! Have fun and keep her between the ditches!

Good luck, happy trails, and God bless!