Smokin' Some Lead

[oldnumber3]

I've only been a member of this forum for about 3 days now but have spent numerous hours looking around, seeing other peoples problems and most importantly realizing that I'm not alone. I couldn't believe the number of members I saw and their willingness to help other with their problems. What a GREAT group!!!!

Well I guess I'll start with my mishap/problem. I have a 2001 Mountain Aire on the Workhorse and love this RV. I've owned it about a year and a half. It seems like there are so many of us out there that have jack issues: won't come up, won't go down or won't work at all. Mine won't go up. At least the front anyway. The rear have always went up, slow but they always found their home. The front however would sometimes work and sometimes need help with a long 2x4. Now more times than not they don't work. I try not to use them unless absolutely necessary.
Last week I was getting ready to head up to the lake to get my daughter married. I had the RV in the driveway with all the jacks down. (I guess I need to mentiton that I have a HWH Touch Panel 310 series.) I hit the store button and went outside to get my 2x4. I put (2) 2x8's under each front foot when I use them so it's easy to pull them out and slip my 2x4 under to pry up. As I was prying up the driverside jack SMOKE started bellowing out from under the hood. "Houston we have a problem" I ran inside the RV and hollered at my son who was in the pass. seat to unbuckle and get out NOW!!! My wife haden't made it to the MH yet. She's usually last to get in. So what did my wife and I find? I opened the hood and there is a inline fuse next to the hydraulic pump in a rubber weather jacket that just melted away. I forgot to mention that 1 hr. prior to this I was washing the front of my MH. This fuse is right behind the grill along with the pump and is subject to getting soaked during a rain or washing. Well I seperated the two wires and taped them up. Scared at this point to even try and turn on the jacks I opened the two center valves and pryed my front two jacks the rest of the way up. On to the lake. I wanted to raise the rear up when we got to our destination so with a couple more sets of eyes I put a fuse in where the other had melted. Turned on my touch panel which lit up. (Tried turning it on before replacing the fuse and it was dead.) I lowered the rear jacks and my rt. front. The next day again with eyes everywhere I hit the store button and all the jacks went up, even the front went up. WOW! Well I got back home and taped this fuse with electrical tape really well. My front jacks still need help going up even the one that came up by itself a day earlier. I'm going to order new springs and go from there. This wire however is my concern. One wire runs to the pump motor. The other lead gets lost in a wire loom. The wire is about 10-12awg. I'm not sure if this is some type of turn on lead or what. Being worried now I have my hood open when I store my jacks. This fuse however is still getting warm when I store my jacks. Not hot where I can't touch it but warm enough that it softens the tape up a little. Is this heat normal for these two wires. If my jacks went up normal it would only be in store mood for about a minute. Now being outside with a 2x4 the unit stays on for about 4 minutes or so. Could this extra runtime be heating things up? Any ideas out there?? Thanks for listening.

[Clay L]

I would call HWH and talk to them. I have read many comments about how helpful they are.

[Flagelpater]

Is the wire on either side of the fuse holder also getting Hot?

[oldnumber3]

Thanks Clay L. I'm gonna call anyway to order some new springs.

[oldnumber3]

I believe both wires are getting hot but I'm not sure as to which one first. Guess I need to check that.

[oldnumber3]

I did find one of the large red hot wires going to the pump motor not as tight as it should have been. I could grab the wire and rotate it at the nut. I snugged it up good but have not had time to check the system since tightening that nut.

[J Walker]

You are in luck that HWH is one of the better companies for customer service, if the economic crisis has not hit them. Anyway, when retracting your jacks the pump should not be running. Valves just open and the springs retract the pistons. One of my pistons became slow to retract and HWH advised me to try cleaning it with dexron and a cloth. That cleared up my problem. The next step, if needed, would be replacement of the springs. There are stronger springs available. Why you were drawing current when retracting is a mystery and something is clearly malfunctioning. You can hope that it is a short circuit, but beyond that some component will have to be replaced or repaired.

[Rick Long]

You tightened up the RED... now go find the ground, take it off and clean it and the spot it attach's to. Do the same for your coach batteries. Bet things start working again.

[CyberVet65]

Info please. I thought that the jacks retracted to the stored position strictly using the springs?
Should the motor be running if that is the case?
I have the HWH system on a 99 Holiday Rambler. Perhaps I should be asking HWH.
Thanks

[Rick Long]

Have to be able to OPEN those valves and that takes the battery and good connections.

[oldnumber3]

Thanks Rick Long. That makes sense. No the pump dosen't run when you store the jacks but there still has to power to open the vavles. I guess I need to start tracing some grounds. If I have a bad or poor ground do you think that would cause the overheating at the fuse?

[Rick Long]

Absolutely!!.. A poor ground creates resistance... resistance creates heat.

[DAN L]

Quote:

Originally Posted by oldnumber3 I did find one of the large red hot wires going to the pump motor not as tight as it should have been. I could grab the wire and rotate it at the nut. I snugged it up good but have not had time to check the system since tightening that nut.

both of the pump motor solenoids for the jacks and the slides are grounded through the large hose clamp arrangement that attaches them to the black painted motor. i ran an additional ground wire from the clamp to the ground stud on my moho.

[RV Wizard]

Quote:

Originally Posted by oldnumber3 Thanks Rick Long. That makes sense. No the pump dosen't run when you store the jacks but there still has to power to open the vavles. I guess I need to start tracing some grounds. If I have a bad or poor ground do you think that would cause the overheating at the fuse?

You need to replace the fuse holder as probable loose connections have caused arcing and the heat you are finding. Look for good clean copper wiring when you strip off the insulation to install connectors. You may have to cut back more to get to non damaged wiring. A circuit breaker could be installed of proper amperage and can be manual or auto reset in lieu of a fuse.