DANGER - URGENT! Black & Decker Electronic Pest Repellers

[deputydog]

I found a mouse in my motorhome today and while I was at Home Depot I saw some Black & Decker Electronic Pest Repellers Model No. 310 which you plug into an a/c outlet and they supposedly emit a sound that will drive out mice, spiders, cockroaches etc. I was skeptical but figured they were worth a try, so I bought a 3 pack and plugged them in.

I then unplugged the shore power and cranked up for my weekly exercise of the coach and before I could get out of the garage, one of them started smoking. It happened to be in an inverter outlet at the passenger floorboard so I was lucky to see it and yanked it out. It did not blow the breaker, but was smoking pretty bad and was very hot.

Since they worked fine until I unplugged the shore power I guessed that they might have some components that did not like the modified sine wave of the inverter and sure enough, I tested the other two on the inverter and they both got hot and began smoking within less than two minutes! I checked the voltage and frequency of my inverter and both are fine, so it almost has to be the wave form.

I'm going to contact the manufacturer tomorrow to let them know.

I would highly recommend that they not be used in a motorhome, especially in an inverter outlet. Setting a coach on fire to get rid of a few mice is a bit extreme!

Hopefully this will save somebody else from having a disaster.

[deputydog]

I found a mouse in my motorhome today and while I was at Home Depot I saw some Black & Decker Electronic Pest Repellers Model No. 310 which you plug into an a/c outlet and they supposedly emit a sound that will drive out mice, spiders, cockroaches etc. I was skeptical but figured they were worth a try, so I bought a 3 pack and plugged them in.

I then unplugged the shore power and cranked up for my weekly exercise of the coach and before I could get out of the garage, one of them started smoking. It happened to be in an inverter outlet at the passenger floorboard so I was lucky to see it and yanked it out. It did not blow the breaker, but was smoking pretty bad and was very hot.

Since they worked fine until I unplugged the shore power I guessed that they might have some components that did not like the modified sine wave of the inverter and sure enough, I tested the other two on the inverter and they both got hot and began smoking within less than two minutes! I checked the voltage and frequency of my inverter and both are fine, so it almost has to be the wave form.

I'm going to contact the manufacturer tomorrow to let them know.

I would highly recommend that they not be used in a motorhome, especially in an inverter outlet. Setting a coach on fire to get rid of a few mice is a bit extreme!

Hopefully this will save somebody else from having a disaster.

[RV Wizard]

deputydog, thank you for warning our members of this danger in our rigs with modified sine wave inverters. I am sure there will be more to come on this topic. Take care and stay safe.

[NeilV]

<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-title">quote:</div><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-content">Originally posted by deputydog:
I found a mouse in my motorhome today and while I was at Home Depot I saw some Black & Decker Electronic Pest Repellers Model No. 310 which you plug into an a/c outlet and they supposedly emit a sound that will drive out mice, spiders, cockroaches etc. I was skeptical but figured they were worth a try, so I bought a 3 pack and plugged them in.

I then unplugged the shore power and cranked up for my weekly exercise of the coach and before I could get out of the garage, one of them started smoking. It happened to be in an inverter outlet at the passenger floorboard so I was lucky to see it and yanked it out. It did not blow the breaker, but was smoking pretty bad and was very hot.

Since they worked fine until I unplugged the shore power I guessed that they might have some components that did not like the modified sine wave of the inverter and sure enough, I tested the other two on the inverter and they both got hot and began smoking within less than two minutes! I checked the voltage and frequency of my inverter and both are fine, so it almost has to be the wave form.

I'm going to contact the manufacturer tomorrow to let them know.

I would highly recommend that they not be used in a motorhome, especially in an inverter outlet. Setting a coach on fire to get rid of a few mice is a bit extreme!

Hopefully this will save somebody else from having a disaster. </div></BLOCKQUOTE>

Most Modified Sine Wave inverters carry a warning about Battery Chargers (Power Supplies) stating that anything with a Battery Charger should be tested for overheating before extended use with an inverter and not used if it gets too hot. So we all have to be mindfull of much much more than just the Pest Repellers that have been mentioned here but anything that has a power supply built into that is in any way related to the circuitry in a battery charger.

This would include any electronic device regardless of whether it has a battery in it or not. This could be even a walkman type device, clock radio, a motion detector alarm, etc. Even a laptop computer could have a power supply affected by this.

Anything run on an inverter should be tested for compatibility first and not be left unattended until it has been verified as safe.

[deputydog]

You're correct Neil, but I thought less than 2 minutes after plugging in, the first sign of a problem was smoke boiling out of the repeller outlet should have tripped some safety mechanism or fusible link in the repeller. (these have a 120V outlet on their side rated at 12 amps to replace the outlet that they use up.

I opened one up today and it appears to be a resistor that overheated, burned and cracked the circuit board where it was attached and melted part of the unit plastic case.