RV electrical system detected bad ground at resort

[SueRVEd]

After a long day of driving we stopped at our destination. Temperature was 85 degrees and it was time to set up camp and get the AC units fired up.

I plugged into the 50 Amp service on the pole and flipped the breaker. The green light lit up and I’m off to turn the AC on. However, they were not turning on. I looked at the electrical source indicator and it stated something like “ground fault”.

Never having this happen before I was stunned on my next move. I went back and checked the 50 Amp breaker at the source. It seemed to be working. I went inside and checked the breaker box to look for tripped breakers and there was a readout panel in there that stated “open ground”.

I went and talked to the office and they couldn’t believe it didn’t work since they just had new boxes installed at every RV site 2 weeks earlier. They called an electrician right away but couldn’t get them to answer their phone at 5pm.

I went back to the site and tried the 30 Amp outlet and it worked fine. The AC units fired up and we were cooling off.

I looked on the internet for voltage readings on the 50 Amp plug and whipped out my volt meter and started checking. Sure enough, it was something in the wiring of the 50 Amp plug since the voltages were all off according to wiring diagrams I found. I wrote down the voltages from pin to pin also wrote down what they should be. I also went to a vacant site to verify what the internet wiring voltages were said to be and got confirmation.

I gave the office my findings and he took a picture and texted the picture to the electrician. The electrician called back and said it made perfect sense and he would be out in the morning at 7am to fix it.

He was there at 7am and found the ground wire not connected and hooked it up.
The 50 Amp was fixed.

The point of all of this was that my coach was able to detect the wiring error and would not allow faulty wiring to damage my electrical system.
I was shocked at how smart the system was and actually saved quite possibly some damage to my unit. It was odd that the green light on my plug did light up but I think one leg did have 120v but the other was 180v and ground was 60v or something like that (I’m going off memory) so maybe that is what lit the lamp?

Anyhow, I just thought I’d share an experience of poor RV wiring that was detected by an RV and saved my coaches wiring.
Not bashing the RV resort but giving accolades to the brains of my electrical system working as it should.

Signed
Thankful......cheers

[Bob_C]

That's exactly why so many push the Progressive EMS....with digital readout...

[vsheetz]

Thanks for sharing.

[egwilly]

Happened to us at a National Forest Campground. 50A service ground fault found by my Progressive EMS. Refused to allow power to pass. Had to find another spot to camp.

No only a equipment issue, a major hot skin issue that could cause electrocution.