Fried Appliances

[hubbub52]

Ok not much of an electrical person here, know enough to do some things, so I could use some info on damage to 5th wheel from a short to ground at a camp ground. We had some electronics fried because of this short to ground, 2-tv's, tv sat. receiver, dvd entertainment center, and don't know about my converter. I do not see anything wrong with 4-way micro wave oven or refrigerator. The a/c's appear to be working correctly. Big question right now is about the converter, the 20 amp breaker will not reset with electricity on, would this mean that the fuses in the converter have blown or that the converter is fried as well? I have an Iota dls-55. I do not see any wiring that is burned or damaged that I can tell at the converter or at the fuse and breaker boxes. I have a Montana 3400rl and the converter is in space behind these boxes, this makes it hard to get to but not impossible. This just happened yesterday and I have talked to the city manager of the city that owns and runs this park. They fixed the electrical problem already and I took some pictures of the wires and such where this problem occurred. I was not the only one who was affected by this short. I am planning on getting someone to check the systems. The city manager wants a written estimate of damages to present to their insurance company but he is not sure about coverage yet. It appears to be a maintenance problem because the wires are corroded.

[firetrucker]

If you were on a 50 amp service, then it sounds more like the loss of neutral so that there was 240 volts across your appliances. Doesn't change the fact that your appliances are fried, though.

Since the breaker will not reset, I'd bet the converter is gone, as well. Damage is internal, as it is with all electronic devices.

Make sure you check ALL the appliances in as many of their operating modes as you can. Anything that was 100% turned off, which doesn't include a lot of things like tv's and stereos, and control circuitry, may have survived. This PROBABLY includes 12 volt devices, too, but I'd check these anyway.

Until you get the converter replaced, make sure you get a good battery charger so you don't run the batteries down too much.

Document everything, and test everything, and good luck.

Bob

[jimcol]

Not sure which 5'er you have but on my 3000RK the converter plugs into a 110v GFI recepticle. If yours is the same just unplug the converter then see if the 20Amp breaker will reset. If it does the problem is in the converter. If it doesn't I'd disconnect the GFI plug from the wires feeding it then reset the breaker. If it holds the problem is probably in the GFI recepticle. Pretty simple just takes a little time to work through the process of elimination. Let us know what you find.