check out my electrical mess on the Escapees forum

[blizzardND]

I posted it there because it seemed to fit right into the thread on grounding of the inverters.
link;
Blizzards Electrical mess

blizz

[Bob86ZZ4]

Wow, that's too bad about how they built it with no access for service. Looks like you're going to do it right now tho. Wow, that picture showing how they had it set up at first looks pretty bad. I think I'd call them and tell them you found that and aren't satisfied with their shoddy work there. At least the boss should know somebody didn't do a very good job. But maybe it is a good job and I just don't know enough about it? Get some more opinions.

About that grounding issue. I don't know very much about electricity. But, I think you want to keep your grounds and neutrals seperate either back to the pole (service hookup at the campground) or the generator. I can't tell from the picture but just want to make sure that that neutral bus bar isn't connected to the box in any way. The ground bus bar should be connected to the box and it looks like it is. That way the ground path is discrete all the way to wherever your electrical is coming from.

And another thing. I thought ground wires could only be green or bare? What's with those blue ones? You can use other color wires but you have to re-code them with the proper color tape on each end. So, that electrician should have wrapped some green tape around those blue wires I thought?

I wouldn't think it would matter about running those two ground wires to the chassis and bolting them to the same point. It's just that you want that neutral kept seperate. On the circuits where you removed some of those ground wires and used your junction boxes to extend from back to the box, did you use a larger wire to run from the box to the junction/device box? I can't tell from the pictures. You know what I mean? You don't want the possibility of the ground wire overheating if there was a short circuit to ground. Each seperate hot wire should have it's own equal size ground and neutral I think? I'm guessing you've accounted for that tho. Just can't tell from the pictures.

What about just using a 30 amp gfci breaker on the pole where you plug in at the park? Don't they sell them in a nice weather proof plug thing?

What about that damaged charger converter? I suppose it's out of warranty now? Was there any ventilation for it? How come it pooped out?

[Bob86ZZ4]

I think you can replace that 30 amp breaker with a 30 amp gfi breaker in the box if you wanted to. That would protect everything from the box on down. By doing it at the post it would also protect your cord I suppose.

[blizzardND]

I think the flash made the green wires look blue, the bus-bar the whites are hooked to is insulated from the box. the wires from the splice boxes to the fuse box is the same wire, I'm not too afraid of over heating as they are connected to either 3 over head lights, or 2-3 wall outlets, on a 15 amp breaker, the longest run anywhere in the truck isn't much over 20 ' so voltage drop isn't my concern either.

the 30 amp GFCI breaker is intended to protect you when there is a problem when you are just on genny or batt/inverter power and NOT rounded to the shore power ground. The problem is the truck then has no actual ground until you grab the metal door handle in the rain, then your body becomes the ground.

I bought the inverter in Elkhart (surplus)for 450 dollars, it needed an 1100 dollar circuit board, then the tech notice somebody was already inside that box and told me the replacement board wouldn't work either. Sooo... I bought a re manufactured unit form him for 1200, with a 90 day parts and 2 year labor warranty.

great guy Robert at One Stop Cop shop in Colorado Springs Co. He's an authorized Xantrex tech. they do a lot of ambulances and special law informant RV and trailer work.

Robert figured the 2 bad Golf Cart batteries I had replaced caused the inverter charger to over work and burn out. I made Sams club replace all 4.

I added a bigger 12x24 vent grills on both sides of the inverter to replace the 10x12 ones in the picture that should take care of the cooling issue.

I'm going to fire the Rumrunner up and take it home where my tools have been moved back to and spend the weekend re-assembling it.

watch for pictures, if you guys have any thoughts or precautions let me know,I'll check in frequently from my laptop.
-blizz

[Bob86ZZ4]

Ahh, good. I'm sorry you've had such trouble with that converter/charger.