DNP Posted February 12, 2019 Author Report Share Posted February 12, 2019 We carved back to good copper. The bus got hot, melted the insulator, ground the bus to the meal box it's in...and we think that led to the flames. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
98Z5V Posted February 12, 2019 Report Share Posted February 12, 2019 2 hours ago, DNP said: We carved back to good copper. The bus got hot, melted the insulator, ground the bus to the meal box it's in...and we think that led to the flames. There were FLAMES, brother?! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RobPLSCA Posted February 12, 2019 Report Share Posted February 12, 2019 3 hours ago, DNP said: we think that led to the flames Yeah, there's got to be an electrician around here somewhere... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
98Z5V Posted February 12, 2019 Report Share Posted February 12, 2019 @Rsquared, emergency on Aisle 5... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
unforgiven Posted February 12, 2019 Report Share Posted February 12, 2019 12 minutes ago, 98Z5V said: @Rsquared, emergency on Aisle 5... He's finesse, if he can't pull out a screwdriver from his pocket protector...he knows a guy.... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DNP Posted February 12, 2019 Author Report Share Posted February 12, 2019 Already had one there guys. I don't touch electrical. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ravenworks Posted February 12, 2019 Report Share Posted February 12, 2019 (edited) I think you have bigger problems. I'm not a sparky but Have you ever had problems where stuff didn't work? I'm wondering if you lost half a leg of your 220/210 (or whatever) and it went out of balance and was trying to come back through the buss. Edited February 12, 2019 by Ravenworks Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DNP Posted February 12, 2019 Author Report Share Posted February 12, 2019 It's a travel trailer. An older, well used one. We either overloaded the crap out of it, or more likely had a loose main ground which was arcing and heating the bus. No 220 in there. Good news is, it works again and we have heat...so the build process can still happen. Or Rob can get out to the shoot and do it there.... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rsquared Posted February 25, 2019 Report Share Posted February 25, 2019 Your ground wires should never do that dude. I could see the "hot" wire cooking like that, but not the ground. That's an odd one. On 2/12/2019 at 1:21 AM, unforgiven said: He's finesse, if he can't pull out a screwdriver from his pocket protector...he knows a guy.... I am the guy too. My work involves a lot of mechanical/electrical stuff. The controls are just the last part to make it all actually work. Example. At the NOAA headquarters in Silver Spring MD, we're re-fitting their chiller plants to all new and improved joker products controls. Part of it is about 33 different 16" control valves for the chiller system. Each valve is 120 VAC powered, being switched open or closed also with 120 VAC. So we run the conduit from the valves to a separate relay panel that I built. Pull the wire from the valves to our relays, then run the control cabling from the relay panel back to our central control panel (which we also custom build on jobs this size). Then, I program the controllers, and pass it off to the nerds for the final integration (for the spinning wheels and changing colors that end customers love to see). I'll throw some pics up at some point. On another thread of course. I'd just hate to derail this one. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
98Z5V Posted February 26, 2019 Report Share Posted February 26, 2019 (edited) 5 hours ago, Rsquared said: Your ground wires should never do that dude. I could see the "hot" wire cooking like that, but not the ground. That's an odd one. I've seen burned down ground wires before, brother - lemme tell you what happened... Guy starts having all kinds of electrical problems with an off-road vehicle... Blows out his Electric Power Steering. Replaced under warranty. Next, his regulator/rectifier blows out (converts AC to DC, and keeps it under 15.5VDC). Warranty. Then he blows out an ECM - the brain. Warranty. Then, all kinds of signal sensors start to go, Vehicle Speed Sensor, Gear Position Sensor, Throttle Position Sensor (which is a combined MAP sensor)... All kinds of shiit. Warranty. THEN, he fries another Electric Power Steering unit up... At this point, I'm tired of it, and I tell the manufacturer that I need a complete vehicle wiring harness. My justification was: It's the only thing that makes sense here. Something happened somewhere, and he burned down a ground. That AMP power has to return to the battery via another ground now. Volts consumed by load, AMPS return to battery, never consumed, always there - that's a charging system. Common charging system stuff. More AMPS returning on another path, because that's what they do... And they burn down THAT ground, then another, then another... I want a wiring harness, or I want paid under warranty to take his whole wiring harness apart and find the burned-down grounds... I get manufacturer approval for a complete wiring harness replacement, all under warranty - and by now, the guy's warranty has expired. By they did it anyway. Call the guy and tell him the news. Know what he tells me?!!? "Yeah man, right after I got it, my battery bracket broke, and my battery hit the bottom of my seat frame and everything shut off out in the desert - I had to have a buddy tow me home..." No fucking shiit... He KNEW when it happened, and I had to CSI that fucking rig for a year to get it right. If only he'd told me... right from the get-go... These things aren't like houses, brother - they're like cars. But not. Cars have alternators. You start a car, you can unhook the battery, take it out, and the car runs, until you shut it off - the alternator provides all the power, and the battery is only there to start it. This is more like powersports shiit and motorcycles. The battery is there to start it, and run it. You unhook the battery, and it dies, right away. The charging system is AC converted to DC, via the reg/rect, and all the charging system does is keep the battery up. You burn down something in the charging system, and you'll hunt that shiit forever, or catch on fire. Hot wires that short to ground before the load - just pop fuses. That's an easy diag, and that's all they do. What fuse popped, what does it handle, and where are the hot wires to those components? - let's look at them. That a given, every single time. In this camper, something happened to smoke a ground circuit, and the generator keeps making power, so everything works - on another ground circuit. Until it smoked another one. Then another one. Before too long, there was only one ground circuit handling everything, before it let the smoke out... Volts are one thing. Don't fuk with the Amps... Edited February 26, 2019 by 98Z5V Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Matt.Cross Posted February 26, 2019 Report Share Posted February 26, 2019 1 hour ago, 98Z5V said: Volts are one thing. Don't fuk with the Amps... Precisely correct. Volts talk smack, amps on the other hand layeth the smacketh down... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
98Z5V Posted February 26, 2019 Report Share Posted February 26, 2019 7 minutes ago, Matt.Cross said: Precisely correct. Volts talk smack, amps on the other hand layeth the smacketh down... Justin Beiber is volts... The Rock is the AMPS... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Matt.Cross Posted February 26, 2019 Report Share Posted February 26, 2019 1 hour ago, 98Z5V said: Justin Beiber is volts... The Rock is the AMPS... Thus endeth the lesson. Amen. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rsquared Posted February 28, 2019 Report Share Posted February 28, 2019 Yeah, I didn't think about it until after I had already posted, that he was referring to a low voltage system. Yeah, you can smoke ground wires on low voltage stuff like that. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DNP Posted March 31, 2019 Author Report Share Posted March 31, 2019 Alright... Back to the topic. Where we at rob? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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