Breaker keeps tripping.

Hi All,

I recently had a 30 amp outlet installed at my house.  I plugged my trailer into it and it tripped the breaker as well as one breaker in the trailer.  I googled the issue and took some steps listed around the world wide web.  I was able to isolate the problem to a single 15 amp breaker. With that breaker off I can plug into the garage and all is fine but the breaker in the trailer trips every time I try to reset it.  It is different from the other breakers in that it has two wires that are connected together.  I cannot read the writing on the label.  It looks like it could say load/recept.  I took recept to be receptacles and sure enough there are three that don't work.  I'm not sure what else is powered by this breaker.  I've tested the other outlets, refrigerator, AC, furnace and the charging to the batteries.  It is all working so I'm stumped.

Any thoughts or opinions?

Thanks,
Mark

mg194 said:

Hi All,

I was able to isolate the problem to a single 15 amp breaker. With that breaker off I can plug into the garage and all is fine but the breaker in the trailer trips every time I try to reset it.  It is different from the other breakers in that it has two wires that are connected together.

Click to expand...

If you mean it has 2 wires feeding out from this 15 amp breaker, I think I would disconnect one wire at a time to find which wire was tripping the breaker. Then after the breaker will stay on with one wire disconnected and one wire connected, check to see what is not working. This should tell you there is a short or overload somewhere in the plugs or wire that are not working.
This might narrow down your search somewhat.

Neal is correct for the first thing to check.

How old is the camper?  Breakers have been known to get weak or go bad, so replacing the breaker may be another move that could help.  They are available at any big box or hardware store.

  First, I will make the assumption that the 30 amp breaker you had installed was wired up for 120v and not 240v. I doubt this is an overload condition because that will usually take a few seconds or more to trip a breaker. Sounds like a dead short. The 15 amp breaker should trip before the 30 amp breaker, but there are all kinds or reasons that can happen. I doubt it is a bad breaker or both of them wouldn?t be tripping. Disconnecting the two wires from the breaker to isolate the problem was good advice. If you know how to use a volt/ohm meter it would be really easy to find out which wire was grounded out, if that?s the problem. Having a two wires feeding from a breaker is not something that would be done at a factory by any legit company. Sounds like something was added on to the trailer in a jackleg fashion to pick up power.

Thanks for the replies.

I tested the breaker by swapping it with the one next to it and the one with the two wires continued to trip.

The trailer is a 2004 Springdale.

I removed the breaker and tested each of the two wires.  Either way the breaker tripped.  In the process a wire attached to the adjoining breaker snapped so I'll be replacing it tomorrow.  I attached a picture of the two wires that were joined together.  One has a label and leads to the blue connector in the bottom portion of the converter on the right hand side next to the wire coil (second picture).  The other heads out the back of the converter to parts unknown but I'm guessing it feed my non-working outlets. 

If that crimped connector is the two wires connected together, I have to say it does look like it was originally installed that way. If I were you, I would stop right now and get somebody there that can trace the fault using an ohm meter or other safe method. Using the ?see if the breaker trips? is not a good method for troubleshooting, particularly that 30 amp breaker tripping. It can damage the breaker due to too many trips, or easily cause a fire wherever the fault is. On these RV?s, in a fire situation there will be nothing left except the frame by the time a fire dept gets there.....even if they are next door. Not to mention it sounds like it?s close to your house. Good luck and I really hope you get this resolved for camping season.

Agree with Boonieman - you have a dead short in that branch circuit.  Was it working before?  A short there has nothing to do with your new 30A outlet - it must have existed before you got the new outlet.

If you lack the meter and the skills to determine where the short is, get some professional help, or at least a handyman with some electrical knowledge.

I agree that this is getting beyond my electrical knowledge and will seek a real repairman.  I was hoping for something simple as it was working just fine two weeks ago.  It's just driving me nuts because I can't figure what has changed in the past two weeks.

Anyway, I appreciate the replies and thoughts.

Mark

If anyone is interested it is now fixed.

Upon further inspection I noticed that the converter had a capacitor on which the top had blown off during one of my reset attempts.  This led me to start by replacing the converter.  I purchased a Progressive Dynamics PD4645V and installed it along with a new fuse panel.  The breaker continued to trip and I discovered one receptacle that was not working.  The rest were showing as wired incorrectly but my lamp worked when I plugged it in.  That led me to believe I had an outlet problem.  I was able to get an electrician I know to come over and take a look.  It didn't take him too long to figure out that my new 30 amp outlet in the garage was wired 220 instead 110. (the guy that wired it is going to cover my associated costs)

The electrician repaired the wiring but the breaker continued to trip only now all of my non-gfi receptacles weren't working.  We disconnected the outlet side of the breaker and the converter worked fine.  We looked at the outlets for obvious problems and found none.  Later this afternoon I climbed under the trailer and found the culprit.  It was the wire that runs from a junction box up to another junction box in the slideout.  It had worn down over time with the slide going in and out.  I guess the 220 was enough to blow it out completely.

Anyway, I replaced that stretch of wire and all is well.

Whoever the guy was that wired your 30 amp recpt. is not an Electrician.  There are plenty of "wanna be" guys that think they are though, and unfortunately you got one of "those guys"  Glad you got it figured out and even better that the wanna be is going to take care of your costs.

Actually he may have been an electrician. Many many many many many stories of a RV owner hiring a licensed, established, and even highly rated electrician to install a TT-30 and it gets wired for 240 volts.

Last summer I had a chat with such an electrician who .. Learned BEFORE he messed up that the TT-30 is a 120 volt outlet.. He was about to mess up HIS customer's RV.

THis is why I recommend putting in a 50 amp outlet. you can use 30 amp breakers but put in a 50 amp -4 Wire, outlet  Those they hook up correctly.

John From Detroit said:

Actually he may have been an electrician. Many many many many many stories of a RV owner hiring a licensed, established, and even highly rated electrician to install a TT-30 and it gets wired for 240 volts.

Last summer I had a chat with such an electrician who .. Learned BEFORE he messed up that the TT-30 is a 120 volt outlet.. He was about to mess up HIS customer's RV.

THis is why I recommend putting in a 50 amp outlet. you can use 30 amp breakers but put in a 50 amp -4 Wire, outlet  Those they hook up correctly.

Click to expand...

An I'm here to tell you, as a Journeyman Electrician since 1980, he WASN'T an Electrician!

I am a lifetime electrician and I agree that it is not the electricians fault. 99% of the licensed electricians in the US would have wired it up 220. The OP did not ask for a 110 volt 30 amp receptacle, he asked for a 30 amp receptacle. He did not ask for the right thing so he is the one at fault.

SeilerBird said:

I am a lifetime electrician and I agree that it is not the electricians fault. 99% of the licensed electricians in the US would have wired it up 220. The OP did not ask for a 110 volt 30 amp receptacle, he asked for a 30 amp receptacle. He did not ask for the right thing so he is the one at fault.

Click to expand...

And any GOOD Electrician worth his weight in Salt, would have asked the fellow WHAT the recpt. was going to be used for....and thus eliminated the issue.  And I TOTALLY disagree that 99% of the electricians out there would have wired it wrong......that's not even close to being accurate.  When you are a skilled and paid professional craftsman, you make sure of what you're doing BEFORE you do it.....not guess or assume.  It's 100% the wanna be electrician's fault and unfortunately, many non electrical type folks that hire these guys, don't know any better....but why would they?  They are trusting their professional paid craftsman to do it correctly because they don't have the knowledge or ability to do it themselves.  And furthermore, any Electrician worth his weight in SALT, seeing a NEMA TT-30 recpt., would have looked at the recpt and seen that there was a place for a 120v wire, a neutral wire, and a ground wire.  And he obviously used a NEMA TT-30 recpt., as the homeowner was able to plug into it.

Please don't make excuses for someone that doesn't know how to do the job they are being paid to do.  A  true Craftsman doesn't make that kind of mistake; they either KNOW what there are doing before they do it, or they research and learn BEFORE they do it!!

You guys are arguing skill vs experience.  Having the skills to do a job isn't the same as knowing what to install or designing the circuits.  More than a few electrical techs know how to do wiring but rely on somebody else, e.g. an architect or a Master Electrician, to tell them what to install and where.  An electrician could spend his entire career wiring houses and never encounter a 30A/120v outlet & circuit, whereas the near-identical 30A/240v is fairly common in garages, workshops and older laundry rooms.  Residential electrical workers (I'm avoiding "electrician") would also be lost in most industrial power systems where 3-phase wiring (3 or 4 wire), motor-generators, transformers, and such are common.

Unfortunately, the typical home or RV owner doesn't have that knowledge either, so it's too-often a case of the blind leading the blind when the requirement is outside the electrical workers experience.  The homeowner assumes the person he hired knows all there is to know about electrical layout and wiring, but only occasionally is that true.

Gary RV_Wizard said:

You guys are arguing skill vs experience.  Having the skills to do a job isn't the same as knowing what to install or designing the circuits.  More than a few electrical techs know how to do wiring but rely on somebody else, e.g. an architect or a Master Electrician, to tell them what to install and where.  An electrician could spend his entire career wiring houses and never encounter a 30A/120v outlet & circuit, whereas the near-identical 30A/240v is fairly common in garages, workshops and older laundry rooms.  Residential electrical workers (I'm avoiding "electrician") would also be lost in most industrial power systems where 3-phase wiring (3 or 4 wire), motor-generators, transformers, and such are common.

Unfortunately, the typical home or RV owner doesn't have that knowledge either, so it's too-often a case of the blind leading the blind when the requirement is outside the electrical workers experience.  The homeowner assumes the person he hired knows all there is to know about electrical layout and wiring, but only occasionally is that true.

Click to expand...

In my opinion there is NO good excuse for doing what was done!  If you don't know, then find out BEFORE you do the work. And in my opinion, he doesn't have the "skills" to do the job, if he isn't smart enough to ask some questions about what it's going to be used for or even look at the recpt. first and see what the markings are that are on it.  The guy was a hack.....pure and simple!

I'm sorry, but I have a very low tolerance for incompetence from someone that is being paid to do a specific task and they have neither the skills, experience, or knowledge of how to do it correctly.  And there is NO ONE out there that knows it all about, electrical or plumbing or carpentry or whatever.....but the true Craftsman/professional, knows that he doesn't know, and seeks out someone that Does know for guidance....or they research it themselves and find out BEFORE screwing something up. 

Over the years, I've worked with simple 120 volt equipment, 240 volt stuff, 480 3 phase, 2300 volt 3 phase, 4160 volt 3 phase and 13.8 Kv 3 phase equipment, and I certainly don't know everything about everything....but.....I've also Never been shy about asking if I didn't know....and that's the difference between a hack and someone that is a Craftsman.

Electrician, yeah right, where did he think the 120 volts for all the 120 volt items in the trailer was to come from?  A silver and a gold screw should have been a hint.  120 V right on the face might be a hint.  It?s 3 freakin? wires, way too many for today?s experts.

lynnmor said:

Electrician, yeah right, where did he think the 120 volts for all the 120 volt items in the trailer was to come from?  A silver and a gold screw should have been a hint.  120 V right on the face might be a hint.  It?s 3 freakin? wires, way too many for today?s experts.

Click to expand...

+1,000,000.  )

lynnmor said:

Electrician, yeah right, where did he think the 120 volts for all the 120 volt items in the trailer was to come from?  A silver and a gold screw should have been a hint.  120 V right on the face might be a hint.  It?s 3 freakin? wires, way too many for today?s experts.

Click to expand...

Totally agree!  I have four 30 amp receptacles wired up for TTs at my farm.  Did em myself, along with all the wiring in my shop, barns and sheds.  I have done lots of electrical work myself, and although I am a "do it yourselfer", I have found MANY screw ups done by "professional" electricians.  A "professional" electrician wired several 120v circuits to the high leg on a 240v 3 phase panel at a customer's shop.  I discovered it when wiring up a forklift battery charger for them.  I have 240v 3 phase at my farm shop and can tell ya that hooking anything from that high leg to neutral will get ya 190 to 200 volts. Folks may call emselves a "professional" but their work proves otherwise!

Many valid points made here.  He knew it was for my trailer and purchased the receptacle he just made a big mistake and he's owned it.  I never would have thought about whether it was supposed to be 110 or 220.  I probably should have considered that as I installed one of these at a previous house.  All I can take away from this is that nobody was hurt, nothing burned down, the financial damage was minimal and I learned quite a bit including to know that what I'm asking for is what I'm actually getting.

Mark