Converting RV to 50 Amps

I have a couple question. Don't scream at me cause Iam new at owning a motorhome and using the forum here. I bought a 1990 Fleetwood Pace Arrow and it has a 30 amp can it be chaged to a 50 amp. Betty

Yes it can but not easily unless you have electrical experience, I would think. With a vehicle that age, I doubt that would need 50 amp in any event. If you are worried about campgrounds with only 50A connections available, there are adapter cables that will allow you to connect your 30A unit to a 50A supply.

Perhaps next time you could start  new thread for your question instead of piggy-backing on another that is not related to your question. Just a suggestion, not yelling at you!!!

I have a 1990 Fleetwood pace arrow and it has dual A/C.  It would be nice to run them both at the same time, but that would require 50 AMP service.  I would follow a thread on that type of conversion on this particular unit with great interest.  Betty, if you decide to persue 50 AMP service, you can click the 'New Topic' button on the list of conversations in the Remodeling your RV section of this website and keep us posted.  I think that some extensive wiring would be required but I am not sure.

When I had a MH with 30 amp and needed the 2nd A/C I modified my power as described here,  http://www.psrv.net/ and enjoyed the cool air.

I seen that thing but don't understand how feeding 20 amps to the generator circuit while also having 30 amps on the shore power would help.  The AC's are fed off of a selector switch that is fed by a single wire.  So short of rewiring the AC units I don't see that it would do anything having an extra 20 amps on board.  Besides, what if the 20 amp outlet is on the other pole of the 220 at the pedestal.  Isn't the generator circuit on a transfer switch anyways?  That would prevent those 20 amps from getting into the coaches 120V systems.

swinn, you are not understanding the intent of the wiring modification required, or accomplished, by the referenced box.  You also don't have sufficient understanding of basic 120vac wiring and/or RV wiring to be attempting modifications of this type.  JMHO.

Porky, interesting how much you can infer from a single post.  Their ads claim you can install it in an hour and run both ACs.  I don't think that is possible with my rig.

I went ahead and split Betty's question off into it's own topic - it looked like an interesting discussion.

Betty -

You can convert your RV, but it's not a simple project.  To use 50 amps, you'll have to replace the electrical cord and 120 volt breaker panel with 50 amp units.  Then move all of the existing circuits over to the new panel.  If this sounds too intimidating, you should consult an electrician.

If both your air conditioners are on one circuit, with a selector switch to choose between one or the other, you'll have to do some additional wiring to move the second air conditioner onto it's own circuit.  This is the whole purpose of the renovation - to let you run both A/Cs at once, they each need their own breaker.

Jim's modification is easier than replacing the cord and breaker panel.  If the second air conditioner is on it's own wiring that is easily accessable, it can take less than an hour to install it, as the makers claim.  If you have to install new wiring to put the the second A/C on it's own circuit, it will take longer.  Once it's installed, you can either run the two air conditioners one a time, like you do now, or run them both by running another extension cord to the park pedestal so one runs on the existing wiring and the second via the separate cord.

Lou Schneider said:

If the second air conditioner is on it's own wiring that is easily accessable, it can take less than an hour to install it, as the makers claim.  If you have to install new wiring to put the the second A/C on it's own circuit, it will take longer.  Once it's installed, you can either run the two air conditioners one a time, like you do now, or run them both by running another extension cord to the park pedestal so one runs on the existing wiring and the second via the separate cord.

Click to expand...

Be careful assessing the simplicity of this modification on a Fleetwood coach, or any 30amp coach, that uses the Intellitec ECC.  It's very easy, as you suggest, to separate the 120vac circuits and rewire them to feed the selected air conditioner from shore power or the added 20amp circuit.  It's another matter entirely to make the system behave as desired when the ECC senses quick, or coincidental, compressor cycling.  The result may/will not be what you expect no mater where the units receive their 120ac power if the control circuits are confused.

I have not found a way to keep the dual thermostats and dual compressor controls active while simultaneously crippling the ECC unit sensing circuits.

The above warning can be ignored if the two air conditioners are controlled via a simple selector switch and their 120vac feeds are separated.

No matter how much others think I do or do not know about 120V AC wiring, the difficulty in installation of such a device as the 20A 'cheater' box was my point.  There are some little stars on the brochure that indicate that it may be more difficult on some coaches than others.  The OP was asking specifically about a 1990 Fleetwood Pace Arrow.  It uses a simple selector switch and does not have an Intellitec ECC.  Both A/C's are powered through a single 20A breaker in the AC breaker panel under the sink.  The AC selector switch is overhead in a cabinet near the front of the coach.  The breaker panel is on the other side of the coach under the fridge or sink.  The power cord is at the rear of the coach near the generator.  The wiring diagrams for the coach are not clear how the AC selector circuit is wired, without direct examination of, documentatin on, or  experience with that selector switch and setup it appears that a considerable amount of wiring would be required to separate the power for the two AC units and power one of them off of a secondary circuit whether it comes from a true 50A service or a secondary 120V 20A service.

My other point was that the pedestal may not be wired to have 20 extra amps available even though it has both a 30A and 20A outlet, or worse they could have run 240V AC to the pedestal and have the 30A circuit on one leg and the 20A circuit on the other leg.  Without using true 50A service you may not acheive the only real goal of upgrading the service in the first place.  Whether this is the way things are supposed to work with park provided AC power pedestals or not doesn't seem to really matter to me.  I have seen a variety of poorly wired pedestals ranging from inconvenient to downright dangerous wired by who knows who that are not right.

The '90 Pace Arrow would fall into the easier group of coaches to add the "box" to if the selector switch is as simple as you say.

The box would be inserted, AFTER the selector switch and BEFORE the rear air conditioner.  You would, of course have to locate this wire and install the box (electrically) in that path.

As you say, installing the box does nothing to guarantee that you will always (ever) find an applicable place to plug in the 20amp cord.

swinn said:

I seen that thing but don't understand how feeding 20 amps to the generator circuit while also having 30 amps on the shore power would help.  The AC's are fed off of a selector switch that is fed by a single wire.  So short of rewiring the AC units I don't see that it would do anything having an extra 20 amps on board.  Besides, what if the 20 amp outlet is on the other pole of the 220 at the pedestal.  Isn't the generator circuit on a transfer switch anyways?  That would prevent those 20 amps from getting into the coaches 120V systems.

Click to expand...

What?!!?

In 30A RVs with large generators it is fairly common to have the generator wired to supply the rear a/c via a second, parallel feed from the main 30A feed.  This second line is not switched by the transfer switch.  With the addition of a external power input plug, that second feed line can be utilized when on shore power, even though the transfer switch has interrupted the main 30A feed from the genset.  So IF the power pedestal has an independent 20A outlet (doubtful), it could be used to provide power to the rear a/c while the rest of the coach runs off the main 30A feed.

No matter how much others think I do or do not know about 120V AC wiring, the difficulty in installation of such a device as the 20A 'cheater' box was my point.

Click to expand...

Regardless of what someone knows or doesn't know nor understand, for those who do, it would be "a piece of cake". For those who don't, not so much.

My MH has been converted over to a 50 AMP. How ever I can still hook up to a 30 amp as well both aircobition work on the 50amp and one at a time on the 30 amp..all is well thanks for the advise..BC