replacing palazar converter

[lovesshelties]

hi, my sister and I need to replace our Palazar 7155 converter. The dealer did not have the exact model but had a similar one (different amperage) so I got it. He told me it is easy to install and comes with a booklet with instructions. Well, like everything it is turning out to be not so simple. We need to change the dc distribution panel which is fine as it comes included. The problem is on the ac side our old converter had a white wire and a black wire. The black wire went to the circuit breaker, while the white wire went to the ground bar. In addition the black wire has another black wire connected to it, with the other having a pigtail nut on it. The new converter has a white wire, a black wire and a green wire. I am fine replacing things if they are exact as the old part, simple replace. According to the instructions, the white wire is supposed to go to the neutral distribution block, which when I google what it looks like, seems we don't have one. The green wire is supposed to go to the ground bar, which tells me it goes where the white wire went on the old setup. The black (hot) wire goes to the AC branch breaker which is the same as the old setup. It further says 'if the utility pigtail was used on the original installation, two short length of 14awg wire and a wire nut may be used to provide the utility pigtail. I am a little confused why I need two extra pieces of wire and what I am supposed to do about the pigtail. Hopefully the attached pics show what we are dealing with. Thanks in advance.

 

[John From Detroit]

Black to breaker
white to neutral buss which should have lots of white wires
Green to ground buss has green or bare wires Unless your rv is very very old and has no green. at 75 I am not sure I am that old.

 

[lovesshelties]

well as I said the old one only has two wires and the new one has three. Am I correct in assuming the picture I attached called 'ground bar.jpg' is the ground bar? The trailer is a 2011 Puma.

 

[lovesshelties]

I don't know what the difference is between neutral buss and ground buss. I don't see a different place where a third wire would be attached.

 

[CharlesinGA]

It is not necessary to replace the 12v DC fuse panel if there is nothing wrong with it.

That is a Parallax brand power center, probably one of the best ever made. They are still made and new parts are readily available for them.

What brand of power converter are you installing? A Progressive Dynamics 4655? by chance? Hopefully not some WFCO junk.

I have to assume that at this point you have removed shore power, disconnected the batteries and any solar panels you might have.

The new converter should have five wires coming from it. Two are 12v DC output. Three are the 120v AC input. Your fridge is probably powered off the same 120v AC circuit breaker that the converter is. The two wires are put into a ferrule so that there is only one piece going into the circuit breaker (code does not allow double tapping a circuit breaker) As a replacement, you take a short section of 14 gauge black house wire, 2 or 3 inches, and take the new converter black + wire and the other wire that connected to the ferrule and join them to the pigtail with a wire nut. The green ground goes to the ground bar slightly above and to the left of the circuit breakers where the bare copper grounds are connected, and the white 120v AC wire known as a neutral connects to the bar that is horizontal on the left side where the other white white wires are connected. The two 12v DC wires from the converter connect to the fuse panel, the white one one goes in the open terminal that is siamesed with the other terminal with a large white wire in it. The black + wire goes in the terminal block to the left of the double block. You will need to install two 30 amp fuses in the two fuse holders just to the left of terminal blocks. These protect the converter from reverse polarity accidents.

Bring the two 12v DC wires thru the grommet in the bottom of the compartment and BEHIND the fuse panel and over the top and down into the terminals. The green printed circuit board is easily damaged when tightening the screws on those large terminals. I highly suggest using an open end wrench that just fits over the terminal block, to hold it while you tighten the screw on top (for every action there is an equal and opposite reaction!) This will put the stress between the wrench and the screwdriver and not on the board.

I usually say to remove the two hex screws in the circuit board and let it float free on the two heavy wires. This will allow you to tighten the terminals while holding them with a wrench and not stress the board. If you do this, make sure you don't pinch wires between the PCB and the metal bracket the board screws to when you reinstall the board to the bracket behind it.

This is a very easy replacement and does not require removal of the entire power center.

I have annotated two of your pics to explain things. the third pic is an example of using a wrench to hold a terminal block on a printed circuit board while you tighten the screw, to keep from tearing the block right off the PCB.

Charles

 

[Gary RV_Wizard]

The converter itself will have two output wires, i.e. it produces 12vdc power. Those are probably black & white or red & white. While is probably the 12v ground. But the entire converter/power center assembly must have 3-wire 120vac coming in, and also passthru to the breaker panel, plus two wires to/from the battery (total of 5). 120vac is a black wire (hot), a white wire (neutral, and a green or bare wire for ground. The neutral & ground bus bars are in the photo labeled powercenter, on the left. The one with the white wires is the Neutral bus bar and the one above with green & bare wires is the ground bus bar. The photo labeled ground bar is incorrect. That is the neutral bar (bus).

Oops! I see that Charles has already detailed this, so I'll quit here to avoid duplication.

 

[Kirk]

I have nothing to add to the two previous responses. I do hope that you have a decent multimeter. Proper polarity is probably the most important thing.

 

[John From Detroit]

I don't know what the difference is between neutral buss and ground buss. I don't see a different place where a third wire would be attached.

ok on the 120 volt side the wires are white green/bare black

on the 12 side generally red and black red + black - coming out of converter but use a volt meter to be sure

in the breaker box black goes to the breaker and you should have two buss bars one has all white wires the other green or bare may be mixed

Now the real fun part RVs are wired by electricians So this is why a voltmeter is a must. They use BLACK for the "Hot" lead (Positive) and white for "Neutral" or negative so you must meter to be sure.

 

[lovesshelties]

Thanks for all the responses. Yes I dd have a voltmeter and did some testing even before I removed the old converter so I have a idea of what is what. I know the thick two wires on the converter are DC and the three thinner ones are for the AC. Charles had the longest response so let me address each part of it. My responses in italics.


What brand of power converter are you installing? A Progressive Dynamics 4655? by chance? Hopefully not some WFCO junk.
I am home while responding to this. When I get to my sisters I will check and see what they sold me. I know it is a 45AMP instead of the 55AMP I had originally. The difference was $100 and thry had the 45AMP installed and he told me it would work.

I have to assume that at this point you have removed shore power, disconnected the batteries and any solar panels you might have.
Yes absolutely. Everything is disconnected during disassemble and reassemble.

The new converter should have five wires coming from it. Two are 12v DC output.
Correct

Three are the 120v AC input. Your fridge is probably powered off the same 120v AC circuit breaker that the converter is. The two wires are put into a ferrule so that there is only one piece going into the circuit breaker (code does not allow double tapping a circuit breaker)
I am not sure about the fridge part. Hopefully my picture is clear enough to show the old converter has two ac wires sort of. One is white, which came off the silver ground bar. The other one is black with two wires connected together in what I think you refer to as a ferrule (I have to admin I am not an expert in the terminology). So the end where the two wires are connected in the ferrule go to the breaker. The end of one of the black wires obviously goes to the converter, while the end of the other black wire goes nowhere and is capped with what I believe is called a wire nut, hence the pigtail term. This is shown in my jpg called pigtail. And reading again and onward I see this is exactly what you explain in the next paragraph.

As a replacement, you take a short section of 14 gauge black house wire, 2 or 3 inches, and take the new converter black + wire and the other wire that connected to the ferrule and join them to the pigtail with a wire nut.
That would make sense to me as that is exactly how the old one looks. But the instructions in the book I received say I need two short sections of 14 gauge black house wire.

The green ground goes to the ground bar slightly above and to the left of the circuit breakers where the bare copper grounds are connected, and the white 120v AC wire known as a neutral connects to the bar that is horizontal on the left side where the other white white wires are connected.
Oh okay, got it. The green wire goes to the horizontal bar to the left and above the circuit breakers while the white goes to the vertical bar to the left of the circuit breakers. This makes sense as that is where the white wire was on the original installation. The old one did not have a green wire so i was confused as to where it should go. The instructions refer to one wire going to the neutral distribution box while the other goes to the ground bar. I was confused because when I googled a neutral distribution box the photo I got looked like nothing we have.

I will end it there because all the other wires are the same and I just have to simply replace them where they were. The only difference was extra green wire on the AC side. Thanks for the suggestion on protecting the green printed circuit board.

 

[lovesshelties]

Sorry I missed Charles first line.

It is not necessary to replace the 12v DC fuse panel if there is nothing wrong with it.
The dealer that sold me the new converter said I had to replace the 12VDC board and it came with the new converter. Is it possible it is because of the different amperage between the two converters

The other thing that really bugged me was the unit they sold me comes totally enclosed in a an aluminium housing. This is fine if I was implementing it net new, but my installation already has the housing, and it fact is connected to the to housing for the power distribution box via rivets.

 

[Kirk]

The dealer that sold me the new converter said I had to replace the 12VDC board and it came with the new converter. Is it possible it is because of the different amperage between the two converters

No. That is the maximum that it will supply. As long as voltage is proper there is no reason for concern. If the new one has a higher amperage rating, that is a good thing.

 

[lovesshelties]

Charles,

I just looked at your pics. Where you asked 'Does this connect to anything? I don't see anything on the panel.' No it didn't, it was just lying loose with the pigtail nut on it.

As for your statement 'this is where the wire nut will go', that part with the two lack wires joined together go to the circuit breaker. That is why I was confused what the extra little piece of wire does. It seems to me (where the two back wires are connected) you have a hot lead going nowhere with a wire nut on the end.

 

[lovesshelties]

Fantastic idea using the wrench. I could see why it would be dangerous not holding the terminal blocks.

 

[Lou Schneider]

Sorry I missed Charles first line.

It is not necessary to replace the 12v DC fuse panel if there is nothing wrong with it.
The dealer that sold me the new converter said I had to replace the 12VDC board and it came with the new converter. Is it possible it is because of the different amperage between the two converters

The other thing that really bugged me was the unit they sold me comes totally enclosed in a an aluminium housing. This is fine if I was implementing it net new, but my installation already has the housing, and it fact is connected to the to housing for the power distribution box via rivets.

The converter manufacturer doesn't know what the existing fuse board looks like, so they supply a new one to cover all the bases.

Does the new board have the two reverse polarity fuses? Modern converters look like a dead short if the battery is accidentally connected backwards and these fuses blow to protect the converter if this happens. The old converter may not have needed them or they might have been on the converter itself.

Another possibility is the old fuse board was designed for a dual output converter which had an unfiltered output for the majority of the loads and a low current filtered output for battery charging and electronics like a radio or 12 volt TV outlet.

 

[lovesshelties]

The board has two 30AMP fuses in the top centre. Maybe that is what they are for.

I have to go today and try find a ferrule. Checked a few stores locally online and couldn't find any. I never even heard of the word until this post. Fix things and learn things at the same time!!

 

[CharlesinGA]

Forget the ferrule and wire nut. If the wire I circled goes no where, you don't need it, just take the black wire from the converter, that is the 120v AC input and put it into the circuit breaker. There must have been something connected to that wire with the wire nut on it, and no longer is, so don't bother with it.

While you could change the fuse panel, there is no reason to. Most 12v DC fuse panels are rated for about 80 amps. As noted above, they give you one in case you have one with burned, broken or otherwise damaged terminals or contacts or you have a very old type fuse panel with a limited number of terminals and may be in poor condition.

Here is an early MagneTek power panel and its fuse board. This is the predecessor to the Parallax panels. Note how simple and limited the fuse panel is. This is why they are giving you a new one.

Ferrules are metal sleeves that are used on stranded wire to make the ends solid so the screw terminals such as the circuit breaker and the fuse panel don't crush the wire strands and cut them.

You won't find ferrules locally, and they require a special tool to crimp them. They are a good thing but not necessary. The attachments are an EXAMPLE of how I did my 12v DC ground wires in my trailer, and what ferrules look like. Super thin, tin plated copper "tubes" that are slipped over the stranded wire and crushed tight onto the wire with the crimper. Ferrules are available in hundreds of different sizes for a perfect fit on the wires you are installing them on.

The tool in the next to last pic crushes the ferrules in a hex pattern. The box behind the tool has ferrules of different sizes in it, with insulator sleeves on them. In some places the insulator sleeves make a nice install and in some places make it difficult to put the wire in the terminal. I ended up purchasing plain ferrules of the length I needed, rather than using the ferrules in the box. The last two pics shows ferrules with insulator sleeves I used when putting a new end on a shore cord. (yes, that is a cat in the next to last pic)

Look at the wire strands in the second pic, and how may of them are not in the hole in the bar nor under the screws. This effectively makes the wire a smaller size than it really is, as you cannot pass as much current thru it. Ferrules mean all the strands are under the screw and the wire can properly carry its load.

Some people still tin wires with solder but this does not work as well as a ferrule (but is a decent substitute), and you can take a ferrule and join two wires by putting them both in the same ferrule and crimping them down. That is what Winnebago did on my motorhome to combine the converter input power and the refrigerator 120v AC power, without violating codes. I assumed that is what I was seeing in your pic. Looking again I see that hard plastic wire nut on the end half wrapped in tape. I thought it was a spade terminal or something like that.. If it does not connect to anything, then you don't need any of that, just the lone wire from the converter to the circuit breaker.

 

[Kirk]

I have to go today and try find a ferrule.

Amazon has many choices.

 

[lovesshelties]

Thanks everyone for your help. We also checked with the RV place and they said the same thing that if the wire with the wire nut it is not connected to anything that we don't need it. We did put some solder on the black wire and then put it into the circuit breaker tested things out and everything's working fine now and we are now way on a mini vacation. Fortunately the weather has not gotten too cold up here yet. Thanks again for everyone's help. Happy RVing.