Posted by MarkB_MI on September 06, 2021 at 04:30:21 from (174.245.18.84):
Last week I posted about problems we had dry camping at Yellowstone with our fifth wheel RV. I'd link to that thread, but it looks like it got poofed for some reason. So here's the Cliff Notes version of that post: Trying to run the furnace at night, we ran the battery flat and were never able to get it fully charged with the generator. This seemed to be due to the camper's WFCO 8955 power converter, which wouldn't switch to boost mode and would only charge at 13.6 volts. On the trip back, we had another problem with the furnace itself when it switched on during a thunderstorm and wouldn't turn off.
So after we unpacked the camper, I opened up the furnace to see what might be the problem. A bunch of water ran out, even though it had been a couple of days since the thunderstorm. Then I saw that the bottom of the furnace was full of wood splinters and metal shavings, presumably left over from when the camper was built. Some of the shavings had become wedged under the control circuit board, presumably shorting it out. I vacuumed out the furnace and tried re-connecting the furnace to power, but the blower was still stuck on. I bought a new circuit board, but when I went to replace the board, I saw that I'd missed one metal shaving under it. I cleaned up the board and dried everything off, then retested with the original circuit board. The furnace now seems to be OK. The new board went into the RV's tool box as a spare.
The next thing I did was to replace the converter module in the WFCO power converter/distribution panel with a Progressive Dynamics PD4655VL converter. The PD unit is designed specifically to replace the dodgy WFCO converter and is known to reliably switch into boost mode when needed. More importantly, you can manually switch it to boost if necessary, which should be just the ticket when you're on a generator and can only run it for a short time. The converter swap went pretty easily. The PD converter is well-made, about four pounds versus two for the WFCO. It has two fans, one in the side like the WFCO and another in the front. Curiously, the DC output leads are only 10 gauge, rather than 8 gauge for the WFCO. Also, if I ever decide to go with lithium batteries, all I have to do is move one jumper on the converter and it's ready for Li-ion.
The new converter seems to work well and I can switch it between modes. I haven't yet tried to deep-discharge the battery to see if it switches automatically like it should. I also moved the furnace to an unused fuse so if I can disable it without killing the refrigerator.
All these problems are attributable to the RV manufacturer, Winnebago of Indiana (formerly Sunnybrook): 1. The furnace failure was the result of failing to clean out debris when the trailer was built, allowing it to get sucked into the furnace. 2. The battery charging issue was caused by the mediocre power converter. Winnebago could have used a better unit, but of course most folks don't dry camp much and wouldn't notice the problem. 3. The furnace should have been on a dedicated fuse, rather than sharing the refrigerator fuse.
Will this post get poofed? I think my earlier post may have been reported by WFCO. This time I'm dissing both WFCO and Winnebago, so there's a good chance this post will disappear.
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