Monthly Archives: May 2017

Refrigerator issue – Ideas needed!

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We have had some ongoing issues with our Domestic RM3962 in our 2012 31’ Classic.  The last known time it was working was Christmas time and it worked fine.

We have been getting ready to full-time from Jan to May of this year so the trailer was going through some changes and the refrigerator was not turned on at that time.  The trailer was hooked to shore power throughout and I have a Boondocker 4 stage converter/charger so being continually plugged in does not bother me.  We have a 50amp shore power connection that I have a 90-degree angle plug and then a 50 to 30amp adapter for the power from the house.

When I was installing the Solar panels and controller we had to remove the refrigerator to gain access to the roof vent.  We reinstalled the refrigerator and I turned it on.  All parts seemed to be working.  This was when it was on the street with a 50-15amp adapter.

Once we were 2 days away from launch I turned on the refrigerator but there was no response.  No display, nothing.  I checked all the power points on the lower control board and the seemed to be responsive.  There is also an upper eyebrow control board but I opted to replace the bottom one.  The switches ohmed out just fine.

I replaced the lower control board with no luck.  I then ordered the upper control board and had it shipped to my mother’s house where we would be in a few days.  We took off without a working refrigerator.

When the upper control board arrived it would not fit.  One connector worked fine but the other one was a 4 prong connector but I need an edge connector.  No go with that. 

I read somewhere that there is a reset switch on the heater flue so I tried that and it seem to be tripped.  I disconnected 12v for 30 sec and reattached it.  I heard the propane start up (I disconnected the 120v)!  The display was flashing 8’s.  However it appeared to be working.  I put a remote temperature sensor in there and it started dropping.

I let it go for 2 days before it seemed like it was doing OK.  We loaded it with groceries and left my mom’s house.  I still couldn’t control it at all. The buttons did nothing.

The refrigerator kept items cold for about 2 weeks then the other day it just went dead again.  No life, nothing.  We moved all our items to the parks’ community refrigerator and contacted a local RV service.  They planned on getting there that afternoon, to our trailer which surprised me.  The helpful lady on the phone asked me about the voltages I was getting and I told her, via my IPN-Pro, that it was 13.2v.  My solar kicks in a .1v below the threshold for my converter so the converter has priority when we hare hooked up.  I also read in some troubleshooting that some converters also throw in a bit of AC when charging the DC.  New to me but the Dometic refrigerator could not handle more that 6V AC.  I ready 0V AC on the DC.  But it got me to thinking a bit.

Prior to our trip, I put in a Progressive Industries EMS-HW50C surge protector inline inside and I had heard it click on and off a few times while here.  Most importantly if I would turn off the breaker for the converter/charger and then back on it would click (the surge protector).  At this RV park, I only had my 30amp setup (90-degree connector and the 50-30).  I started to wonder about that.

I got out my 50amp cable, plugged it directly to the trailer and the pedestal.  Reset the refrigerator and it came right on!  All functionality with buttons and everything.  The RV repair guys (3 of them!) showed up shortly after this.  I told them all that I had done, they wanted me to keep an eye on it and didn’t even charge us!  Great people here in Texas.

It is now 5 days since then and all is good with the refrigerator.

In my pea brain thinking it appears some kind of short or bad connection occurred in the adapters I was using.  We had a lot of rain at home and some large amounts here.  There was a bit of water that came out from the adapters when I disconnected them!  This short/bad connection caused the 120V AC to do odd things to the refrigerator or perhaps the charger/converter was sending bad 12V.  Thoughts and ideas are welcome.  Anyone with any ideas why some short like that might cause this issue?

I will be decommissioning my twist-lock 50A connectors and getting a SmartPlug setup but for now, we have a working refrigerator again!

2 week Texas update

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We are still here!  We had a bit of ‘inclement’ weather 2 days after my last post.  It sounded terrible!  Thunderstorms, winds to 60mpg, tornadoes, 2-3″ of rain in a few hours and (the Airstreamers worst nightmare) hail stones larger than dimes!  What should we do?  Hookup and run?  Find a car wash or gas station to hide under?  Since the county we were in was not specifically one of the map of the worst we (I) decided to stay.  Here is one of the maps we saw:

We are in Burnet County and it was not in yellow at all.  We both fell right asleep but I was awake at 1 am and listening to the hubbub outside.  Heavy LOUD rain, wind but no hail sounds.  We had our windows open for the coolness and I never heard the sound of hail hitting the glass.  I got up and put up our side and rear awnings, I did NOT have the main awning down.  I learned my lesson from Arizona many years ago.  I was awake for about 30 minutes until I convinced myself that there was nothing else I could do about all this.

Roxie woke up about 3:15 to the heavy thunderstorm sounds, lightning sounds like directly above the trailer.  Very loud and cracking.  Roxie did not like this and was scared, she started praying.  I looked outside and saw a small stream going under out trailer.  I knew this might happen from looking around prior to this.  However, our pad is very firm and packed.

We made it through the night and there was no damage or erosion.  It was quite an experience.

That day, Saturday, we decided to take a drive through some of the Texas Hill Country.  The destination was Fredricksburg.  I knew it was a very popular town.  We could also try out some back roads, which I love to do.  At one point we ended up on an unpaved road but only about 10 miles worth.  Roxie thought that I did that on purpose.  No, not this time.  Along these roads, we saw numerous deer, vultures, wild turkeys, other various birds and a turtle waiting to cross the road!

On the road, we passed by Lake LBJ that had an overlook and a monolith made out of pink granite.  The pink granite came from a 600′ dome of it that is near Marble Falls:

Fredricksburg was very quaint and touristy!  I kind of figured it would be as a lot of people come up from Austin or San Antonio for the day or weekend.  It was a bit too much for us so we opted to keep going.

One place I knew we were going to go by was the Lyndon B Johnson State and National Historic Parks.  We stopped into the State Park location and the ranger there was very excited and animated that we could still get into the last tour of LBJ’s Texas home.  We latched on to his enthusiasm and headed for the tour.

LBJ is a bit before my time as I was only 8 when he decided not to run for a full second term but I do remember bits and pieces of that time.  But it is a very historical site and they do love LBJ around here so it was interesting to view the Texas White House.  Part of the journey to the tour was to drive over a large part of his farm and also see the landing strip that he had on his property.

Here is a picture of the house, a swing near the Pedernales River and the swimming pool:

At the house, they also had an interesting guestbook.  Concrete squares were created and the visitors would inscribe them while wet:

In this shot, I can see Alan Shepard, Wally Schirra, Deke Slayton, Gus Grissom, Leroy Cooper, John Glenn, Hubert Humphrey, John Connelly, JFK.  He had a few important visitors.

He and his wife, Lady Bird, are buried on the ranch with other family members:

He was also born on this ranch in this home:

The road home took us through Johnson City, naturally.

On Sunday, the weather was very unpredictable and gloomy and we actually never left our spot all day!  We had to get caught up on viewing The Voice.  The rest of the week was household stuff, laundry, groceries, getting mail.

On Friday we had to go to Austin to pick up some mail and we ate at Hopdoddy’s for a late lunch and then decided to complete the LBJ trinity.  Lake, Home and Presidential Library.  The Library is on the campus of the University of Texas and had its’ own parking lot but the students are already out of classes so it didn’t matter too much.

This is our third Presidential Library, the previous two are Nixon and Reagan.  I know both the Bushs’ are in Texas so we might get to those also.  Presidential Libraries are always very interesting and positive.  You don’t see too many negative items about the President in there.  One that I remember from one fo the informational kiosks about LBJ is that he decided to run for US Congress initially because he wanted to bring electricity the Texas Hill Country.  Hard to imagine a life without electricity!

Our status has changed a bit also.  We have given our two weeks notice on this camp spot.  We will be moving on sometime next week after the Memorial Day holiday or perhaps the week after that.  We won’t go over the month that we have paid for.  We have decided to attend a wedding for one of Roxie’s relatives but that is still 1400 miles away in North Carolina!  The sooner we start the slower we can take.