Born Free Leap'n Lions RV Club Info & Discussion Forum

Hello everyone. My name is Michael and I recently purchased a 1995 24ft with a rear side bed. I have been a lurker and had always wanted a Born Free. Anyway, I came across a deal and couldn't pass on it.

My main problem is electrical. First, when the engine is running/driving, it is not charging the coach battery. I looked around and could not find the battery isolator. Also, I noticed that the circuit breaker for all outlets have jumped and would not reset. One of the outlets had a burn mark on it and I changed it out. But, it still would not reset. Finally, when I plugged the shore power cable, I could not get any power on inside the coach (no air, no microwave, etc). Is there something else I need to do?

Thanks everyone in advance for all your help.

1) First recommendation - take it back and try and get your money back.

2) If that don't work then:

a) If your coach battery master switch is shut off then the battery is totally isolated from any source of charging such as your engine alternator, coach generator or being plugged into shore line power.

b) Replace the AC outlets circuit breaker that will not reset with a new one

c) The fact that you can't run any AC powered devices such as your air conditioner, microwave, etc is potentially a bigger problem. First make sure the left most 30 amp AC breaker shown in the photo below is not tripped. Then if you can get behind that AC power input breaker, verify with a meter that there is 120 vac to the breaker main bus bar terminal. If there is then maybe that breaker is defective also. If not 120 vac at the input terminals to the breaker, then your work is cutout for you to trace out why you have lost power between that breaker and your connection to the shore line power pole.

Thank you for the response. I really appreciate it. Btw, I did not give an accurate description of my problem. My generator works but surges. When it is running, I can run the coach air and all other accessories. If I'm running on house battery, I can run everything except the air. So basically, I believe that my problem is probably two fold. One, I have an isolator that is defective and preventing my coach batteries from charging when I'm driving. The second is I am not getting power from the 30 amp shore line. My guess is maybe the power box/Inverter may be defective.

You say if you are running on house battery that you can run everything except the air conditioning. I really doubt that you can also run the microwave - true?

The fact that you can run your AC powered appliances when running your generator provides much more helpful information. AC power from the shoreline power pole and from the generator both enter a transfer relay mounted on the backside of your Magnetek power center. This transfer switch contains a mechanical relay that either feeds this AC power from the shoreline connection or from the generator to the main 30-amp input circuit breaker as shown in the photo in my earlier post. So my guess is that since you have AC power to the coach when starting your generator, the problem most likely is that the relay in the transfer switch is not making a connection connecting shoreline power into that main 30-amp breaker.

You should be most likely equipped with a Magnetek power center containing a 7345 Charger/Converter located in the lower section below the breaker & fuse panel. If your house battery is charging when running your generator, that charger/converter is working OK and has nothing to do with your shoreline power problem.

Mounted behind the metal enclosure containing the breaker & fuse panel will be a Magnetek ATS300 transfer switch. Magnetek sold out to Parallax many years ago and the replacement transfer switch will be a Parallax ATS301.

Pulling out that upper metal enclosure far enough to replace that transfer switch can be a real problem requiring the disconnection of the many colored DC fuse wires that may be too short to pull the enclosure forward.

Your surging generator problem could have several causes:
a) not using a fuel stabilizer in the generator when coach was in storage for many months without running generator periodically
b) govenor out of adjustment
c) weak fuel pump

What fuel stabilizer do you recommend?

Brent

I own a 1995 RSB and I've had some issues over the 7 years I've owned it, including some electric problems. You've received excellent advice regarding your specific post but if you have any future issues with your rig, feel free to reach out.

Thanks!

I use Sta-Bil which is available from Walmart.

Thank you

Brent

Merkur,

Were you able to solve you shoreline power problem?

whemme wrote:Merkur,

Were you able to solve you shoreline power problem?

Bill, Thank you for all your help. I am really busy (wife and I have full time jobs and 3 kids) and am slowly working on the rv. My family are actually using it and are working around the electrical problems. When I get the chance, I am going to start testing the components. I have been running the generator and it smoothed out. It is no longer surging. My guess is that there were some gumming in the carburetor. I am in the process of sorting out all the other minor problems. Finally, I have a feeling that the previous owner installed some interesting things that I have to figure out. There was switch that was mounted on the firewall and I haven't figure out what it was for. He installed a brake controller and extra water temperature gauge. There was also a 110v wire mounted for I think a tv that he took out. Finally, there is one of the red keys that people install to manually control an electrical switch. For the life of me, I can't seem to find it. I will update when I get everything sorted out. Thanks again for all your help.

Merkur wrote:

whemme wrote:Merkur,

Were you able to solve you shoreline power problem?

Okay, I finally had time to look at my rv this weekend. I solved most of my electrical problems. With regards to not getting power, I found out that my shore power plug was badly oxidized. I ended up cleaning it with fine sandpaper and got power to everything except for the broken circuit breaker that powers the outlets. I replaced the ground fault circuit breaker and everything will now power on. Btw, the ground fault circuit breaker is very expensive. A new one cost around $80.00. Now, all outlets work, air conditioner, microwave, etc. all work. Only exception is the refrigerator. I will check on that later. Also, I am still trying to find out why my engine will not charge the house battery while it is running. Thanks again for all your help.