Pedestal Power By Mike Sokol Bigger outlets Today’s RVs have much greater power requirements than those of even 10 years ago. You have lots of appliances, so that single 20-amp outlet can’t provide enough current. This is when you need to step up to 30-amp outlets at the campsite. Let’s see how they’re wired. Here’s a side-by-side comparison of both…
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Your Sprinter RV cost too much? Blame chickens!
Road Signs Which came first? The Chicken Tax, the Sprinter or the Egg? A lesson in tariffs and international trade By Mike Sokol This is not a political article, and I’m not taking sides. However, I believe that “Those who cannot learn from history are doomed to repeat it.” This is the story of how a cheap chicken in the 1960s…
Read MoreStray Voltage Patrol – Sign-up
Here’s the official Stray Voltage Patrol sign-up form. We’ll put the info in a contact list and send you all an email in a few weeks to gather a little more information about things like where you are in the country, do you use 30- or 50-amp service, and how far and often you travel. That way we can work…
Read MoreRV Electricity – Using a Non-Contact Voltage Tester
Dear Mike, After reading your article on RV hot-skin voltage I ordered a Southwire 40126N Non-Contact Voltage Tester, but now wonder if it’s the correct tool. According to the directions it detects voltage by putting it near a hot plug. But will it also find a hot-skin voltage by putting it next to the skin of an RV? —John Baxley…
Read MoreRV Electricity – Hot grounds and the Stray Voltage Patrol
Dear Mike & Chuck, My wife and I love reading your newsletter – keep up the good work! I just finished reading the post regarding the note you received from Stephen Wickland and the hot-skin condition found at an RV park pedestal. I have been plugging into pedestals to support everything from pop-up trailers to a travel trailer to our current…
Read MoreBreaking News on “Stray Voltage”
Breaking News on Stray Voltage By Mike Sokol Within hours of publishing my article Focus on Stray Voltage, we received this very interesting comment from Richard Iddins. Dear Mike, We just left a park in Alberta Canada. Where this morning when I was greasing the suspension on our trailer and when I touched one of the axles with my arm…
Read MoreFocus on “Stray Voltage.” What is it and why should you care?
Focus on Stray Voltage I’m declaring July official Hot-Skin/Stray Voltage month. For those of you who don’t know, an RV Hot-Skin occurs when the ground wire on an RV’s shore power feed is interrupted somehow. That allows even normal leakage currents inside of an RV to create a Stray Voltage on the entire RV, including its “skin,” chassis, wheels, hitch…
Read MoreRV Electricity – ABCs of generator noise
Dear Mike, I really learned a lot from your RV Electricity article on generators last Sunday. But do you have a more basic version of it without all the math, sort of like generator noise pollution for dummies? —Lost in the numbers Dear Lost, All right, so here is the Cliff Notes version of Part I on Generator Noise Pollution without…
Read MoreRV Electricity – No~Shock~Zone by Mike Sokol – Issue 8
Issue 8 • June 24, 2018 Brought to you as a public service by RVtravel.com. Support comes from our sponsors, advertisers and the contributions of readers, who believe that an educated RVer is a safe, happy RVer. Please consider supporting our efforts with a voluntary subscription. Subscribe to one of our many online newsletters (including this one) about RVing. Welcome … By…
Read MoreRV Electricity – Voltage drop
Voltage drop If you’ve been following along with this series, you already know about voltage, amperage and wattage. But what about that 800 lb. gorilla in the room … Voltage drop? Rumors and Innuendo We’ve all heard about how hooking up an RV on too long or too skinny of an extension cord can force its appliances to run on…
Read MoreRV Electricity – Generator Noise Pollution – Part 1
Generator Noise Pollution – Part 1 by Mike Sokol – All Rights Reserved I’ve had several recent emails about noisy generators bothering nearby campers. I guess it’s that time of year when everyone needs air conditioning in their RVs and no sane amount of solar panels and house batteries have enough power to run an air conditioner for more than…
Read MoreRoad Signs – The Good, the Bad and the Ugly
By Mike Sokol How many of you like Spaghetti Westerns? I certainly do. And how many of you like the king of Spaghetti Westerns, Clint Eastwood? Again, me too. And I grew up on a steady diet of that genre with great movies like “A Fistful of Dollars,” “Hang ’em High,” and “The Good, the Bad and the Ugly.” I…
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