Freedoms Elite 30FE Trips House GFCI

[Lefty02]

Picked up a new FE 30FE the end of January. Took it home and tried to plug the shore power cord into the house power outlet in the garage. The GFCI tripped so I tried two other GFCI outlets with the same result. Opened all the breakers on the coach power panel, plugged it in again, GFCI tripped. Finally plugged into a non-GFCI outlet with no problem.

The next morning I checked the end of the shore power plug with my multimeter and found the neutral and ground pins directly shorted together. This was obviously the reason for the GFCIs tripping since they trip if return current is different from exiting current. The same amount of current will not return if the path is shared with the ground.

Took it back to CW and after two weeks they called to tell me there weren't any issues with the electrical. I went to CW and showed them the short indication on my meter while checking the shore plug. This seemed to piss off the technician that supposedly worked on my coach and he proceeded to tell me how my 36 year of troubleshooting electrical problems on airplanes didn't properly prepare me to troubleshoot RV electrical systems. And by the way, the short indication I was seeing on the shore cord was a false indication. It was apparent I wasn't going to get my RV repaired by Las Vegas Camping World service department.

I called Thor and the tech agreed there was problem. He emailed the wiring diagrams for the 30FE. I was able to find the short in one of the 120 vac outlet circuits. A screw went through a wood 2x2 horizontal support under the refrigerator and into the neutral wire of the circuit. Pulled the wire off the screw and the short disappeared.

Sorry for the long story, but I guess the moral is...If you can do it yourself rather than relying on someone that works on somebody else's RV like it it belongs to somebody else, do it yourself. You'll be happier with the finished product.