Thor Forums

[Beau388]

Originally Posted by Hugh.vines@att.net

Heat pump won’t work below 40 degrees

Not exactly accurate for Coleman mach 8 Plus. True the heat pump will not come on is the outside ambient is below freezing (this is because the heat pump dies not have a defrost cycle like a home heat pump), but mach 8 cuts over the the heat strip if the thermostat calls for heat mode 2. Mode one heat is the furnace.


As for the second A/C, I wanted a quiet Mach 8 plus for the bedroom (16 amps draw). When I bought my coach, 50 amp power center was not an option, so I planned to install one with the second A/C. Our first trip with 30 amps proved I did need 50 amps, as I couldn't even run the microwave (15 amps) water heater (11 amps), charger (2 amps) and DirecTV (3 amps) with out tripping the main CB. It took couple weeks to collect the parts: power cord, inlet, transfer switch, EMS, inverter, thermostat, power center and aux CB panel. Wiring was straight forward except for the 12 volt mess which to a day to wire correctly due to the interrupt relays and Rapid Camp circuit board. I ran the 12 awg and 20 awg wires up the Thor chase for the original bedroom fan and had a a local RV repair place install the heat pump, as it is to heavy for an 80 year old to wrestle with. The reason for a new inverter was a 30 amp pass-trough to allow three different 15 amp, 120 volt circuits on the inverter. This allows a 20 amp CAFCI circuit (I hate GFCI duplex outlets) for the kitchen, bathroom and outside duplex receptacles in the main CB panel. Now I can run basically everything in the coach at the same time and the EMS shows I have a balanced load of 35 amps on each leg and plenty of head room for more stuff.