sunlight
Durham,N.C.
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My old refrigerator died and is gone. I'm sure the repairman told me the outlet worked behind the refrigerator. What is involved in getting that electrical outlet to work? I checked to see that all switches in my panel were on. I tried several appliances including my new dorm refrig. and nothing works. I am plugged into shore power and the top AC works. Thanks Doug
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enblethen
Moses Lake, WA USA
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Try turning the circuit breakers off with a little pressure toward off. Then turn back on.
Next, check your GFCI receptacles to insure they are set. Push test button and then the reset.
Bud
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sunlight
Durham,N.C.
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Enblethen, on the GF.. is the black one the test? In other words which do I push first and which to reset? I am actually wait until it stops raining so I can go outside and replug the refrig. in without standing in water. Thanks for the advice. Doug
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otbiker
Kerrville TX
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Check the GFI on the OUTSIDE of the rig. RVIA standards say the refrig plug must be GFI protected, since its outside...
Marty & Martha in Kerrville
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othertonka
Stockton, CA
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I would check the GFIC in the bathroom and in the service bay. Push the TEST button and then push the RESET button, then check to see if you have power in the refridg outlet. They wire these things so that the circuit goes through the GFIC and then goes on to other outlets after that. If the GFIC "TRIPS" then all outlets "downstream" from that GFIC are also dead. Here is a good article about GFIC if you are interested.
GFIC
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enblethen
Moses Lake, WA USA
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The black should be the test, red should be the reset.
This must be pretty elderly model. Most do not have colors on face. The newer style has the red showing when they are tripped.
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sunlight
Durham,N.C.
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Thanks for everyone's help, I will have to look, I don't think there is a GFI outside. Would it be in the rear of the refrig. area? This is a 92 Toyota motorhome. Even if the resetting solved the problem, what would cause it to trip like that? If the GFI test and resets, and the turning of the switcheds off and on firmly doesn't do it, what sort of work would a repairman have to be getting into? I am not skilled beyond the first measures. Doug
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enblethen
Moses Lake, WA USA
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One thing that causes them to trip is a bad element in refer.
Other causes could be moisture in the exterior receptacle.
I would suggest buyiing an inexpensive circuit tester. These have three LEDs. You simple plug them into your receptacles to see if they are wired correctly and they will give you some insight as to what the problem is siuch as open phase conductor, neutral or ground. About $5 at local hardware store.
This will give a little more info for some help here.
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ShapeShifter
Buffalo, NY
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otbiker wrote:Check the GFI on the OUTSIDE of the rig. RVIA standards say the refrig plug must be GFI protected, since its outside...
Interesting. I have two outlets in the area behind the refer access panel. One is for the cooling unit of the refrigerator, and is NOT protected by a GFCI, it is fed directly from a breaker on the main panel. The other outlet is for the ice maker portion of the refrigerator, and it is daisy-chained through the GFCI in the bathroom, and IS therefore GFCI protected. (By splitting them up, it allows the ice maker and ice/water dispensers to work off the inverter, while the cooling unit is running on propane and not loading down the inverter.)
While general purpose outdoor outlets need to be GFCI protected, that may not apply to dedicated purpose outlets like one would find behind a refer access panel. The odds of someone electrocuting themselves by plugging into that outlet are small. I think dedicated purpose outlets might be exempt from the GFCI requirement.
But none of that changes the fact that checking all GFCIs for being tripped is a good diagnostic step.
enblethen wrote:This must be pretty elderly model. Most do not have colors on face. The newer style has the red showing when they are tripped.
Perhaps that's not an industry-wide standard, because the GFCIs I have in both the rig and the house have red lights that are normally on, and they go off when the GFCI is tripped (the opposite of what you state, if I read it correctly.)
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YC 1
Yuba City Calif.
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sunlight wrote:My old refrigerator died and is gone. I'm sure the repairman told me the outlet worked behind the refrigerator. What is involved in getting that electrical outlet to work? I checked to see that all switches in my panel were on. I tried several appliances including my new dorm refrig. and nothing works. I am plugged into shore power and the top AC works. Thanks Doug
Doug, by the comment "top AC works" do you mean the air conditioner or the top part of the outlet. Just testing my understanding here.
If you have a microwave does it light up?
Are you hooked to shoreline via a pigtail into a 30 amp outlet?
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