Screaming Surge Guard - 30A Portable

michellep · 02-10-2015, 11:52 AM

So, after bringing the trailer home from the dealer yesterday (new refrigerator "fix" from Atwood installed and blown refrigerator fuse replaced AND sconce on front wall that fell out from said wall being fixed - fix was my idea that dealer implemented...see - I have the brains, just not the talent or experience to implement...)

Anyway, I plugged the 30A Surge Guard in and then plugged the trailer into the Surge Guard.

Surge Guard had started its 2 minute timer thing. Well, timer did its thing and then the Surge Guard started howling! Scared the hell out of me. I immediately yanked it out of the 30A outlet. Then I just leaned against the trailer and cried...what's next...

I had electrician put a 30A outlet on the outside of the new garage for any camping guests to use. Was going to try that, but guess what - the outlet is so deep within the cover, the extension cord could not be plugged in. Each 30A outlet is on its own circuit and the breakers were not tripped.

Rehooked up the truck and drove to the house. I was going to try everything over there, just in case the new garage wiring had somehow gone "bad".

Then I had a thought - don't plug the Surge Guard into the trailer - just plug it into the 30A outlet at the house. DUH...why hadn't I thought of that before I rehitched?

Surge Guard timer does its thing and at the end of the timer, it started screaming again.

Stupid question - but the Surge Guard has gone bad, right? (since the very beginning, there was something (maybe a screw?) rattling around inside the Surge Guard. Very recently, there is the sound of "multiple" things rattling around. I have never dropped or abused it...)

Dang, those things are expensive...

ON EDIT: I sent an email to the mfgr of Surge Guard outling this problem. No reply yet. I don't know if they're a Customer Service friendly company...

Travels with Yoly · 02-10-2015, 12:25 PM

Michelle,

As you probably know, there are two basic surge protectors .... one that protects you from a large sudden rise in external voltages like in a lightening strike for instance and the other type that is described as a voltage management system. These are much more expensive and protect you from several other sources such as a slow rise in voltage or low voltage. They monitor the incoming voltage and display it on a LCD display. They cost over a couple hundred dollars usually.

We've been using the Progressive Industries surge protector since we started camping in a trailer. It is the basic kind that basically protects from a lightening strike. It doesn't have a timer function but it does have lights that display correct or incorrect polarities. It currently sells for $88 on Amazon .....

http://www.amazon.com/Progressive-In...urge+protector

We chose this one because of the "Lifetime Warranty" and the great reputation they have for customer service. That being the case, we've never had an issue with ours. We also bought a digital voltage checker from Camping World for about $50. It plugs into the post outlet (with adapter) and displays voltage and frequency. It gives me a quick picture of the condition of the site's electrical condition before I even plug in the surge protector and harness. We've stayed at over 100 different sites now and only found a couple posts with questionable voltages (I just used the post at the adjoining site).