RV FEATURE
If you buy a new van, the chances are it will have a comprehensive but also complicated electrical system. High-capacity lithium batteries, large solar arrays and high-wattage inverters that were rare 10 years ago are now standard fare. For the vast majority of these RVs, the electrical system will be designed and installed by professionals using high-quality components. Unfortunately, that is not always the case.
Similarly, if you buy a secondhand caravan or camper, the chances are the electrical system will have no resemblance to whatever system it came out of the factory with. And who knows what sort of components were used to expand the system or how competent the installer was.
As a rule, lithium iron phosphate batteries will not spontaneously combust but that doesn’ t mean they are infallible. Poor quality batteries will have inferior internal wiring and internals.
Are you convinced yet?
Now you might be sitting there thinking,“ So what? It ' s only 12V. How dangerous can it possibly be?” Well, you only have to spend a few minutes on any caravan and camping group on Facebook to see that even a small electrical issue can result in, at the very least, an expensive repair bill, or at the other end of the scale, a devastating fire.
So, what are the sorts of things we should look out for when assessing how safe our electrical system is? Here are five things I see regularly on my Facebook groups that are easy to identify and don’ t have to cost a fortune to rectify.
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