240 Volt Power Point in Front Box

[Roughit Instyle]

Hi all,
Has any one installed a 240 volt power point in the front box for the fridge to use when you are on 240 volt power supply?

Pete.

[Frankrhona]

Just a comment on your thoughts.
If it was me I would be very reluctant to run a 240VAC lead to the front box. Track has taken care to physically separating the low voltage and hi voltage circuits in the yellow power box. The 240V wiring is short, well protected and well secured. This is good, but it does not have a Residual current device (RSD) like your home wiring for additional protection against electrocution.
The moment you run a 240V cable from the power box to the front box you have a wiring harness with mixed voltages and need great care to protect the cable insulation and moisture egress. If it shorts to the chassis both the Tvan and the tow vehicle may become live with the tyres insulating it to ground. You will know about it when you make the connection!
Having said all that, I see no reason why you would not continue to run your fridge on 12V and let the battery charger keep the battery topped up. When hooked up to 240V we use it to charge camera and phone batteries mainly. Everything else is 12V.
Regards, Andrew.

[The Hueys]

No reason why it can't be done. Legally the high and low voltage wiring needs to be separated so it would just be a matter off looming them away from each other. Track may be able to supply the components for the plug in system they use for the 240V on the MkIII to make the job easier.

[boobook]

If you have a battery charger at the 240 electrical point in the TVAN and plug that into 240V it will run almost the same as 240v straight to the fridge. Unless you are talking about a 3 way fridge.

I can't see any advantage to running the 240V to the fridge other than you get back some charger capacity to charge the batteries quicker. If capacity is an issue it would be cheaper, and easier to get a charger with slightly higher capacity. compressor fridges convert 240 v to 12 ( or 24)v inside the fridge so you don't gain anything other than a small amount of efficiency.

Maybe I'm missing something.

[Roughit Instyle]

Thanks for your input. Our van does run 2 batteries and the larger charger, but the charger continually plays up even though Track say all is OK. The smell of burning wiring is a bit disturbing when the charger is used.
When I looked at the 240 circuit I was a little surprised that Track had not used the plug in type wiring. Our caravan has this which made it very easy to add an extra power outlet. I had planned to use it as it makes the joints very secure and protected. Yes I was going to run the 240 circuit away from the 12 volt circuit and run the wiring in flexible conduit for extra protection.

Pete.