Mike, as usual a very good article. Especially true when stranded wire is used and especially in high vibration, also heating and cooling of the conductors. I have personally seen where someone tightened down on a stranded wire to the point that they severed the strands, effectively reducing the current carrying capacity. Electrical terminals are not designed to be torqued to a 1/4 turn before they are stripped. I also like to use a NO-OX contact grease on most of my electrical connections
Do you recommend spraying the screws with a contact cleaner like deoxit? I had not heard previously about a yearly maintenance cycle for RV load centers. I would also think it is dependent on how much an RV is used. We certainly don’t do this at our homes.
I’m talking to one of my circuit breaker experts tomorrow. My gut feel is that circuit breakers should periodically be removed from the backplane bus, and possibly cleaned with some sort of contact spray. But I need an expert opinion to confirm my SWAG…
The cause of RV termination screws loosening up is probably the road vibration and heating/cooling cycles they’re subject to. Of course if you only take a few trips a season in your camper this probably won’t be an issue. But full-time road warriors should probably inspect their connections yearly. Most casual RVers can probably check internal ATS and Load Center connections every 3 to 5 years, or immediately if there’s any sign of overheating. But I think shore power cords need a yearly inspection and contact cleaning since they take so much abuse!
The service panel in your house doesn’t have those temperature swings or vibration so they can go decades without problems, as long as they were installed correctly to begin with.
Mike, as usual a very good article. Especially true when stranded wire is used and especially in high vibration, also heating and cooling of the conductors. I have personally seen where someone tightened down on a stranded wire to the point that they severed the strands, effectively reducing the current carrying capacity. Electrical terminals are not designed to be torqued to a 1/4 turn before they are stripped. I also like to use a NO-OX contact grease on most of my electrical connections
Do you recommend spraying the screws with a contact cleaner like deoxit? I had not heard previously about a yearly maintenance cycle for RV load centers. I would also think it is dependent on how much an RV is used. We certainly don’t do this at our homes.
I’m talking to one of my circuit breaker experts tomorrow. My gut feel is that circuit breakers should periodically be removed from the backplane bus, and possibly cleaned with some sort of contact spray. But I need an expert opinion to confirm my SWAG…
The cause of RV termination screws loosening up is probably the road vibration and heating/cooling cycles they’re subject to. Of course if you only take a few trips a season in your camper this probably won’t be an issue. But full-time road warriors should probably inspect their connections yearly. Most casual RVers can probably check internal ATS and Load Center connections every 3 to 5 years, or immediately if there’s any sign of overheating. But I think shore power cords need a yearly inspection and contact cleaning since they take so much abuse!
The service panel in your house doesn’t have those temperature swings or vibration so they can go decades without problems, as long as they were installed correctly to begin with.
Thanks Mike! What about the use of contact cleaner in the maintenance cycle?