Need help wiring from camper to truck battery

T

traveller

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Thousand Oaks, CA
Posted this on the FWC forum but 0 response..Hopefully I can get some help here.

I just bought a used FWC Fleet. I also bought a wiring kit from FWC that I am trying to install. No instructions came with it and I am not 100 % sure about wiring it. Please review my wiring diagram.

What size fuse should I install?
Do I need to ground this setup somehow or does everything look ok?

Appreciate all suggestions.


Wiring.jpg
 
What year/make/model truck do you have?

A lot of new trucks come wired for trailer tow package and might even have a camper plug in the bed. If yours has that, use what is already there.

If it has a plug in the bed for a camper, just get a plug and wire it your self. It it has a rear plug for trailer tow, splice into the charge wire running to the back plug.
 
Assuming you will be charging a house battery in the camper. I would use a single breaker for circuit protection since breakers can be readily reset. It should be installed within the first couple feet of the battery. Wire size depends on long a run you have to the camper and how much voltage drop your willing to allow(less than 3% would be good) and what rate of charge you need/want. Use quality marine grade connectors if you can source them, jacketed wire will protect against chafe through and I highly recommend it. Just my 2 cents, you'll likely get varying replies and most will work fine.
 
The fuse needs to be sized to protect the wire that you run from the truck battery to the bed of the truck and into the camper. What gauge wire is in the kit? I think they typically use 10 gauge wire which should use a 40-50A fuse, 12 gauge wire would be a 30A fuse. The voltage drop between the truck and camper battery will never let that much current flow through the wire. On my 2019 Grandby, the yellow wire was pos, black was neg, and green was the running lights.

The link below has good information on selecting wire size and fuses for marine environments and I think it applies to campers as well.

https://www.bluesea.com/resources/1437
 
Hi Traveller
Fuse and breaker only differ in one respect. Fuses are a single use protection breaker can be reset.
Circut protection is for the wire, and should be as close to you battery as possible. If you are using a refrigerator there should be a separate fuse for the refrigerator. Lights should have there own fuse. ect.
Thermal protection protect‘s the trolling motor.
If you look at charts for wire size and fuse size they are rated by current draw.
You will see the longer the wire the fuse size will drop. You would size the wire and fuse from the refrigerator based on the power consumption and initial start up amps for said refrigerator. Repeat for next circut.

Good luck sir.

Russ
 
Click on the Steps to Wiring a Truck link in this post. That's from a few years ago but should give you some good info. Note that wire colors change at the the Atwood plug. Also- the battery isolator shown in that diagram is the older Sure Power 1314/1314A one.

The diagram shows a 30-amp thermal breaker.

.
 
There seems to be some confusion here, the 'thermal breaker' is the circuit breaker or OCPD (over current protection device). You don't need a fuse or breaker in addition to this.

Before wiring this up, how much charge current do you want/need from the truck?

Do you plan on mostly using solar to charge the camper batteries, or do you want to charge primarily from the alternator?

The reason I ask, is that the 10AWG wire that comes with the kit will limit the charge current to the camper battery, and particularly with newer alternators you may get very little charge current from the truck. If you do want charge from the truck, you may want to use larger wire, or consider a DC-DC charger to use with the current wire.
 
Hi Rando
Maybe I’m misleading by my previous post. Thermal breakers I thought were to protect devices, and would be up near the device. Where as fuses/circuit breakers are for the wire, and close to the power supply.

Didn’t learn that anywhere or read it in a book. Just the word thermal, and the fact there motor was in OP diagram. Is where my mind went.

Russ
 
My 1st question would be are you charging this battery exclusively from the alternator or will there be solar or campground plug in also.

I have read multiple posts about folks battery unable to keep up with demand often due to voltage drop in weak wiring...

How much energy do you need to replace everyday.

10 amps well wiring not so critical. 40 amps, better be using something besides 10 gauge....

I would suggest 4 or 6 gauge wiring depending on your run length. Voltage drop is your enemy and if you don't get enough your battery will suffer.

A DC to DC charger eliminates much of that issue as would secondary supply such as solar :)

Good luck :)

Just my 2 cents and probably all it's worth :)
 
Hi Traveller
I had sometime today and googled thermal breakers. I have copy/paste this from Wikipedia for reading on thermal circuit breakers.

“Thermal magnetic circuit breakers, which are the type found in most distribution boards in Europe and countries with a similar wiring arrangements, incorporate both techniques with the electromagnet responding instantaneously to large surges in current (short circuits) and the bimetallic strip responding to less extreme but longer-term over-current conditions. The thermal portion of the circuit breaker provides a time response feature, that trips the circuit breaker sooner for larger over currents but allows smaller overloads to persist for a longer time. This allows short current spikes such as are produced when a motor or other non-resistive load is switched on. With very large over-currents during a short-circuit, the magnetic element trips the circuit breaker with no intentional additional delay.”

I have seen the thermal circuit breaker in the photos above. I personally wouldn’t use that to protect the wiring on my camper. The reason is that automatic resetting Saftey’s can lead to more problems than manual reset Safety device’s.
My experience with thermal safety devices are either imbedded in the windings of a motor, or mechanically fastened to the motor case. I’m just a guy out there making repairs and fixing what’s broken or not working properly.
So that’s my mind set.
There is no reason you cannot wire your camper and have a good functioning circuitry for your needs. You might want to talk with a company and just listen to what they would do and what they would charge.
Hope this helps, I think that’s what members on this forum want and try to do, help.

Russ
 
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