Jon R
Senior Member
Hi All,
One of the last electrical items I have to figure out on my new Grandby is getting the marker lights to work when the truck marker lights are on. I found the truck marker light fuse and have connected the camper lights positive wire to that circuit. No lights. The lights work if i connect the wire in the camper to the camper battery. I tested the wire to the truck for continuity and am good there. After thinking about what could be wrong with the ground side for a few minutes, and mentally tracing the ground path, the light bulb came on, so to speak. I remembered that I decided to isolate the truck and camper grounds, and used the isolated version of the Victron Orion. The only connection to the truck ground is the 6 gage wire running from the truck battery negative to the negative input side of the isolated dc to dc charger.
So now I need to choose one of a few ways to tie the marker light ground to the truck ground. One way is to give up the isolation altogether. I’d prefer not to do that. Another would be to take apart the camper ground bus bar and test every wire to see if it’s the ground wire for the marker light. However, I’m not sure they didn’t just use the chassis as the current return for small circuits like those lights. If I could find that ground wire I could run wire to the truck ground and connect it to that. A third way, which would solve the problem if the camper chassis is the return, would be to run a small truck ground wire to the camper and use the two wires from the truck to operate a relay that connects the marker lights to camper power.
Am I failing to think of a better solution to this? I would really prefer to maintain isolation of the camper and truck grounds.
Thanks
One of the last electrical items I have to figure out on my new Grandby is getting the marker lights to work when the truck marker lights are on. I found the truck marker light fuse and have connected the camper lights positive wire to that circuit. No lights. The lights work if i connect the wire in the camper to the camper battery. I tested the wire to the truck for continuity and am good there. After thinking about what could be wrong with the ground side for a few minutes, and mentally tracing the ground path, the light bulb came on, so to speak. I remembered that I decided to isolate the truck and camper grounds, and used the isolated version of the Victron Orion. The only connection to the truck ground is the 6 gage wire running from the truck battery negative to the negative input side of the isolated dc to dc charger.
So now I need to choose one of a few ways to tie the marker light ground to the truck ground. One way is to give up the isolation altogether. I’d prefer not to do that. Another would be to take apart the camper ground bus bar and test every wire to see if it’s the ground wire for the marker light. However, I’m not sure they didn’t just use the chassis as the current return for small circuits like those lights. If I could find that ground wire I could run wire to the truck ground and connect it to that. A third way, which would solve the problem if the camper chassis is the return, would be to run a small truck ground wire to the camper and use the two wires from the truck to operate a relay that connects the marker lights to camper power.
Am I failing to think of a better solution to this? I would really prefer to maintain isolation of the camper and truck grounds.
Thanks