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Topic: Reverse Polarity in Mortorhome

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Gail-force

04/7/2018 at 10:09pm
Location: Land of the Prince Bishops
Outfit: Autocruise Starburst

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We've just come back from Scotland, and when I've plugged our motorhome into our house electrics via a short hook up/3pin cable the LED panel on the motorhome has beeped 4 times and said I have Reversed Polarity.....I've plugged in the kettle to a socket and it's not working (eek!) how can I fix this? I know this happens in Europe a lot but North Berwick isn't France. Any help would be appreciated

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Bernie47

04/7/2018 at 10:40pm
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If it worked ok on site it sounds as though your hook-up cable at home is incorrectly wired.

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Bernie

Gail-force

05/7/2018 at 6:08am
Location: Land of the Prince Bishops
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Hi Bernie, to be honest I think it beeped when we hooked up on site and the electrics worked ok then, I'm just concerned as to why it's "reversed"....we are using the same cable we've had for a year

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Opensauce

05/7/2018 at 11:05am
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Brits worry totally unnecessarily about reverse polarity abroad & fail to realise that plenty of UK houses have reversed polarity which rather does point out that reverse polarity with modern EU standard electrical equipment is not an issue.

If your kettle is not working when plugged in you have a fault. Nothing to do with polarity. Check your wiring as suggested. Or maybe kettle has failed?

bigart

05/7/2018 at 8:08pm
Location: Chorley
Outfit: Motorhome swift Escape 686

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We always check the power with a test plug,,if reversed I have a plug and socket wired on socket blue to brown, which reverses the reverse polarity,we have used this many times abroad and usually when you have to use the old two pin plugs hoping that this helps Arthur

James Watt

05/7/2018 at 8:48pm
Location: Costa Del West Sussex
Outfit: Tesco 4 Man Dome. Outwell Virginia 5

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I spent a lot of time in the Philippines in the last 7 years.

The home I bought was incorrecectly wired, but that didn't stop the electrical items from working.

If I found a tingling when touching them, I just put the 2 pin power plug in 180 degrees round. We had NO EARTH. But that's normal there. Just had to be careful not to touch 2 items at the same time

Regards James

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Gail-force

08/7/2018 at 9:17pm
Location: Land of the Prince Bishops
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Hi all, thanks for the info. I have no idea what's going on with my electrics....I plugged it back into the house using the same lead and it's not showing Reverse Polarity on the LED and the sockets all work....(I haven't tried the kettle, so it may be goosed) I can only guess that by plugging it back into the house it's "flipped" the polarity back. I'm not going to look a gift horse in the mouth here, but thanks for all the helpful info.Gail

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I always knew I'd get old. How fast it happened was a bit of a surprise though.

navver

09/7/2018 at 8:28pm
Location: West country
Outfit: Mondeo

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Please don't anyone say that reversed polarity is OK in a house. It is not and can be very dangerous.

In a house - fuses and MCBs and switches are single pole and only break the live wire. With reverse polarity the live will not be disconnected by the fuse, MCB or switch.

In caravans - the RCD and MCBs are normally double pole so they make reverse polarity OK. That's why we don't get too upset about it in caravans.

It sound as if you have a crossed wire fault somewhere either in the house wiring or the EHU lead and also perhaps a faulty kettle.

It needs checking out by an electrician.

debcon

12/7/2018 at 11:48am
Location: west yorks
Outfit: Caravanett

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As navver says its not safe we in the uk only fuse live and normaly only use single pole light switches to turn lights on and off thus if you have reversed polarity all your light bulbs if broken in situe will be live

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