[bikestuff]

Gang,

I have a fairly new magnum inverter so I am getting used to it. Have been running on generator constantly for three days. In Dallas its been 105F, so pretty hard to stay cool without the AC.

Anyway, tonight I noticed that I have an alarm on the Magnum. It says "High Volts AC". The meters over the dash say that I have 120V on L1 and L2. (35A L1, and 20A L2)

My TVs and other AC stuff are working normally.

So..What do I do now? Is this serious? What would you check first? I suspect that it may have something to do with the excessive heat....but have no idea where to start.

Thanks,
bill

[whatsnewell]

It sounds to me like at some point your voltage was too high. I am a neophyte when it comes to this stuff, but if your incoming voltage is now reading at 120vac on each leg you should be OK. I know there are others who are much more knowledgeable, and I have no doubt they will chime in soon.

[encantotom]

Hi Bill,

I looked at the Magnum manuals and the way i understand the fault you are seeing is if the incoming AC power (either the genny or shore) exceeds 150v then the inverter charger will show a fault of High Volts AC. if the fault is a hard fault, it will shut the inverter down.

your inverter and or your auto transfer switch (if it is like mine) monitors the incoming AC power and if there is a problem with it in terms of voltage, frequency that is out of range, it will shut power off to the coach. your inverter if it detects a problem and the transfer switch (with power monitoring) doesnt, only the inverter will shut down ( ithink). if there is a hard fault, the inverter will reset itself. the manual says to leave all AC power off for 15 min and then try it. i suspect it will autoreset much quicker than that and it probably did.

it is very likely NOT due to heat. 105 may be hot to you but really isnt that hot for these things. i ran my genny in my driveway at 115 degrees all day no problem. we ran for constantly while we were on our trip while driving and alot while sitting and it was 105-115 during that.

if your inverter is overheating you will get a different overheat fault, not the high voltage AC fault.

assuming you were running on genny only, i would assume one of the following if everything is working ok now.

1. a glitch of somekind from the genny
2. a false error

if it was me, i would just reset the fault, and run it and see what happens. again i believe you have enough safety systems monitoring the power that if the power is bad that it will just shut you off.

my prosine xantrex got into a fault mode and i had to disconnect power from it and rehook it up and it reset itself.

and no problems after that. (and that was before my last trip)

call me monday if you want me to talk you through it

tom

[bikestuff]

Tom,

Thanks for the reply! Man...I cannot imagine having 115F all the time!

I rested the generator last night and this am it came up with no fault. I looked in the manual but could not find a way to reset the fault without resetting the entire memory of Magnum.

The meters are reading rock steady around 120V. I agree it looks like a transient condition, but when I turned inverter off...and lost all AC to coach....and turned back on....it still had fault.

Guess I will watch it today.

Cheers,
bill

ps. The addition of a single roof air to my twin basement airs has really made a big impact. Can keep the coach cool without problem now.

[encantotom]

i bill,

according to your manual, it takes about 15 minutes with the power off to reset the fault. did you wait that long when you first tried to reset it?

on the roof air....another 15kbtu of cooling is a lot....glad it made it much better

if you are running all 5 air conditioners, are you having to watch your power consumption any more than before or no issue?

tom

[bikestuff]

Tom,

I am not sure what I should watch out for...but from meters I am far below 50 amps on both legs. Since my generator puts out 20kW...as long as I stay lower than 50 amps x 120V X 2 = 12kW I should be fine. Right?

I have had no issue with breakers tripping or anything like that.

Cheers,
bill

[encantotom]

others are probably more experienced than i am.

the biggest issue is LRA (locked rotor amps) or start up of the compressors. that said, a 50amp breaker will not blow at 50a if it is just a quick surge.

interesting though that we have 20kw gennys and a 50a service....

so you are doing fine. the electric portion of the aquahot will shut off your basement airs, but NOT your new roof air you put in. so if you run the electric aquahot you will need to watch it.

if you are managing it so no breakers blow, then you are doing fine.

i would suggest to not run a toaster, air cons, several hair curlers, microwave, and space heaters....ha ha

tom

[bestgenman]

Thought i would chime in here even though it has been months since your trouble. If you were running 4 tons of basement air and one ton additional on roof, your loads are fairly significant. You stated that power was from genset at the time, if a large block of load released (shut off) the voltage regulator had to reduce excitation quickly, however there is always some overshoot of voltage and possibly the inverter caught the overshoot and displayed an overvoltage condition. Reset the inverter as Tom mentioned and watch it for a while to be sure the overshoot was the culprit.
I agree with Tom on watching your current (AMPS) since the additional roof top may not have been connected to the disabling scheme Newell uses to prevent overcurrent while the Aqua Hot is on electric heat.

Gordon