Surge Protection - a requirement or nice to have

[Blazer]

My Progressive Industries protector Tripped shutting down incoming power from a “New” power pedestal in a Idaho campground when I hooked up and turned on the breaker a few weeks ago. If it saved me just the one time from electrical damage due to a incoming power problem to the motor home then it was well worth the investment. So it is nice to have.

[peggwn]

We've been saved twice in the last year with our Progressive 30 amp protection, once from a bad pedestal and once from a surge. We hard-wired ours; took less than half an hour. As a side issue, make sure the wiring in your Power Transfer box are tight. If they work loose and short it doesn't matter how good your surge protection is.

Happy travels.

[RaySowers]

We just came home from a trip through northern Minnesota. While at a nice RV resort, I lost AC power. It was my high-end "surge protector" that shut down the power to protect my motorhome from a low power condition. I will never hook into power without one. I also lock it to the post.

[NeilV]

It should be a requirement even though its not. Most people just chalk most of their Air Conditioning, TV, Transfer Switch, Etc failures in their RV's to cheap equipment installed by the manufacturers however most times its bad campground wiring and extended brownouts from the local utility companies that are causing these problems.

I had a Hard Wired Surge Protector with automatic shutdown for low/high voltage along with all the common wiring issues yet was too regularly dealing with failed start capacitors, burned out motors, overheated circuit boards, etc, etc until I put in a voltage correction transformer. When there was an extreme low voltage situation where moving to another campsite or campground was not an option during a low voltage shutdown on your surge protector you could be left in 100+ degree heat having to decide on hitting the bypass and taking your losses or toughing it out such as in the summer of 2008 where most of the East Coast was plagued with low voltage during that heatwave event.

The voltage correction transformer takes care of the low voltage situations that even the expensive surge protectors allow to pass, along with most that they would shut down for, greatly extending the life of your Air Conditioning, Microwave, TV, Transfer Switch, so forth and so on. The Hughs Autoformer I installed in my coach had paid for itself in the first year and many times over on the cost of repairs over the past 11 years not to mention the convenience of not having to decide if I wanted to hit the bypass taking my chances or go without power. Now I am just looking at an indicator telling me when the voltage coming is is damagingly low however the Autoformer is automatically correcting it.

You have to decide if its better to be replacing equipment more often, putting in a surge protector and having power shut off on you when there is a brown out or having a system that fixes voltage issues for you without shutting down your entire coach until the power incident is over.


I travel with a dog and its much nicer to come back to an air conditioned coach instead of a hot one on low voltage shutdown with an overheated dog inside.

[RTrider]

We have a surge protector/voltage monitor system wired into our MH. I would not be without it. This past summer we were in a campground for the summer and every weekend the voltage would get low, especially when it was hot. Yes, it shut down our power a few times, but we never sustained any appliance damage. Several people in the campground damaged A/C units because the voltage was too low for the compressor to start. A couple of days we even ran the genny for several hours, but as I said, no damage. I wouldn't take the chance. BTW, the local power company finally resolved the power problem the last month we were there.