30Amp versus 50Amp Hookups

[PrescillaM]

This may seem like a stupid question BUT some of the information that I have read on RV parks has the full hookups as 50Amp connections. My RV will be a 30Amp. Do I need to purchase an adapter to go from a 30A to a 50A? I'm also "assuming" that I would need a 30A female to a 50A male? Is this correct or am I jumping ahead of the gun?

Also, is there a way to convert a system from a 30A to a 50A? I would love to have more power if I could but the RV I want comes with 30A standard and I don't want to wait to order one.

Newbie
Prescilla

[Ronbo]

30 amp is more widely available than 50 amp. I have never seen a hook up that only had a 50 amp plug. Your breaker will be a 30 amp so that limits the power you have coming in even if you adapt up to a 50 amp plug. Ou would need a new breaker panel to take advantage of 50 amp service.

[PrescillaM]

30 amp is more widely available than 50 amp. I have never seen a hook up that only had a 50 amp plug. Your breaker will be a 30 amp so that limits the power you have coming in even if you adapt up to a 50 amp plug. Ou would need a new breaker panel to take advantage of 50 amp service.

Thank you.

[Big Greg]

You can upgrade an RV from 30a to 50a BUT it would be much much too expensive. If you want 50a purchase the RV that way so you don't have to rewire the entire RV. 30a will provide 30a of electricity, 50a has two power legs and supplies 100a of electricity (50a on each leg.......BIG difference!).

You can get a power cord pigtail or adapter from Camping World, RV dealers, and Amazon. If you are purchasing your RV from a dealer include the pigtail in the RV purchase deal. Many power pedestals have both 30a and 50a outlets. The pigtail or adapter needs to the male on the 50a end to plug into the pedestal and female on the end plugging into your RV power cord.

 

Amazon 50a to 30a pigtail:

http://www.amazon.com/Conntek-14315-1-5-Foot-Pigtail-Connector/dp/B003YDY7YK/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1457906525&sr=8-1&keywords=rv+pigtail+50+to+30

 

Depending on how the power input to RV is physically setup (if it has the power input connection on the side) a 90 degree pigtail will eliminate the stress on the power cord. This one is 30a to 30a.

http://www.amazon.com/Camco-55532-PowerGrip-Locking-Adapter/dp/B005BNZJ8O/ref=sr_1_5?ie=UTF8&qid=1457906924&sr=8-5&keywords=90+degree+power+rv+cord

Greg

[PrescillaM]

Thank you Greg. I was looking at the amperage usage of an A/C or a Heater, plus a few appliances and it looks like the amperage would be used up quite quickly with 30Amps. Maybe I just need to make sure I don't have multiple things running at once. I don't want to ruin anything right off the bat so I was trying to think ahead.
I will certainly ask the dealer about the connector. Thanks for the links

[moisheh]

You need a lot more than a breaker to change a unit to 50 amp. Unless you are very handy you would need an electrician. Your cord will have to be changed to a 6 ga with 4 wires. Probably need a new panel. But not required. Just purchase an adapter and you will be able to plug into a 50 amp pedestal and get a full 30 amps.

[skp51443]

Thank you Greg. I was looking at the amperage usage of an A/C or a Heater, plus a few appliances and it looks like the amperage would be used up quite quickly with 30Amps. Maybe I just need to make sure I don't have multiple things running at once. I don't want to ruin anything right off the bat so I was trying to think ahead.

I will certainly ask the dealer about the connector. Thanks for the links

 

It does add up fast and it can be quite aggravating when you go over the limit and trip a breaker. We had a list of our appliances and what amount of power they used so we could see what we could have on at any one time. We had fits in hot country when the air conditioner was needed about 20 hours per day as it used about half our power. It and the electric water heater put us at about the limit, if the electric fridge element kicked in while the heater and AC were drawing power it would trip the breaker. Same with using other big power users, got frustrating enough our second rig was a 50 amp model.

[mptjelgin]

I have stayed at one commercial RV park that had only 50 amp service. At that time we had a 30 amp trailer and had to borrow a 50-to-30 amp adapter. We later bought that adapter and never needed it again!

[Barbaraok]

Thank you Greg. I was looking at the amperage usage of an A/C or a Heater, plus a few appliances and it looks like the amperage would be used up quite quickly with 30Amps. Maybe I just need to make sure I don't have multiple things running at once. I don't want to ruin anything right off the bat so I was trying to think ahead.

I will certainly ask the dealer about the connector. Thanks for the links

 

We are often in parks that are only 30 amps - especially in the Northwest, and older national/state/county/city parks. While I love the ease that 50 amps provide, having to go on 30 amps isn't a problem unless it is over 95° - and it is is that we need to go farther north!

 

When we plug in (30 or 50 amp) our refrigerator is on electric as is our water heater and the inverter. We have a power share feature on our inverter and when on 30 amps, I set the power share for 20 amps. Then with the other lights, TVs, etc., I can run ONE addititional large power user like A/C or Microwave or Electric Heater or hair dryer or Washer/Dryer. If it is warm enough for the A/C, then if I need to use the microwave, the A/C is turned off (but the big fan keeps running). Or if it is on the cold side, and we've got an electric heater going, then that it shut off while using the microwave/convection oven - and we use a fan to blow the heat from the microwave around the coach.

 

All of this to say, that it really isn't hard to live with just 30 amps, just a tiny bit of planning. Now, since we often travel in the southwest on the shoulders when it is really hot, we do love having the 50 amps. I'm not sure that I would purchase a unit that was only 30 amps today unless it was very small.

 

Barb

[trailertraveler]

...is there a way to convert a system from a 30A to a 50A?...

A fairly common and easier modification is the addition of a separate 20amp service with a single circuit breaker that can be used to power outlets for an electric heater, blow drier, etc. Depending on the way your trailer is wired, you may want to add outlets for this circuit or if your trailer has outlets on more than one breaker just rewire one of the outlet circuits to the new circuit. This will give you an actual 50 Amps of capacity, not the 100 Amps of the 50 Amp RV circuits.

 

In regard to adapters, I use the 50 Amp to 30 Amp adapter quite often when the 30 Amp recepticle seems worn or damaged. If you travel enough, you will encounter sites with only 50 Amp outlets, only 30 Amp outlets and occasionally only 20/15 amp outlets. Adapters are available to handle all those situations.

[Chalkie]

While I have a 50 amp RV I carry a 30-to-50 amp adapter. Whichever way you need to go it is a good idea to carry an adapter. The impact to me is that if it is really toasty outside on 30 amp I can not run both a/c's. Moving an RV that is built on 30 amp up to 50 amp all the way through would be cost prohibitive but an adapter is cheap when you find yourself in that situation. The park I am in now, for example, does not offer 50/30 amp hookups. One part is 50 amp and the other side of the park is 30 amps.

[PrescillaM]

Thank you everyone for your input. It is much appreciated.

[Kirk W]

A great deal of the amount of power required for comfortable living in an RV is based upon the size of the RV and the number of people living in it. Most smaller RVs are built with 30a service and a goodly number of the larger ones are also. With your RV at 28' in length, it probably has only one air conditioner and very few RVs of that size come with 50a service because it really isn't that difficult to manage with the lesser power. By far the majority of RV parks and campgrounds will have 30a power plugs, while many state and federal parks and even some older RV parks do not have 50a outlets. What the adapter does is to allow you to connect your 30a cord to a 50a outlet, safely. It does not increase at all the amount of power that you can use, although there could be times when power demand is high in an older park that the 50a outlet might be more stable and so preferable for use by your 30a trailer.

 

As you said, what you need is the short cord that has a 30a female plug on one end and a 50a male on the other. The 50a outlet has two hot legs and the adapter allows you to connect to one of those legs only, leaving the other unused and the circuit breakers inside of your RV still limit you to the 30a use that your RV was designed to use.

I would not be in any rush to spend the kind of money that a properly done upgrade to 50a service requires because in order to make good use of it the trailer would need a major rewiring and you probably would gain very little. With your present 30a service you will quickly learn that you can't run your electric hair dryer at the same time as the electric skillet and the air conditioner or an electric heater. You may not be able to use your microwave and your electric coffee maker at the same time, and a few other things of that nature but the limitations are not difficult for most people to learn to manage. We presently travel (2 of us) in a travel trailer with 30a power service and it is seldom an issue, although the electric heater does need to be turned off when we cook in our electric fry pan.

[skp51443]

Another reason to carry a 50-30 adapter that came to mind reading this topic is when you get a site that has a bad 30 amp socket, either damaged or a weak breaker. Being able to grab your 50-30 and use the 50 amp plug is a lot less effort than moving to another site or hoping the park will fix the 30 amp issue.

[LindaH]

I have never seen a hook up that only had a 50 amp plug.

We were just recently in an RV park where all their pull-thrus had ONLY a 50-amp plug. The back-ins had ONLY a 30-amp plug. We've seen other RV parks where there was only one or the other, but not both.

 

Some RV parks charge extra for 50-amps, so even when we had a 50-amp RV, we'd get a 30-amp spot because we were never in a position where we *needed* 50-amps.

[PrescillaM]

Another reason to carry a 50-30 adapter that came to mind reading this topic is when you get a site that has a bad 30 amp socket, either damaged or a weak breaker. Being able to grab your 50-30 and use the 50 amp plug is a lot less effort than moving to another site or hoping the park will fix the 30 amp issue.

That is what I have read Stanley. Makes sense to carry one. I've read that the 30A plug can be in poor condition and I like to be prepared.

[Barbaraok]

We carry two cords, one 30 amp, one 50 amp, plus a 50-30 adapter, also a 30-15 adapter for driveway parking. If only 30 available, 30 amp cord is easier to handle. Plus, we've been to parks where you are charged for 50 amp if you have 50 amp cord because not dog-bones allowed. And yes, they did come around checking on the cord size.

[cluwood56]

Ok, This all scares me!

Remember for safety never adapt to a higher amperage with out an added circuit protector at the lower amperage.

Circuit breakers do fail!

Don't burn your rig to save a few bucks!

[cluwood56]

Ok, This all scares me!

Remember for safety never adapt to a higher amperage with out an added circuit protector at the lower amperage.

Circuit breakers do fail!

Don't burn your rig to save a few bucks!

When was the last time you tested your circuit breakers!

[Dutch_12078]

Ok, This all scares me!

Remember for safety never adapt to a higher amperage with out an added circuit protector at the lower amperage.

Circuit breakers do fail!

Don't burn your rig to save a few bucks!

 

Does it also scare you that the sub 1 amp table lamp in your S&B living room is plugged into a 15 or 20 amp circuit?

[Kirk W]

Ok, This all scares me!

Remember for safety never adapt to a higher amperage with out an added circuit protector at the lower amperage.

Circuit breakers do fail!

Don't burn your rig to save a few bucks!

As a career electrical worker, I must have missed something in my education. The current rating of a power plug has no impact upon the amount used, it is the voltage that is key. If you look inside of your RV you will discover that every load in the RV has two circuit breakers to supply it, the main one at 30A or 50A, depending upon the RV power cord and wiring, and a second one with a lower rating for the specific circuit or load. As an example, in my travel trailer, the air conditioner has a 20A circuit breaker that supplies it alone, and the distribution panel it is mounted in has a 30A main breaker between the distribution box and the RV power cord. Those are completely independent of whatever I happen to connect my shore power cord to. I am probably as conservative as any of the electricians, engineers, and electrical techs on this forum, but see no problem at all in using any of the U/L dog-bone adapters, or even to making up my own. I don't like the little plug type of adapter, for several reasons but safety isn't one of them.

 

When was the last time you tested your circuit breakers!

Intentionally, I have never tested a circuit breaker, not even during my 8 years as a Navy Nuclear Power electrician. I don't know of any intended way of testing a circuit breaker and I have been inspecting and replacing them for the past 40 years. Would you mind sharing with us what your test procedure is? I do open up the electrical distribution box in both my RV and my home-base at least annually and do maintenance checks but have only tested one by accident when a tool slipped!

 

I have been retired for some time now so it may be there there is some means today of testing a circuit breaker that I am not aware of so please do share with us the way to do this.

[bigjim]

Sometimes not knowing has its value. I don't know this but I am thinking that one test you could do on a breaker is turn it off and check for power going threw it when there shouldn't be. Or continuity threw one. I don't know how we could do it but I wonder if they are not tested in the manufacturing process by overloading a random sampling for instance to see if it would trip.

[cluwood56]

Yes I have tested circuit breakers to see what load the shut off at.

Usually on a 3 phase system with a motor I could put a variable load on. Simple amp probe over the wiring.

Smaller circuits with amp gauge and variable resistance load.

No , I don't recommend people do this on a circuit breaker unless you have a specific reason to. (breakers weaken every time they are tripped)

What I do recommend is shut off a circuit breaker on occasion just to make sure it shuts off the power.

GFI breakers just push the test button. I have seen a few that didn't shut off.

 

What scares me is the thought of some one adapting a 20 amp rig to a 50 amp service and have an issue in the wiring before the breakers in the rig.

I have never seen in any codes where it is alright to put 50 amps of power thru wiring rated for 20 amps.

 

My daughter tested GFI breaker that failed to shut off by dropping a hair curler in a sink with water running. Almost burnt down the house!

I prefer to error on the side of safety.

[Randyretired]

I understand the concern of a slight chance of overloading a wire but it is common practice. We plug a lamp with small wire jnto a 20amp circuit for instance. When I wired my garage/shop I put in 3 50 amp circuits but routinely plug in welders and more that don't require that much power. I even ran a 50amp circuit to my air compressor even though it only requires 40amp in case I want a bigger compressor some day. As for circuit breakers failing if that happens a nearly unlimited supply could easily burn down any building. I agree with limiting risk within reason but I have a limit. All of life is a risk.

[Kirk W]

Sometimes not knowing has its value. I don't know this but I am thinking that one test you could do on a breaker is turn it off and check for power going threw it when there shouldn't be. Or continuity threw one. I don't know how we could do it but I wonder if they are not tested in the manufacturing process by overloading a random sampling for instance to see if it would trip.

If you call that testing, then I guess I have done so but if you plan to do that I strongly recommend that you do it with the shore power cord removed to prevent any current through the circuit breakers. Each time that you open a modern circuit breaker under load, the trip point will drop a small amount. They are designed to fail in open condition and while it isn't impossible for one to fail closed, it is extremely rare and as I said in post #21, an RV has two breakers between each load and the power cord that connects to the outlet. If there is a danger in connecting to a supply that has a higher current rating than your load, then you need to have a separate circuit breaker for each appliance that you use since no two require exactly the same amount of power. There is some risk each time we get out of bed and everything that we do each day adds more risk. Using good judgment in choosing what risks to accept and how far to carry each one makes only good sense, but it is impossible to "live" and still avoid even the smallest of risks.

 

As to the testing in the manufacturing process, you are absolutely correct about the random sample testing. There are test standards that are required by the electrical codes and also by the U/L seal folks. I know of no electrical component that has 100% of the items tested, or even close to it and I know of no maintenance department that tests circuit breakers.

 

GFI is a different matter entirely. It has been mentioned on these forums many times that one should test their GFI outlets or circuit breakers from time to time, even though we lived for a long time without them. The GFI is there especially to protect people when in a wet environment and that is the place where there is most risk of mishap as well as the greatest probability of serious injury or death if it should happen. A GFI is much like a seat belt in that most people rarely if ever need one but if they do it can save your life. And just like seat belts, they must be kept in good condition in order to do the job that they were designed to do, but few owners ever bother to check them.

 

Do I need to purchase an adapter to go from a 30A to a 50A? I'm also "assuming" that I would need a 30A female to a 50A male? Is this correct or am I jumping ahead of the gun?

~ ~ ~ ~ Prescilla

Very little of this applies to the original question, whose answer is that you should carry an adapter to allow you to use power to your 30a RV from a 50a power pedestal when there is a need to do so. A 30a RV is not capable of using more than the 30a that it's equipment limits it to.

 

While it is true that there may be a tiny bit more risk in connecting to a 50a outlet as compared to the 30a your cord was designed for, as one who has been in electrical repair since 1961 and who has owned RVs since 1972, I have done this myself hundreds of times and know many more RV folks who do so on a fairly frequent basis, yet I have not know one case of there being some issue caused by the higher current rated outlet. In all of that time and in close to 20 years of following RV internet forums, this is the first time that I have seen this made an issue. I would compare this to using a 2 quart water pitcher to fill an 8 oz water glass. Just because the pitcher holds far more water than the glass, that doesn't mean that you will spill water everywhere.