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EL inverters and lighting - Printable Version

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EL inverters and lighting - Ralph L. Fullenwider - 09-22-2006 09:58

Hello everyone:

Funny things happen in tracing a signal on these inverters.

1, there are no fused inverters.

2; with out a load on the out put side, the inverters have a 2 to 3 second
life span, period, then they are gone.

3. the out put voltage goes from the inverter/s to the rheostat, from there
to the different panels. Though they are large wire wound rheostats, they
do go bad or change value. They are not very expensive and BB has them. The
El panel runs on 110 vac, true, but I have been told that the brightness is
not changed by varying the voltage but the frequency or Hz of the 110 vac
out put side. On the lower dash panel, it is usually divided into 2/3 or 4
sections depending on the year of the Coach. Bill is right, do not remove
the silicone going to the panel tabs. You can check the panels with an
extra inverter, but cutting the wires going to the panel about 10 inches or
so from the panel tabs and hook up the extra inverter there to see if the
panel will come on. If it does then back track to the next point where the
wiring goes, usually to the rheostat. There is also one of the round cannon
plugs involved and signals have been known to be lost there, through
electrolysis or heating up then contracting so many times that there is no
longer much of a connection through the pins.

I check the inverters with a small panel I have come up with, and wire it
direct to find the defective one or 2. So they are always checked with a
load. In cases where there are 4 or 5 inverters wired series/parallel, this
panel really comes in handy.

Just some ideas to check on.

Safe travels,

Ralph and Charolette Fullenwider
Ralph's RV Solutions, Duncan, Oklahoma