Power and Nothing Else

[sasky7777]

I posted this over on Kal's site as well, and thought I would see if there were any suggestions over here.

Plugged in my 50 amp back to back kit for the first time. The main contactor switched, the safe start interlock worked,but that's about it. The main power light never turned on, I hooked up a pump and no light or power. The first go the amp meter showed gibberish for 5 seconds, and since then nothing. It is getting power but nothing else. Any ideas where I should start trouble shooting? My first instinct is the neutral connections.

 

[bcrawfo2]

Yes. I'd get a volt meter and check your hot to hot and hots to neutral

 

[kal]

I posted this over on Kal's site as well, and thought I would see if there were any suggestions over here.

Strange, I don't see your post in my forum!

I'm assuming this is a kit from TheElectricBrewery.com? Take a look at our troubleshooting tips thread: http://www.theelectricbrewery.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=25460

While it's for the standard 30A panel, most of what's written holds true for the other panels as well.

The main power light never turned on, I hooked up a pump and no light or power. The first go the amp meter showed gibberish for 5 seconds, and since then nothing. It is getting power but nothing else. Any ideas where I should start trouble shooting? My first instinct is the neutral connections.

Likely something about the NEUTRAL or HOT bus is mis-wired. That's where I'd look first.

The unfortunate part I have to mention is that if one of the meters worked for a few seconds but never again, it's likely fried. This is unfortunately fairly easy to do give that 5VDC and 120VAC are wired close together: If you get any of the wires crossed the results are usually not good. Make sure to also set the DC power supplies to 5VDC (or slightly under).

Good luck!

Kal

 

[sasky7777]

So I double checked all my wiring, and hooked it all up, and again the same thing. Power goes on and nothing else. I took out the multimeter and I have 240 in and out of the 50 amp main relay, and power in but not out of the BK and HLT relay. I had 120 on either side of the main relay where it hooks into the buses, but nothing at the hot or neutral bus. I checked the 7 amp in-fuse and saw that it had blown.
Any suggestions?
View attachment ImageUploadedByHome Brew1476126636.199126.jpg
View attachment ImageUploadedByHome Brew1476126725.350815.jpg

 

[kal]

The 7A fuse blowing means that there's something mis-wired or something shorting out as under normal load it should not pull more than 7 amps. With the pumps not running, that fuse should only see about 0.1 to 0.2 amps. With both pumps running add another amp or two, far below 7A.

Is there someone else that can verify for you? Finding wiring issues is often very difficult if the same person who did the wiring is the one verifying as the mistakes are simply not seen because you never noticed the mistake in the first place. Sometimes a fresh set of eyes is the best idea.

Since the amp meter is likely blown, I would disconnect it completely too until you figure out where the issue is. (The panel will run fine with one or both meters disconnected).

Good luck!

Kal

 

[sasky7777]

My grasp of electrical wiring is pretty low. If the 7A fuse is blown, does that stop the elements from working? I would have thought the elements and lights for them would still work. I am going to find some outside professional help, but does something look wrong in the pics I have posted?

 

[kal]

My grasp of electrical wiring is pretty low. If the 7A fuse is blown, does that stop the elements from working? I would have thought the elements and lights for them would still work.

If the 7A fuse is blown then the entire HOT bus will no longer receive power power, so most things (including the lights and PIDs) will no longer receive power. Without power to the PIDs, you can't fire the elements or most other things.

I am going to find some outside professional help, but does something look wrong in the pics I have posted?

Unfortunately it's pretty difficult tell from a pictures that only show small parts of the wiring as it's impossible to trace where wires go as the whole setup is not shown (we don't see how the door is wired at all) and often wires are hidden/underneath items making them difficult to trace.

That said, your safe start interlock seems to have a wire from pin 8 to the HOT bus that should not be there from what I can tell.

Kal

 

[sasky7777]

To find the problem we unhooked everything from the hot bus and tried each wire one by one. It seems so obvious now, but it did the trick. Like Kal and others have said it is tough to see the mistakes sometimes without a fresh set of eyes.
So I had the doorbell transformers backwards. There are two wires on them that are pre-installed so I assumed those fed the converters. I swapped the wiring and now everything works but the volt meter.
It reads 000. I have it hooked up just like the instructions and then my electrician friend hooked up both wires to each leg of the 50amp relay and still nothing. Any thoughts?

 

[sasky7777]

Just solved that last problem. The wiring to the meter is 5v dc, ground, leg 1, blank, leg 2. I had it 5v dc, ground, blank, leg 1, leg 2.