# Gilligan, The A/c, The Rv And Me



## thefulminator (Aug 8, 2007)

My family and I just returned from eight days in the Columbia Gorge, central Oregon and Mt. Hood. For the three days in the gorge and three days in central Oregon, the daytime high temperatures were over 100 degrees. On our first day in the gorge, the temperature was 105 and as we were going to bed I turned down the A/C to 66 and it quit working. It had been fine set at 72 all day. Luckily we have a fantastic fan, which made the trailer almost tolerable.

The next morning I called out dealer and they walked me through everything they could think of and still nothing. When the temperature was set on the thermostat, as the manual stated, the A/C would click but not turn on. I then called Dometic. They told me based on the symptoms they thought the circuit board was dead and that there is a temporary fix. By jumping the main relay, the circuit board is bypassed and the unit would run and would have to be turned on and off by the breaker. I really didn't want to tear the unit down so they gave me the name of two authorized repair companies. The first was in The Dalles Oregon and the second was a mobile service called Bill's Mobile RV Service. They would pay for the mobile service parts and labor but I would have to pick up the tab for the house call.

I called Bill's and to my surprise Bill said that Dometic takes so long to pay him for warranty work that he wouldn't make the house call even though he comes to Maryhill State Park regularly. I asked him if he would come out if I paid the entire bill and he said he would if he had the part. He asked me to get the part number off the unit so I started to tear into it. I had to take most of the unit apart to expose the model number. He told me that he didn't have the part and that he was sure the shop in The Dalles wouldn't have it either. He did give me the instructions on how to do a manual reset of the thermometer.

Since I had the unit pretty much pulled apart I decided to try the repair that Dometic gave me. I needed to find the crucial part that Dometic told me I would need, a paperclip, which the park office supplied. I got the paperclip installed to jump the relay on the circuit board, turned the power back on and again, noting happened.

I pulled everything back apart and put it back together. I then thought that if I had jumped the relay it should have worked. I had brought an electrical tester with me and checked the wires going into the A/C unit. There was no power. I again reassembled everything, turned the power on and it still wouldn't work.

I finally went to the converter and thought that maybe a wire had come loose. I was trying to see if the front panel popped off or was screwed on and gave it a slight twist. The A/C instantly came on and continued to work for the remainder of the trip.

On the way home we stopped off at our dealer. They dug into the converter and found that the neutral wire for the A/C had been improperly installed in the converter. Even though there were unused holes in the neutral bus bar, Gilligan tried putting two wires in the same hole which eventually worked loose and fell out. It was an easy fix but since I was about 45 days out of warranty my dealer charged me $57. They told me to call Keystone and tell them I should get reimbursed since it was put together wrong in the first place. I called Keystone the next day and they told me to send them the invoice and they would pay me for it.

For those of you having various electrical problems, you might want to open up your converter and see if Gilligan has struck again.

By the way, you can do the manual reset of the thermostat that has 5 buttons from top to bottom on the right side with a LCD display on the left side as follows:

Turn the thermostat off. Holding down the top and bottom button together, turn the thermostat back on. That is all there is to it.


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## CamperAndy (Aug 26, 2004)

Sorry to hear about all the troubles but before everyone goes to have the trailer rewired. You can have more then one wire in the neutral buss holes but Gilligan is known to be very weak. ALL of the neutral buss screws should be checked to make sure they are tight but don't worry if they are in their own hole or not. Also the buss has a big wire that runs out side to the trailer frame this is also a classic spot for the wire to be loose so check the frame ground.


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## battalionchief3 (Jun 27, 2006)

Oh you gotta hate that.......I found Gilligan to be weak also. After reading things here I went out and checked the connections on my breaker box and did find a few loose. I usually check them all once a year. I figure bouncing down the road cant help. Glad it started working again but for 57 bucks I would mark it up as a learning experience.


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