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Old 01-04-2017, 05:58 PM   #331
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I recently spent a week camping in the van in Bass Lake and Moab........and the drawer slides don't stay closed...at all. All four drawers were regularly flying to and fro with every turn.

Need another solution; the obvious one is latches but its not that simple, as the drawers do not have face frame between them, so nothing for the latch to latch to.....still thinking.
Did you ever come up with a solution to keep you drawers closed? I went through your later posts and could not find it. Am building frameless cabinets and trying to figure a guide way to secure the drawers.

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Old 01-04-2017, 06:19 PM   #332
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Did you ever come up with a solution to keep you drawers closed?...
Sorry, that just struck me really funny.


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Old 01-04-2017, 08:22 PM   #333
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yup....a zipper....

On a more serious note, I ended up removing the "push-to-open" mechanism on the accuride slides and I installed the 2" round Southco plastic latches. The drawers do not open while driving anymore.

You can barely see them here in the very left side of the picture.....since there is no face frame between each drawer I put the latches on the sides of all the drawers except the top drawer, which has the latch in the usual place..the middle of the drawer.





I'll take a better picture and post it tomorrow if I can remember.
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Old 01-05-2017, 06:29 AM   #334
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...On a more serious note, I ended up removing the "push-to-open" mechanism on the accuride slides and I installed the 2" round Southco plastic latches. The drawers do not open while driving anymore.
When I had my SMB and my kid was really young, I actually replaced my Southco latches with locking Southco latches just so he couldn't get into thinks like the inverter.


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Old 07-25-2017, 09:10 AM   #335
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More melted fuses/fuse block.....contact resistance

I just got back from a week camping in Moab and Flagstaff....van worked fine....

I thought that I may have a separator issue...poking around the electrical stuff I found this:



The melted green blob was a 30A fuse that powers my electric water heater. The metal part of the fuse was still in-tact and the water heater was still functional. Apparently, 18A through that fuse was enough to melt things (my water heater element is 300W and draws about 18A). One of the faston 1/4" terminals going to the water heater relay was also a bit scorched but still functional as well.

So what is puzzling me about all this is that pumping big amps through a small ATO fuse makes enough heat to melt things..likely due to contect resistance..seems like the physical fuse size needs to get bigger with larger currents.

One other lesson learned here is to not use crappy ebay cheap fuses.....name brand fuses like buss, etc appear to have a nylon type plastic which will likely survive higher temps. The green fuse on the left (which will be replaced very soon) is one of the cheapies........the yellow one below it is a typical higher quality unit.

I've had similar problems in the past with a fuse from my solar panel melting the fuse block as well....
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Old 07-25-2017, 09:17 AM   #336
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Is the green one on the left the same brand as the melty one on the right??

This is a little frightening really. I think the blue sea busses are rated to 40A max on a circuit.....this shouldn't happen.

Yikes.
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Old 07-25-2017, 09:36 AM   #337
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It's been my experience that the upper limit of an ato fuse size is around 10 amps. That's 10 amps continuous load not momentary load or fuse rating. After that a much larger fuse/holder size with more contact area and/or mechanical clamping force is necessary. If not just for the safety aspect but from an efficiency stand point. If something is warm than that is watts of energy not doing the work you want. I think you know that but it may help others.

There are many larger sizes available but the Maxi size is pretty affordable for a mid range capacity.
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Old 07-25-2017, 01:08 PM   #338
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Is the green one on the left the same brand as the melty one on the right??

This is a little frightening really. I think the blue sea busses are rated to 40A max on a circuit.....this shouldn't happen.

Yikes.
Yup...same cheap fuse......

Well, it does happen...happened twice to me so far.....it's about contact resistance of the small parts...small fuses......1/4" faston terminals....

resistance times current squared makes heat (IsquaredR losses....)

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It's been my experience that the upper limit of an ato fuse size is around 10 amps. That's 10 amps continuous load not momentary load or fuse rating. After that a much larger fuse/holder size with more contact area and/or mechanical clamping force is necessary. If not just for the safety aspect but from an efficiency stand point. If something is warm than that is watts of energy not doing the work you want. I think you know that but it may help others.

There are many larger sizes available but the Maxi size is pretty affordable for a mid range capacity.
Exactly....

I just noticed something interesting in the photo....the fused metal element looks way smaller in the melted 30A green fuse on the right compared to the green 30A fuse on the left....
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Old 07-25-2017, 01:21 PM   #339
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Yeah, noticed that too.
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Old 07-25-2017, 01:33 PM   #340
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Yeah, noticed that too.
That's very weird about the size difference in the metal. Very strange.

I'm glad you found this before anything melted. You didn't notice a smell, I guess?
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