15 Amp power lead for caravan

Our present caravan as well as the previous one take a normal 10 amp lead and plug. Hope yours is the same.

Brian

In our experience all the caravan parks we have stayed in have power outlets that
fit a standard 10 amp lead.
This may be because a 10 amp earth will fit into a 15 amp earth fitting.
However your caravan may have a 15 amp inlet so you will need a 15 amp female
end to your cord.

Jeff

Hi there,

I solved the problem by buying a 15 A lead and a male 10 A and a female 15 A spare plugs. Then I cut 1/2 m of the cable at the male end. Disconnect the 15 A male and reattach to the cut end of the long bit. then to the short bit attach the 10 A male to one end and the 15 A female to the other, and tadah you got an adapter lead. A female 15 A can attach to a male 10 A, but it the male is 15A it wont attach to the 10A female as the Earth pin is too big. Check your van. If it is 15 A you need to do the adapter thing to get the lead to plug in to the house. If not, you dont have a problem.

Good luck, and dont forget to get a licensed sparky to do the wiring, else make sure you know what you are doing connecting the leads and rewiring, else it wont be a happy holiday at all.

Cheers
Dave.

Hey Brian, It will depend on your caravan. If you have a 15amp connection on your van then you must use a 15amp lead. You can tell by checking the Earth pin. I f its larger than the other two then it is 15amp.

If your van has a ten amp connection (same sized earth pin) then you can safely use a ten amp lead plugged into the 15amp outlet at the caravan park

Do NOT do as suggested above and start changing plug tops. A 15 amp lead is deisgned to carry 15 amps if you put a ten amp plug top on it then it can only carry 10 amps. Illegal and dangerous. if your van has a ten amp connection (same sized earth pin) then you can safely use a ten amp lead plugged into the 15amp outlet at the caravan park

All your appliances in the van will most likely have ten amp leads on them to plug into the 10 amp power outlets in the van. Just plug the fridge into a lead from the house till you are ready to go. If in doubt call a sparky

Hi Brian

You can get around the problem by disconnecting the fridge lead from its power point inside the caravan and connecting the fridge plug to a normal extension lead whilst at home to get the fridge nice and cold. For safety it is also wise to make sure that the extension lead is connected to a safety switch or if connected to the house circuit, it is safety protected .......... Murphy's Law is always present!
As I understand it, "on the road" ........all caravan external LEADS and PLUGS MUST be 15 amps and also cannot be joined to make up a longer lead.

Make sure you don't only carry a 15amp lead, some caravan parks only have 10amp outlets, so you can't plug in the 15amp lead. I have a short lead with 15amp female & 10amp male to use in this instance.

Hi Brian,
What l've seen done in my tavels is they actually grind the earth pin to size,l'm definatly not saying this the way to go but l have seen this done!...theory l've been told is it is technicly still a 15 amp lead...your decision.Merry Xmas.
JD

goodday brian and others

legally your caravan must have a 15 amp plug (large earth) and caravan parks are supposed to provide a 15amp outlet although very few still have only 10amp and make it hard when people only havea 15 amp lead
you can buy leads with a 10amp plug top (male ) and 15amp extension socket (female)which is what you need at home if you file/grind down a 15 amp earth plug a caravan park person can ask you to remove it from there power supply as it is an illegal piece of equiptment
i recently heard of a caravan park telling christhmas customers that all leads must be safety tested and tagged and with a filed down earth pin it would fail tast and tag

steve E Grade sparkie Victoria and seasoned caravan traveller
Test & Tag is a big part of my work
ps i carry both types of leads when travelling

You guys go to a lot of trouble for no good reason
As i understand it in Qld at least ALL new c/van parks will be 15 amp , OLD ones can be either - in the intrim you can buy a an exempt lead for the express purpose of your caravan power with a 15 amp socket and a 10 amp type plug rated at 15 amp on the other end the cord will be rated at 15 amp
ALL caravan parks with 10 amp outlets will have a current limiting curcuit breaker fitted to the outlet
I bought a new one only 6 mths ago from Laurence and Hanson electrical Moulded plugs on both ends
regards Kev

Caravan parks now have an internal switch in the socket.
Try and plug a 10A lead in and it will not turn on.
The earth pin may be larger for a 15A plug but the main thing to look at is the size of the other 2 pins - they are thicker allowing for more current flow without overheating. Same with the capacity of the wire in a 15A lead.
Please, for safety reasons, use the correct lead. It is designed to protect us.
Techie

G’day all,

I’m no technical person so I can’t be held liable for the stupid things I say (just to keep in the theme of keeping the insurers happy). I have both type of leads and have also (illegally, I guess) used adaptors. I have even gone to the expense of having a 15 Amp outlet fitted in the garage at home so I can hook up the trailer when not in use.

I have two points here, one is that I have a camper trailer and like powered sites if they are available, I run a battery charger (3 stage 15 Amp output) and some lights. I reckon that 15 Amp is overkill for my purpose. Secondly, I have had to use both leads together, several times on a recent trip because the output in the park is 30+ meters away and I reckon there should be a responsibility on the parks that provide power to do so more conveniently/safely. And I really hate the “have to do this for the insurance” argument when so many other things are all wrong anyway – it just seems like an excuse/conspiracy.

I hate testing because it seems to add little and costs a lot. Take annual vehicle checks for example, I saw stats a while ago that showed that there were more unroadworthy vehicles (per capita) involved in accidents in NSW then in QLD. The story is that it costs NSW drivers $50M to get pink slips annually whereas in QLD this is not required.

Kind regards

Thanks a million to everyone , Steve i hear what you are saying that you can buy a 15amp lead with male plug rated 10 amp with female socket rated 15 amp , only problem missus tried to buy one of these in Bunnings (WA) other day , was told that there is no such product !!