Keith Gooden
In today’s episode of the Motorhome Matt podcast…
Matt Sims
I’ll be answering your questions on reverse polarity. You’re excited about this, aren’t you? What is it, when should you worry about it and how do you solve it?
Keith Gooden
And we answer your questions on sat nav recommendations, rear lounge motorhome layouts and Crit’Air stickers throughout Europe. Welcome to the Motorhome Matt podcast. I’m Keith Gooden.
Matt Sims
And I’m Motorhome Matt.
Keith Gooden
There’s industry insights and expert advice for the world of motorhomes, caravans and campervans, and it’s all brought to you by www.thatleisureshop.com.
Matt Sims
Now remember, as always, please follow on your podcast app, whichever platform you’re listening to us on, and make sure you subscribe on YouTube. Brought to you by www.arobasecreative.co.uk.
The upcoming Caravan, Camping and Motorhome Show 2024
Keith Gooden
Straight into the news for this week then, Matt. NEC Caravan, Camping and Motorhome Show 2024 – it’s on from the 13th to the 18th of February.
Matt Sims
Yep! The annual pilgrimage to Birmingham. We always take a holiday in Birmingham every February. I’ll be on the advice centre throughout the show. Do check our socials for details of when I’m on the stand 3120. It’s a brand new advice centre for 2024 and it’s in Hall Three at the show.
Keith Gooden
And it is advice on motorhoming and caravanning, not just general advice about things like athlete’s foot.
Matt Sims
“I’ve got this terrible rash!” I’m not helping you with that.
Keith Gooden
He does have a terrible rash, but come and see him anyway.
Matt Sims
That’s very kind of you to say. Do you mind? That’s private.
Keith Gooden
And That Leisure Shop is powering the Crespo and Bo-Camp stand…
Matt Sims
We’re powering it!
Keith Gooden
4180.
Matt Sims
Yes, Hall Four. Crespo and Bo-Camp are there, and our team at That Leisure Shop are running the stand. So we love Crespo furniture and we love Bo-Camp accessories. They genuinely are beautiful. They’re like nothing else in the market.
And we’ve got hundreds of them on display for you to purchase, and we’ve got stock. Stock has arrived in the UK. So you can order it at the show for instant delivery after the show. And they are beautiful things.
So if you’re looking to up the game with your camping furniture, something that’s really light and folds flat and raises the game of your outdoor furniture and your accessories… I can’t get this out at all!
Keith Gooden
When people gaze across at you when you’re parked up and they see you there with your Crespo and Bo-Camp furniture, they’re going to be looking over and they’re going to be thinking, “I wonder if they get the fruit bowl out and we put the car keys in later.”
Matt Sims
It’s not that kind of stuff, but it is beautiful! It would be a beautiful fruit bowl, that is true. So go and check out stand 4180, Crespo and Bo-Camp. We’re also running the Maypole stand, so if you need wheel clamp security, towing accessories or a cover for your motorhome, campervan or caravan, then the team from That Leisure Shop are also on the Maypole standard.
We’ve got John and Tash working with us there on the Maypole stand from Life Beyond Bricks. So go and say hi to them. We’ll be at the show all week, and I’ll be popping on and off the stands as well. So yes, it’s going to be a busy week!
Matt’s product of the week
Keith Gooden
That Leisure Shop’s product of the week – do you know what I want? I want the lightest welly boot I’ve ever come across. Can you help me out there?
Matt Sims
Look at this.
Keith Gooden
And it’s pink.
Matt Sims
What a beautiful colour! Have you felt the weight of these? These are LBC welly boots – the lightest boot you’ll ever wear. And you know what? That’s true. They are stunning. They come with a removable sock. These are machine washable.
So you put the sock on – this is the idea, Keith. You put the sock on and then slip your foot just gently into the boot. And the idea is, because the sock is so thick, you upsize. So if you’re size… what size are you?
Keith Gooden
Nine and a half.
Matt Sims
Nine and a half, okay. So you go for a 10 and a half, or 10 or 11. And you go a size up to accommodate the sock. They are incredibly strong. I can’t rip them. And they’re very, very light. We love them. Maddie loves the little lip on the back so you can kick your boots off. We’ve all got them and they are really cool. These are ankle boots. Look at this pair here.
Keith Gooden
Lovely.
Matt Sims
These are the men’s boots. They come with a removable sock as well, and they’re superb. I’ve got a pair of these. In fact, Kevin who imports these into the UK – they’re made in Poland – he actually climbed Snowden in a pair of these.
Keith Gooden
Nothing else, just a pair of these.
Matt Sims
I’ve got a little bit sick in my mouth.
Keith Gooden
So £39.99 for the small and £59.99 for the big.
Matt Sims
The lightest boot you’ll ever wear. I love them. LBC – go and check them out at www.thatleisureshop.com.
What is reverse polarity?
Keith Gooden
It’s the Motorhome Matt podcast with me, Keith Gooden.
Matt Sims
And with me, Motorhome Matt.
Keith Gooden
It’s brought to you by www.thatleisureshop.com. The main part of our podcast today is the exciting subject of, “What is reverse polarity, and what do I need to do?” It’s about electricity, isn’t it, Matt?
Matt Sims
It is, yes. We get loads of questions about this. It is important.
Keith Gooden
It is important, because it keeps you safe. Now, the thing is we use alternating current, don’t we? So it doesn’t really matter which way the wires go round, ultimately, but it does, if you see what I mean. But why does it matter, reverse polarity and motorhomes?
Matt Sims
So it matters because our motorhomes generally have a single pole trip, which means – you know that little electrical trip that goes off when something shorts out and you turn it on, you push it up, and then all the electrics work in your ring main? That only detects a short on the live side.
So we’ve got live and neutral. In a reverse polarity situation, the live is coming down the neutral. If there’s a problem, it won’t trip off. So the trip is only detecting a fault on the live side. So if something went faulty, say a kettle shorted out or some metal object in the motorhome shorted out and had a problem, the trip wouldn’t go off because the trip isn’t detecting a fault on the neutral side.
Keith Gooden
Two wires, and you cross them accidentally. And most of it is done accidentally – human error – and your safety features are on the live side. So if they cross over, it won’t detect it and it won’t be safe.
Matt Sims
And the issue is on the continent, in France, in the sockets there, the wires are both black. Here, they’re generally brown and blue so we can determine the live and neutral. Often on the continent, they’re the same colour.
So electricians wiring up a campsite don’t care about live and neutral. They just have two wires, and they just wire them in. And that’s how you can easily get reverse polarity, because the live and neutral are potentially around the wrong way.
Keith Gooden
Blue and brown. Bl, left. Br, right.
Matt Sims
Very good.
How do you fix reverse polarity?
Keith Gooden
There you go. Okay, so how are we going to solve this? So we’ve rolled up, we’re in a motorhome or we’re in a caravan. We’re on the continent. We’re going to plug in. And we want to test that the electricity is the correct polarity, which as we’ve explained is important for safety reasons. How do we do it?
Matt Sims
Really easily. So it’s on probably about one in 10 campsites that you might find this, particularly in rural France. Most of them are wired up correctly, it has to be said. But occasionally it happens. The important thing is to know. It could happen anywhere. It could happen in the UK, if a socket’s been wired up incorrectly.
I’ve got one of these little socket testers. You can buy them. We sell them at www.thatleisureshop.com. You can buy them in B&Q. They’re typically £10 to £15, something like that. And you plug this in the socket, and this one says three lights is correct.
So it gives you different light configurations for different scenarios, and I’ll read them all out. So no earth is two lights, a neutral fault is a different two lights, live and earth are reversed and live and neutral, which is what we’re talking about today, are reversed. So if you’ve got reverse polarity, you end up with one little light on the left. And I’m going to illustrate this for you in a second. The question is, how do you fix it?
Keith Gooden
Well, that’s the thing. I’ve pulled up, I’ve plugged it in. “Ah, my polarity is reversed!” What am I going to do? I’m going to have to drive off to find another campsite, aren’t I?
Matt Sims
So I’ve got a few adapters here, which I’m going to show you.
Keith Gooden
Just a couple!
Matt Sims
Just a couple, right! So we’re talking about hookup cable into a motorhome. This is a two pin plug, okay?
Keith Gooden
Like they use on the continent.
Matt Sims
Yes, to a three pin socket. So it’s worth taking one of these with you when you want to go onto the content, because some campsites are still using this little two pin socket called a Schuko plug rather than the blue socket that you typically see on a UK campsite. So we’ve got this here in order for me to illustrate this.
Keith Gooden
This has got a UK three pin plug on it for demonstration purpose.
Matt Sims
For demonstration purposes only.
Keith Gooden
Okay, you’ve plugged it in.
Matt Sims
I’ve plugged it in. And then what I’m going to do is I’m going to plug my other adapter in, which is a 16 amp, blue three pin plug to a three pin UK socket. And I’m actually going to test for reverse polarity. And look, we’ve got three lights.
Keith Gooden
Which means everything’s right.
Matt Sims
Everything is correct. Everything’s normal. Now, my advice is, when you get to a campsite, you take this blue plug with your 13 amp three pin socket. Plug this straight into the campsite, before you’ve even attached the motorhome.
Plug that straight in and test the polarity and test the earth of the campsite socket before you do anything else. Okay? Check you’re happy with that. And then plug your hookup lead, so your long orange cable, typically, into the socket, and then you can plug that other end into your motorhome as you would normally.
And then what you can do is take your tester inside the motorhome and go and test all the sockets. Test them all. Just check none of the sockets have got reverse polarity or an earth has come off. It’s possible that an earth could come off the back of the socket.
So test the socket in the lounge, the kitchen, the bedroom – wherever you’ve got a socket in the van. Go and plug this in. And then we would actually leave this socket tester plugged in throughout our trip and so we can keep an eye on the electrics in the van just in case anything does go wrong whilst we’re away.
Keith Gooden
Now, the important thing is to do it in this order that you’ve described because first of all you’re testing the electricity supply on the campsite before it goes into the motorhome. And then when you’re hooked up, you go into the motorhome and you test inside the motorhome because you don’t know. As Matt says, something in the motorhome could be wired incorrectly.
Matt Sims
I’ve seen it many times where a motorhome has arrived from the factory and the live and neutral are around the wrong way or the earth isn’t connected. The earth is missing. It’s either not there at all or it just hasn’t been wired onto the back of the socket. And you have to take the socket out and wire it up.
The other thing I would say as well is always plug motorhome in first and then go and plug into the campsite socket so you’re not carrying a live cable around. You never know – you don’t want to be dragging the socket through a puddle. It could short out. Just to be safe.
Keith Gooden
Even if you are wearing the lightest welly boots in the world.
Matt Sims
Even if you are, yes!
What products do you need for reverse polarity?
Keith Gooden
How much with all these little bits of cables that you’ve got here cost? Because this seems like a good set you could carry around in a sack.
Matt Sims
Absolutely. Like Father Christmas with his sack. So probably… I don’t know, tens of pounds. Hook up cables, £20. These little adapter cables are a fiver.
Keith Gooden
So do you make these up yourself? Or do you buy them?
Matt Sims
You can buy them. We sell them at www.thatleisureshop.com. You can make them yourself if you’re competent to make them.
Keith Gooden
A fiver? Really that cheap?
Matt Sims
Yes, for an adapter cable like that. Maybe £10 in some shops. And then what I’ve done is I’ve made this cable. So this is a very short looking hookup cable. It is a few inches long. It’s a male plug and a female socket.
But what I’ve done here is I’ve swapped the live and neutral in one of them. It doesn’t matter which one. People often say, “Should you put it on the plug or the socket?” The socket is probably the best idea. And I’ve labelled the plug as live and neutral reversed.
It’s a rather unique looking cable, because as I say, it’s an incredibly short hookup cable, and it’s swapping my polarity. So let’s say for example in my scenario earlier, the polarity was reversed. Then this is going to reverse it. Now, in this scenario sitting here, the polarity isn’t reversed. So we are now going to swap the polarity around. And look – lo and behold…
Keith Gooden
The polarity is reversed.
Matt Sims
We’ve got one light. So that’s what would happen in the event that you are experiencing reverse polarity. And then you would go and connect your polarity swapper, if I can call it that, or your polarity reverser adapter in line.
And people say, “Do I connect it at the campsite end or the motorhome end?” I would connect it to the campsite end so you get the polarity the right way round as early in the chain as possible. But you know, frankly, it doesn’t really matter. But probably best practice is to swap it at the campsite post at the socket.
Keith Gooden
And remember, you’re just swapping around the cables. You’re bringing the polarity into line. There’s nothing massively technical about it. And that’s why you just need this little adapter.
Matt Sims
What I definitely wouldn’t do is have a long hookup cable that has a reverse polarity plug or socket on it. Make sure it’s an adapter that you use so that it could never be confused as your regular hookup cable.
Keith Gooden
Yes, yours is plainly marked.
Matt Sims
It’s only a few inches long. You can make one of these yourself if you’re competent to do so. It’s literally swapping the blue and brown wires around the wrong way.
Keith Gooden
But can you buy them off the peg?
Matt Sims
That’s a good question. I’ve never seen them for sale.
Keith Gooden
Because it seems like a good thing to sell.
Matt Sims
Yes. I have seen them on sale online. I have got a query, and maybe if you’re an electrician listening, are these UK compliant? Are these regulatory compliant? I don’t know the answer to that. We don’t sell them in the shop. We sell the components so you can make one or get one made.
I have seen a company selling them online. But you can buy the plug and the socket for a few pounds. It’s a short length of flex. Get somebody competent to make it up for you. Or if you came into the shop, we can make one up for you.
Keith Gooden
It just seems strange that on the motorhomes themselves, there’s not a little switch that you can just flick to reverse the polarity.
Matt Sims
That’s a very good point. So if you’ve got a British motorhome, and it’s got Sargent electrics in it, then there’s a red light that comes on when you’ve got reverse polarity and it automatically swaps it for you. But not every motorhome has got that.
Keith Gooden
Right. Okay. I know electricity makes you sort of go, “Oh…” if you’ve got no interest in it, but it’s really very simple. You get to the campsite. It could be wired the wrong way round. That means that the safety features on your motorhome or your caravan wouldn’t activate if there was an electrical problem. So you want to reverse it so it’s the right way around. Those little do-berries here, the little plug socket…
Matt Sims
Do-berries?!
Keith Gooden
… with the lights that tell you what condition the electricity is in and then your little pack of adapters make sure everything is the right way round. Test the electricity from the campsite first and then once you’re confident that the polarity is correct coming into the motorhome, test the inside of the motorhome. Have I got that right?
Matt Sims
You’ve got that right, yes. Leaving the little tester plugged in throughout your trip is really good practice. It keeps an eye on the sockets.
Keith Gooden
Fantastic. So there you go. I hope that has been a help to you. Remember, those safety features are important so it does matter. Anything else you’d like to add about reverse polarity?
Matt Sims
Only wire one of these up if you’re confident to do so and competent to do so. If you’re not sure, get somebody to do it for you.
Keith Gooden
AC/DC – that’s a different thing entirely, isn’t it?
Matt Sims
Yes, that’s a band from your era.
Keith Gooden
Ah…
Audience Q&A
Keith Gooden
It’s the Motorhome Matt podcast. I’m Keith Gooden.
Matt Sims
And I’m Motorhome Matt.
Keith Gooden
It’s brought to you by www.thatleisureshop.com. It’s time for the Q&A where you ask the questions and Motorhome Matt, the expert, he answers them. And if he doesn’t know, he’ll ask somebody else who does know! First of all, Ian Lynch is in West Sussex.
What’s the best motorhome satnav?
Ian Lynch
Hi, guys. I’ve just started listening to your podcast. I’m really enjoying it. I’m in the market for a new motorhome sat nav, but there are loads out there. What are your recommendations? Many thanks!
Keith Gooden
Cheers, Ian. Satnavs – we’ve spoken about this before, Matt. And motorhomes, caravans, you’re towing something – they’re quite big vehicles, aren’t they? And so a normal satnav might send you down a single track road, and you find yourself getting stuck. So what are your satnav recommendations here for Ian?
Matt Sims
Well, we use the Avtex satnav unit, which is powered by Garmin. The great feature of that is you can put the dimensions of the motorhome in it so it will keep you off those roads with grass up the middle and avoid low bridges. The really handy feature is the ability to put the size of your vehicle in. The other app we use on our phone is CoPilot. Really useful.
They do chew the battery up on your phone, that is the only thing, any app that’s a satnav. Waze is another great satnav app, but you can’t put the dimensions your vehicle in that. You do need to keep your phone plugged in in the car or the motorhome if you’re using them. But our go-to satnav unit, we’ve had it for years, is the Avtex Garmin unit.
Keith Gooden
And what sort of prices should he be looking at?
Matt Sims
£300 to £400, typically. They’re small portable units, which keep them entirely separate from the phone. And so you can’t be accused of being on the phone if you’re adjusting or anything like that, which is really important these days.
Keith Gooden
But £300 or £400 compared to the app, which is free on your phone, seems like quite a steep price to pay.
Matt Sims
True. CoPilot has a subscription so it’s ad free, and you can download the data as well. I think it’s £20-odd a year, from memory. It’s a while since I paid it, actually. Yes, it’s a piece of hardware that comes with a warranty. Avtex units are great. You can move it from car to motorhome to wherever you’re driving, and you can adjust the sizes of the vehicle you’re driving as well.
Keith Gooden
Fantastic.
Do other motorhomes have build quality that compared to Adria and Hymer?
Keith Gooden
Jason’s in Swansea. “Hi, Matt really like the podcast. I’m in the market for a new – nearly new – motorhome. I’d like an Adria or Hymer, but they do not have the layout I’m looking for.” He wants a rear lounge.
“I seem to have narrowed it down to a Roller Team T Line 700, or maybe some Swifts or Auto-Trails. My only concern is the build quality compared to Adria and Hymer. What’s your view on this? Thanks in advance.” And by the way, he said, “PS – if and when I do get a motorhome, I will be sure to get any extras etc. from you!”
Matt Sims
We appreciate that! We look forward to seeing you. You’re only in Swansea, so just across the water. You make a valid comment about build quality. The quality and the price point as well does vary from manufacturer to manufacturer. Did you say he’s looking for a rear lounge layout?
Keith Gooden
Yes.
Matt Sims
So you’re going to find that harder to find in a European-built motorhome. It’s traditionally always been a very British layout, because we go away in our motorhome and we love to spend the day sitting in it because it’s raining. Whereas on the continent they generally are outside. So historically, it was a very, very British layout.
Adria did introduce a rear lounge layout some years ago, and Hymer do it as well, of course. In fact, we’re increasingly seeing this layout in motorhomes because it is a really lovely layout. The compromise, of course, with a rear lounge is a lack of storage. So you don’t get always a big garage area underneath what would be a fixed rear bed.
Build quality – it depends what you’re spending. Read reviews. It depends as well on the age of the vehicle. My experience is European motorhomes are often better built. They’re built for winter use. They’re better insulated. We use a range of motorhomes on our motorhome hire fleet and we’ve run Adria, Roller Team, a lot of European-built motorhomes. Dethleffs is another make as well. Hobby.
And they stand up really, really well to a higher level of use than perhaps a privately owned motorhome would. But I would definitely look at the finish as well. My experience of European motorhomes is that they tend to be slightly more cutting edge, dare I say that, although increasingly British-built motorhomes are adopting some really nice styles.
Bailey for example have really upped their game. I think they’ve sacked off Doreen in accounts who used to design all the interiors, and they’ve got a really young dynamic design team who we’ve interviewed in the past. And their interiors are really cracking. So I would definitely read reviews.
And when you’re going in them all – that’s a top piece of advice, go in them! Open and close the cupboard doors. Open and close the bathroom door. Sit in the seats and move the cushions around. How does it feel? Trust your gut. And the more you look at, the more you’ll be able to tell the build quality. Lift the cushions and look at how thick the wood is under the seat. And you’ll soon get a grasp of what level of quality has gone into the build.
Do I need a Crit’Air sticker for each country I visit?
Keith Gooden
Richard Ayers is in West Sussex. “Hi, Matt. I plan to travel through multiple European countries and may go into environmental zones.” Low emission zones, as we like to call them in this country.
“Do I need the equivalent of the French Crit’Air sticker for each country I visit? Or will the one Crit’Air sticker be accepted in other European countries? I may visit France, Belgium, Netherlands, Germany, Sweden, Finland and Norway on my next trip, but may go to Spain later in the year.” He says, “Thank you very much, Matt.”
Matt Sims
Sounds like a good trip. Can I come? That’ll be good. Get some photos and share them. So the Crit’Air is unique to France. In fact, it’s unique to each city in France. This was your expense recently when you went to Rouen.
Keith Gooden
I went to Rouen and got a Crit’Air for a Rouen. And I was fine. But I couldn’t have taken that Crit’Air and gone to Paris, for instance. I would have needed a Parisian one.
Matt Sims
So if you’re going from France to Belgium, you will need to get the Belgique low emission zone sticker. There’s a really useful website actually where you can research each European city. And the criteria for that city is on the website. It is www.urbanaccessregulations.eu.
Just search the city and it will tell you what you need to go into that city. Some are simpler than others. France is a little bit more complicated. Another thing to be mindful of as well is these stickers are a few pounds. How much was your Crit’Air? €4?
Keith Gooden
€4 or €5. And by the way, don’t go through a third party website. They charge you an extra tenner. Go direct.
Matt Sims
Exactly. That’s what I was going to say. An extra tenner? I’ve seen websites charging €100!
Keith Gooden
Really?!
Matt Sims
Yeah, £200. They’re a scam. They will get you the sticker. You don’t need to spend that much at all. Literally go to the correct website. A website like www.urbanaccessregulations.eu is a great place to start. It will send you to the right website. And then you know you’re only spending what you need to and not being scammed.
Keith Gooden
When I applied for the one for Rouen and paid my €4 or €4.50, whatever it was, I can’t remember now, I got an email straight back, which said if you’re stopped by a gendarme or an officer, print this out and show them. And it said, “I’ve applied for a Crit’Air. It didn’t arrive in time before I left. But here’s my application code number.” In the end it did arrive, but good belt and braces, that one.
Matt Sims
Absolutely. Yes, very good. And we are seeing more and more of these low emission zones or clean air zones being rolled out across Europe and of course here in the UK. So you need to keep abreast of this. And as we’ve said before, things are changing every month. So before any trip, go and do your research on your planned destination and check that you’re complying with all the local regulations.
Keith Gooden
And remember, it’s not just countries, it’s cities within countries. They all have different rules. I had the Rouen Crit’Air, and like I said, I couldn’t have driven into Paris. I would have needed a separate one.
And so when you’re actually crossing borders into different countries… this whole thing around Brexit, they were saying, “We don’t want a European superstate.” It’s not a European superstate!
And something like the Crit’Air underlines this, because if you’re visiting a lot of countries, first of all you’ve got to research which have got low emission zones, and then you’ve got to apply for them individually in some cases. But you never know, in some countries, you might just need one. It is at the moment a developing picture, and it’s a nightmare.
Matt Sims
It is. And when applying for them, you need to have your V5 to hand. So part of the process is to put your VIN number in. The classification of the vehicle – whether it’s M1, all this information hopefully is on your V5.
And if you’re not sure then get on to a chat group. Facebook has loads of them, and other people will have the same vehicle as you and they can help you and tell you what category your vehicle is if theirs is the same as yours. There aren’t that many variations on this. So you’ll need your V5, which is the blue and red document, the registration document to hand when you apply for it.
Keith Gooden
And take your V5 with you when you go.
Matt Sims
There’s a whole tonne on that. Go to www.thatleisureshop.com/europe and you’ll get a whole checklist of what you need to take with you.
Keith Gooden
So the website for this is www.urbanaccessregulations.eu.
Matt Sims
Just type in www.urbanaccessregulations.eu.
Keith Gooden
There you go. Not complicated at all.
Ask Matt your questions
Keith Gooden
If people want to ask you a question, Matt, and get it on the podcast, what do they do?
Matt Sims
It’s easy. And we would love it if you did, because I’m sure if you did, there are hundreds of other people wishing they’d asked it as well. It is mhmp.info/askmatt.
Keith Gooden
And you can leave us a review at mhmp.info/review.
Matt Sims
And if you’re watching on YouTube, please hit the subscribe bell and the button. And then the gods of YouTube can tell you when we release new content. And YouTube is sponsored by www.arobasecreative.co.uk.
