USB Charging Ports not charging

[Ted S.]

I just replaced my ports with Blue Sea units and they work great. Got them on Amazon.

If you read carefully, they manufacture to a non-spec which seems to make a difference.

[Wayne&Sam]

I find those adapters all die pretty quickly. I just put in cigarette lighter sockets and plug an adapter into that. I keep spares on hand and can just pop a new one in when needed.

[Adventure.AS]

It is important to connect the + and - leads correctly on the USB port otherwise it won't work.

[chaseav]

Originally Posted by WkendWarrior

The port itself. No idea of make or model.

It’s pronounced Chy-nuh.

[DRPREECE]

Originally Posted by Adventure.AS

It is important to connect the + and - leads correctly on the USB port otherwise it won't work.

As Adventure AS points out, polarity may be important.

Notice on the original port one tab is copper, the other silver. That typically indicates polarity. Positive goes to the copper tab.

If you reversed the polarity during reassembly the port most likely wouldn’t function.

The new port has two silver tabs which typically indicates polarity is not important and it will work even if the inputs are reversed. (Or they rely on some marking on the device to indicate polarity).

Did you check the polarity of your connections on the original?

[switz]

The OEM units can, in theory, provide 5V at 1.0 amp. Many of the newer devices (like an iPad) want 2.0 or even 2.1 amps to charge and can possibly overload these lowest possible cost units that Airstream installs.

[WkendWarrior]

This thread lives! Good call on the polarity, its possible that was the issue on my original port - didn’t realize that at the time (this was about 2 years ago). I probably reversed the connectors to check, but honestly don’t remember. Actually thinking about it more, I don’t think i disconnected the USB port as part of the original work. So the wires shouldn’t have been reversed...

Anyway, as it turns out, one of the 2 USB ports in the bed area went out recently, and last week I replaced both ports with the Blue Sea units I mentioned earlier in the thread. First one i reversed the polarity and as you point out, it didn’t work. Good news is the Blue Sea units have that little green light to show you right away that you’ve made a mistake. ;-)

My conclusion - the OEM USB ports were, uh, not the highest quality...

[chaseav]

I just swapped out my factory USB port (which had power but would not actually charge) with a new Blue Sea Systems unit. Total install time was 5 mins, the last two mins of which were spent figuring out if "that was it...?" Downside though, it has a little green light on it to let you know it's on. That's going to have a power drain (?) and may be annoying at night.

Thank you to whomever it was that suggested replacing with this unit and suggesting how simple it was.

[StrmyWeather]

Interesting thread. Thanks for the thorough detail.

[TinVenture]

Thanks for the detailed description. One of my USB ports have been working intermittently. I’ll have to take a multimeter to it and maybe time to order a Blue Sea as well.