Small diesel generators

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Weedhopper

Weedhopper

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I am in the market for a small diesel generator for the house. I have a good gas generator that I use for work and the infrequent power outages at home.

My concern is a long term outage, like a week or two, or more. Sooner or later we in the Northeast will get tough weather like other parts of the country, and there are global threats/reasons too.

I usually have 500 to 750 gallons of heating oil on hand, so diesel is the obvious fuel of choice.

I see a lot of China made generators that are copies of Yanmar. My choice is either to dig deep and get a Yanmar, or save 75% and get a China knockoff. This generator would probably never be used unless there was a prolonged outage so I am wondering if I could trust the cheap one to get us thru a long term outage.

Any experiences with The Yanmar copies??
 
I would look for a Kubota diesel Generator.


The Yanmar Diesel Generators are good. Check you local marine dealer and see if they have any they took off of Yatchs. The Boat Diesel Generators are small and very compact, uber quite, fuel efficient, etc.
 
Thinking about building one too. They scream at 3600 RPM and thats a lot of wear. If I can get one to purr along at around 2500 RPM that would be nice.
 
The marine ones? They should have Demand Governors on them. They pretty much idle unless a load is put on them and then they rev up to meet the demand.

You could try to find a Honda Diesel generator as well. Many were sold as welder/generators.
 
I will look around. I guess a motorhome generator would work too. I don't need a huge amount of power, I just need it.

We have a very dry finished basement... and a very active sump pump. If The power is out for more than four hours, we swim... ask me how I know. :bang:
 
We just had our new Fire Engine delivered, it has a 3.2kw Onan diesel RV generator, it is very quiet and comes in a nice small weatherproof package. It is plumbed in to the Engines diesel tank with a lift pump. Don't know cost.
rvqd3200lg.jpg
 
I could drive to Central in Bangor, will look into that.

Where in Columbus are you ? I have to be back there again in a couple of weeks. Worthington, Dublin, Marysville. Family business stuff.
 
I have a 30kW Generator over in the for sale section. It runs on gasoline or propane. It will power the entire neighborhood at idle. That is the reason I have not connected it to my place.

The main power line from the substation 5 miles from my house is 65Kw (kV?) and it supplies a few hundred homes.
 
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Yeah, but that's not enough to power my wife's hairdryer. Just say'n
 
D'Animal said:
I have a 30kW Generator over in the for sale section. It runs on gasoline or propane. It will power the entire neighborhood at idle. That is the reason I have not connected it to my place.

The main power line from the substation 5 miles from my house is 65Kw (kV?) and it supplies a few hundred homes.
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A 30kw generator only supplies about 140amps of 220v 1ph at full load. that could only power the average 3000 sqft house at full load.

If you know how to weld, you might want to look into a diesel welder/ generator (like a Lincoln Vantage) and get a multi-use item with better resale.
 
sixty said:
A 30kw generator only supplies about 140amps of 220v 1ph at full load. that could only power the average 3000 sqft house at full load.
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This is the specs at about 1/3 idle. You are right about the Amps.

Onan 30.0 EK-15R 18F

Continuos Standby Rating

3 Phase KW 30 KVA 37.5

1 Phase KW 20 KVA 25

Volts 120/208 Amps 104 @ 1800 rpm
Volts 127/220 Amps 98.5 @ 1800 rpm
Volts 139/240 Amps 90 @ 1800 rpm
Volts 254/440 Amps 49 @ 1800 rpm
Volts 277/480 Amps 45 @ 1800 rpm


I have a 400 amp service on my house, 200 of it goes to the garage. If I ran everything full load at once, I would blow transformers off the poles.

I already snap the circuit breaker when the air compressor kicks on while I'm Plama cutting. It is not the circuit breaker, it is the feed to the house.
 
Weedhopper said:
I could drive to Central in Bangor, will look into that.

Where in Columbus are you ? I have to be back there again in a couple of weeks. Worthington, Dublin, Marysville. Family business stuff.
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I did purchase a generator from that place and highly recommend them. The support is excellent.

I actually live in Lewis Center (the Polaris area), which is the very south side of Delaware. It is few miles N of Worthington and a few miles east of Dublin.
 
D'Animal said:
I have a 400 amp service on my house, 200 of it goes to the garage. If I ran everything full load at once, I would blow transformers off the poles.

I already snap the circuit breaker when the air compressor kicks on while I'm Plama cutting. It is not the circuit breaker, it is the feed to the house.
Click to expand...

I know what you mean, My tig welder running at 350 amps unbalanced pulls more than my 125a service. Between my 10hp compressor and different welders I could trip a 400a main pretty easily. I would love to have 200 amps just for my garage.

You must have a large compressor!
 
Curious is your house 3-phase to use your plasma? Mike
 
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