Generator exercise??

[Beschneid]

I recently purchased an MEP802a, thank you “Light in the Dark”. Great machine, low hours . In the process of building a shelter for it, added extra screening for rodent protection, battery maintainer 5/2 NOCO. I plan of exercising the machine once per week. I am familiar with the Kohler and generac sets that run on a schedule once per week for 20 minutes. What are recommendations for the 802 for exercising? If so WITH or WITHOUT load?

It has been great getting to know some of you,. Realized that Kurt lives just down the street and stopped by when I had questions the first day I had it. Guy and I affiliated through the units we were in while serving in Germany.

I apologize if this has been addressed in the past. I tried to search the forum for the topic but could not find anything

Thanks

Bruce

 

[DieselAddict]

You will want to load it as part of your exercise routine. Doing a cold start and then not loading it will lead to a bunch of junk building up in the exhaust called wet stacking.

You are better off in my opinion testing it less frequently but with a decent load on it. I run my primary unit every couple of months for a half hour with at least 15 minutes of it above 80% load.

 

[Digger556]

I'll 2nd DieselAddict's comments. Once per week is more than you need to exercise it.

I typically run mine once per month. Let it warm up for 5 minutes, then apply a load for 30 minutes to an hour. I start the load and 50% and work up to 80%, with intermittent pulls to 100% to test function. Don't forget to let the exhaust cool by running the engine at no load for a few minutes before shutdown.

 

[Light in the Dark]

Glad you are happy with it Bruce! Once a month, with a good load for 30 min to an hour (min 50%, as close to capacity as you can manage even better), should be sufficient. There is no right answer, but do keep the fuel in the machine fully picked with antigel, biocide, and your favorite lubricity agents. The running also keeps the fuel circulating, which helps redistribute all those additives in the system. ULSD is terrible when sitting in an idle machine.

 

[shazam]

I normally run the MEP803 once a month for an hour. Am I wasting fuel?....is 30 minutes a month long enough? The remote start switch handles start-up and shut-down from the panel in the basement. I run the house, which is minimal, and 4 x 1500 watt milk house heaters to provide load. Sufficient?

As an aside, we have a heat pump for the house, but it has back-up heat coils of 15KW. This is what the panel looked like when I inadvertently kicked them on while running the gennie. The MEP803 is a beast!

Jim

 

[Farmitall]

I run my MEP803a once a month for half an hour to an hour with 75-80% load on it, (two dryer elements, that draw 43 amps) then cool unloaded for a couple of minutes then top off the fuel.

I think once a week would be excessive.

 

[Guyfang]

Once a month is good. The important thing is getting it up in a higher load range, to help allow it to get to running temp, and 3/4-1 hour is good. But get the load up. 75-90% is great. Someplace in that range.

 

[chucky]

Just something to put in the back of your minds if your gen doesnt put out any current one day after its been sitting or what have you .An old electrician buddy of mine has gotten so many good deals buying gensets that dont put out he will plug a electric drill into a 110 socket on the generator and stick a bolt shaft with no head on it into the chuck and take another drill (battery operated and spin the other drill motor and excite/wake up the generator goes to putting out power ez peeze ! iVE SEEN HIM DO IT A NUMBER OF TIMES !

 

[Guyfang]

On some sets this works. But not the TQG's. Probably @kloppk can explain it.

 

[kloppk]

Just something to put in the back of your minds if your gen doesnt put out any current one day after its been sitting or what have you .An old electrician buddy of mine has gotten so many good deals buying gensets that dont put out he will plug a electric drill into a 110 socket on the generator and stick a bolt shaft with no head on it into the chuck and take another drill (battery operated and spin the other drill motor and excite/wake up the generator goes to putting out power ez peeze ! iVE SEEN HIM DO IT A NUMBER OF TIMES !

That method is for cheapo gensets (portable big box generators such as like Generac, Coleman, TroyBilt, Homelite, etc) that have lost their residual magnetism in the rotor. They have no means of building up the residual magnetism to get the AC generation working enough for their voltage regulators to work and bring up the AC output.
Some of the cheapo generators have a small magnet imbedded in the rotor to get them to work regardless of how long they have sat unused. Not many do from my experience.
I've used that trick several times to bring cheapo generators back from the dead. Sometimes a small battery is connected to the cheapo genset outlet for a brief moment can be used. Depends on the generator which method gets used.

Do not do this to a MEP (TQG) genset.
MEP's have a "flashing " circuit in them to kick start the AC power generation process.
The "flashing" function in a MEP momentarily provides DC power to the static exciter which in turn starts the AC power generation. Once the start switch is released to RUN the MEP's AC voltage Regulator then quickly takes over providing power to the static exciter to continue the power generation process.
This does not apply to the MEP-831A. It's PMA has permanent magnets in it, so it does not need "flashing".

 

[Beschneid]

Thanks for all the feedback. Setting a date on my calendar for monthly unless I need to run it in the mean time for it's intended purpose.