With freezing rain forecast for central NC, time for a generator test

[DieselAddict]

Tonight in central NC we have the potential for a bit of freezing rain. That can be a really bad time here if we get trees down on power lines this far out into the woods. Figured it was time to give the MEP803 a bit of a workout. Warmed it up and increased the load till we got it a bit over 100% then kept it between 80% and 90% for a while. It smoked a bit while it burned off the junk in the exhaust. I've been using it on some new property because it will start the air compressor while the 831 can't. It was a little bit wetstacked from it.

BUT.. After giving it a good workout for an hour or so its cleared up nicely and looks to be mission ready for whatever happens here tonight.

Got to give a big thumbs up to Kurt and his controller. Makes keeping and eye on the thing inside the house a SNAP!

 

[DieselAddict]

Wanted to give a bit more info about my generator test. I've been using the generator lightly loaded on a new piece of property I bought earlier in the year. I've not been able to put much more than a 10% load on it for the last 30 hours of run time. Yesterday I brought it home and gave it a good load test. In the relatively short time it ran lightly loaded I did have some gunk build up in the exhaust. Once I had warmed it up and started loading it there was a good bit of smoke coming out of the exhaust for about an hour of hard running. Typical of wetstacking.

It wasn't bad enough to be a problem with performance, the unit was able to hold a full load plus a bit without staling. Also want to be clear that this isn't a complaint.

I know there are lots of thoughts and opinions about wetstacking. I can report from personal experience that on this particular 803 it doesn't take many hours of running with no real load for there to be a noticeable effect. The 30 or so hours on this one was enough.

If I had setup a load bank and was able to run it harder for longer it would have taken less time to clear up. I was running the house off grid while using the oven and dryer which varied the load between 40% and 80% most of the time but kicked it over 100% when the heatpump cycled on.

My advice - run them as hard as you can. If you can't run them hard under normal use (under 50% load) be sure to set aside a couple hours of hard running on a load bank at +80% load every 30-50 hours of run time.

 

[nextalcupfan]

I load bank my 803a every 3 months or so.
Equally to remove any wet stacking and give the components a good workout.

 

[Zed254]

I observed evidence of wet stacking my 802 in 65 hours of run time at around 20% load with my camper. I'm delivering 52 amps -- 120 volts single phase -- to a small camper. After 65 hours I noticed a wet fuel stain on the top of the unit next to exhaust stack. My solution....and it works well.....was to add 2 electric space heaters of 12.5 amps/each that heat up the night. This loaded the diesel engine up to 60-70%.

 

[Light in the Dark]

Have fun in the storm everyone. Looking somewhere 10-18" up here.

 

[DieselAddict]

I'm OK with snow but the ice we get here sucks. Thankfully the storm spared us this time and it came down as all rain. Still a chance for something tonight but lower probabilities.