Generator conundrum

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goeasy123

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I have a Pugura 4000 genny on board with a single cylinder Farymann engine. The manual recommends running it on 50% to 60% load to avoid glazing the cylinder bore.

Problem is.... it takes about 2 hours running every day to charge the batteries from around 55% to 70%. The loads I have available are a water maker and a water heater. After a few days at anchor I run out of load capacity to maintain a decent level of charge in the batteries while running the genny at the required 50% to 60% load. I could off course dump hot water overboard to gain capacity....not a very economic idea! (I hope this discription makes sense)

Any clever ideas?
 
goeasy123 said:
I have a Pugura 4000 genny on board with a single cylinder Farymann engine. The manual recommends running it on 50% to 60% load to avoid glazing the cylinder bore.

Problem is.... it takes about 2 hours running every day to charge the batteries from around 55% to 70%. The loads I have available are a water maker and a water heater. After a few days at anchor I run out of load capacity to maintain a decent level of charge in the batteries while running the genny at the required 50% to 60% load. I could off course dump hot water overboard to gain capacity....not a very economic idea! (I hope this discription makes sense)

Any clever ideas?
Click to expand...
I can't find any info on this gen. My question: are you charging from the dedicated 12V output commonly provided in most portable generators?
 
What's the rated Kilowatt output for this Genny, A plate on the Generator Alternator should state the output Kw the Max output current for the Genny at 230 V and maybe 12 V also.
What Ampere Hours are in your 12 or 24 V Battery bank ? I presume you are charging this through a battery charger powered by 230V from The Genny? This should be a significant load and current while charging . Are you counting this? What current do you see on the output of the charger when running the genny?

You could increase the charging load on the Genny by adding batterys to the domestic bank and you wouldnt have to runt it so often.

Have you solar or wind power topping up the Battery Bank? Is so you could turn this off and add load on the generator. But if this is the case, as you are only running the Genny for a couple of hours it would make more sense to add more Solar or wind and forget the genny , Sell it and buy a solar panel!

Kinsale 373
 
I had a Fischer Panda based on the same (or similar) Farymann engine, I got rid of it, it caused too many problems, but that's another story.
I currently have a Fischer Panda generator based on the Kubota engine, which seems much more reliable., but has the same problem when charging just the lead acid batteries.
I'm assuming that the generator, which I'm not familiar with, produces AC.
You could run an electric heater or fans or a dehumidifier on the AC side depending on where you are in the world, that would load the generator and could make life more comfortable.
I often run a 1kW fan heater in the morning to load the generator , warm the boat up and dry things out a bit, whilst running the generator to charge the batteries (sailing the NW coast of Scotland and getting soft in my old age).
 
All good ideas. Thanks.

The genny is 4.2KVA - 3.8KW, 230VAC. The water heater or water maker takes about 50% of that, but that gets used up before the batteries are charged. The dehumidifier takes virtually nothing and we're on the Atlantic coast of Spain.... not much use for any form of air conditioning or heating.

I have 420Ah of batteries. Charging makes very little load, so I'd probably have to sink the boat with extra batteries to get the load to something that makes sense.

I think some auxilliary solar might make sense so that I don't have to run the genny for so long, but I don't have a mounting point at the moment. I'd also thought about a hydrogenerator, but not sure of the pros and cons.
 
I think i would get rid of the old genny and either go for solar and maybe add an extra battery. Or you could get a new honda genny perhaps 2kw suitcase type. i would personally go for solar. I have 240w panel which charge my 540amp hour batteries. I also beefed up my fridge with very thick insulation and changed all my lights to LED. i can go weeks without charging.
 
how about using the generator as YOU see fit and not as the manual says and see how long it lasts without bore glazing?
and what if it gets a bit of bore glazing? is it the end of the world?
probably outlast your boat and main engine...

much cheaper than replacing generator or fitting all sorts of things in order to get to this 50-60% load.
Mine rebuilt (apparently was ok) at 1k h (yanmar 2gmf 8KW) typically run at 20-30% of it's capacity, bores were fine, just honed since the whole thing was taken to pieces.

V.
 
vas said:
how about using the generator as YOU see fit and not as the manual says and see how long it lasts without bore glazing?
and what if it gets a bit of bore glazing? is it the end of the world?
probably outlast your boat and main engine...

much cheaper than replacing generator or fitting all sorts of things in order to get to this 50-60% load.
Mine rebuilt (apparently was ok) at 1k h (yanmar 2gmf 8KW) typically run at 20-30% of it's capacity, bores were fine, just honed since the whole thing was taken to pieces.

V.
Click to expand...
I am with Vas on this one
Jim
 
I think if you use decent oil and run the thing at a reasonable load at the beginning of every run (so it quickly gets up to a proper temperature), it should not die of bore glazing anytime soon. Most casr run at a whole lot less than 50% power for most of their 200,000 mile lives.
And a bore hone and new rings for a single pot motor is not the biggest job in the world.
Adding some solar to do the last bit of top up charging seems like a sensible move though, even if an hour of generator charging does the heavy work.
 
Good advice here.

If I run the genny MY WAY what's the best process to minimize glazing? lw395 suggests a hard load at the beginning of a run. Is boiling a kettle for 5 minutes enough? What about at the end of a run. Is there anything to do there?
 
goeasy123 said:
Good advice here.

If I run the genny MY WAY what's the best process to minimize glazing? lw395 suggests a hard load at the beginning of a run. Is boiling a kettle for 5 minutes enough? What about at the end of a run. Is there anything to do there?
Click to expand...


Dont use synthetic oil.

Use the genny when you need it. If that is daily, so be it. If it aint broke, dont fix it.

We have an 8KW Westerbeke with a 3 cylinder Mitsubishi engine. When not on shore power when cruising - most of the time - it get an hour's use each morning to heat a tank of hot water - 2kw element - and charge batteries - 60W Charles charger - and any other 240v use. Perhaps microwave or power tools.

So far, the more I use it, the better it gets.
 
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