HFL Generator Problem

crossy

crossy

Well-Known Member
Joined
10 Jun 2010
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178
Location
Bradford on Avon, Boat in Poole
www.horizoncharterboats.co.uk
I have an issue with a circa 20 year old 6KW HFL generator (Mitsubishi engine I believe) which appeared while we were on our summer cruise this year.

When running the Genset a sudden increase in load, such as turning on the water heater, occasionally caused the Victron Multiplus 12/1600/70 charger/inverter to flick off and reboot temporarily cutting AC supply to the boat (irritating whilst cooking dinner...). I rang Barden who supplied the charger to me last year and their advice was to try to replicate the issue when plugged into the mains. If I couldn't recreate the fault whilst plugged into the mains then their thinking was that the root cause was likely to be the electrical supply from the generator "collapsing under load".

Having returned to our home marina and connected to shore power I have tried all I can to get the unit to flick off again by turning on lots of high draw loads at the same time (hoover, heater etc) but cannot replicate the fault.

Before I commission one of my local engineers to take a look has anyone seen this before and is there anything else obvious I could look at or test myself before the spending starts? We spend quite a bit of time at anchor or on buoys so the Gen is important to me.

Thanks in advance,
Andrew
 
Last edited:
Geny is not big enough to power the new charger + an other AC appliances .
Someone’s got there sums wrong .

A 6 kv will av just over 4.5 ish constant runing , the 6 is a peak max short period figure ,

Or your water heater is drawing excess current because it’s scaled up and on its way out ? You have not indicated it’s condition / age .
 
Portofino said:
Geny is not big enough to power the new charger + an other AC appliances .
Someone’s got there sums wrong .

A 6 kv will av just over 4.5 ish constant runing , the 6 is a peak max short period figure ,

Or your water heater is drawing excess current because it’s scaled up and on its way out ? You have not indicated it’s condition / age .
Click to expand...

Thanks for the response.

The generator is actually a 6KW (ie, 7.5KVA) if that makes a difference to the above?

The immersion heater was brand new 2 years ago so shouldn't be scaled up. When it tripped the charger was (from memory) running in float stage so shouldn't have been drawing a large load from the Gen on it's own. That said, if this is likely to be the issue then i believe the unit can be re-configured to give a lower charger output, say 50A instead. I'd be a bit disappointed if it was though as I went through the specs with Barden in detail prior to purchase.

Cheers,
Andrew
 
it does sound like the gennie isn't responding fast enough to the higher demand if it all works OK on shore power
it also sounds like the installation is OK if it all worked OK before you set off for the summer cruise
as the gennie is 20 years old I would check the following first:

change the generator fuel filter(s) - as it has appeared during the cruise could just be poor fuel flow caused by bunged up fuel filter

put a decent ac voltmeter directly on the gennie output and watch what happens as you increase the load
do the same at the 240v ac circuit breakers/distribution panel - be very careful, if you are not competent/qualified get help.
check all the wiring connections from the gennie output to the Victron unit - 20 years of sea air corroding the connections/output cable. A summer cruise bouncing about has finally revealed it.
check/change the capacitor(s) that control the output voltage of the gennie - after 20 years they may be on the way out
 
Last edited:
crossy said:
I have an issue with a circa 20 year old 6KW HFL generator (Mitsubishi engine I believe) which appeared while we were on our summer cruise this year.

When running the Genset a sudden increase in load, such as turning on the water heater, occasionally caused the Victron Multiplus 12/1600/70 charger/inverter to flick off and reboot temporarily cutting AC supply to the boat (irritating whilst cooking dinner...). I rang Barden who supplied the charger to me last year and their advice was to try to replicate the issue when plugged into the mains. If I couldn't recreate the fault whilst plugged into the mains then their thinking was that the root cause was likely to be the electrical supply from the generator "collapsing under load".

Having returned to our home marina and connected to shore power I have tried all I can to get the unit to flick off again by turning on lots of high draw loads at the same time (hoover, heater etc) but cannot replicate the fault.

Before I commission one of my local engineers to take a look has anyone seen this before and is there anything else obvious I could look at or test myself before the spending starts? We spend quite a bit of time at anchor or on buoys so the Gen is important to me.

Thanks in advance,
Andrew
Click to expand...

Does the Victron cut out on overload? Or some other reason?

Regards Anthony
 
We have the Victron Multi+.

It is very sensitive to A.C. voltage. Our does exactly that when our chiller starts up on days when the shorepower is a bit challenged by lots of boats running aircon. From memory it reboots at 186v, your geny probably can't regulate fast enough.

I have a 11kva Onan and it's fine on that.

I have the setting software and have tried all but no success. I use a seperate Phoenix charger when things are like this.

Edit: my memory is wrong, it does happen on the Onan but to get round that I switch a soft start unit into the chiller.

This all happens for me when a 15A chiller load cuts in.

Shorepower here is usually about 225v but often is down to 216v which with a few volts drop on the cable just seems to push the Multi+ over the top.
 
Last edited:
the victron Multiplus has a "UPS" mode,
in that mode, it will try to keep the output voltage as stable as possible, (fe for computers )
BUT when the 230V supply on its input fluctuates too much, it does exactly what you get (switch off the 230V output)

with a dipswitch inside you can enable/disable that UPS function, (which you don't need on a boat),
when disabled, the voltage on the vinctron's outpunt will follow or variate according what it gets on its input
 
I just looked in the manual, (Multiplus 3kw model, but i guess they are all the same)
it is dip switch nr 3 that you have to place in the "off" position,
and then:
quote from the manual:
To store the settings after the required values have been set: press the 'Down' button for 2 seconds (lower button to the right of the DIP
switches). The temperature and low-battery LED’s will flash to indicate acceptance of the settings.

all manuals are online at Victron energy
 
kashurst said:
it does sound like the gennie isn't responding fast enough to the higher demand if it all works OK on shore power
it also sounds like the installation is OK if it all worked OK before you set off for the summer cruise
as the gennie is 20 years old I would check the following first:

change the generator fuel filter(s) - as it has appeared during the cruise could just be poor fuel flow caused by bunged up fuel filter

put a decent ac voltmeter directly on the gennie output and watch what happens as you increase the load
do the same at the 240v ac circuit breakers/distribution panel - be very careful, if you are not competent/qualified get help.
check all the wiring connections from the gennie output to the Victron unit - 20 years of sea air corroding the connections/output cable. A summer cruise bouncing about has finally revealed it.
check/change the capacitor(s) that control the output voltage of the gennie - after 20 years they may be on the way out
Click to expand...

Good shout, will check the connections and see if I can identify and replace the capacitor(s) when i'm down next.

Cheers.
 
Forty_Two said:
We have the Victron Multi+.

It is very sensitive to A.C. voltage. Our does exactly that when our chiller starts up on days when the shorepower is a bit challenged by lots of boats running aircon. From memory it reboots at 186v, your geny probably can't regulate fast enough.

I have a 11kva Onan and it's fine on that.

I have the setting software and have tried all but no success. I use a seperate Phoenix charger when things are like this.

Edit: my memory is wrong, it does happen on the Onan but to get round that I switch a soft start unit into the chiller.

This all happens for me when a 15A chiller load cuts in.

Shorepower here is usually about 225v but often is down to 216v which with a few volts drop on the cable just seems to push the Multi+ over the top.
Click to expand...

OK, never really payed much attention to the actual voltage value itself on the analogue display, just that it had a reading which I took to mean, "All OK". Will see what actual reading I get from it next time.

Cheers.
 
BartW said:
I just looked in the manual, (Multiplus 3kw model, but i guess they are all the same)
it is dip switch nr 3 that you have to place in the "off" position,
and then:
quote from the manual:
To store the settings after the required values have been set: press the 'Down' button for 2 seconds (lower button to the right of the DIP
switches). The temperature and low-battery LED’s will flash to indicate acceptance of the settings.

all manuals are online at Victron energy
Click to expand...

Thanks Bart, hugely helpful as always.

Andrew
 
Hi - Useful thread. We have a 3.5kva HFL Gemini Generator on our (new to us) Birchwood TS31 - We've been out on a few short two day trips but we just had our first week away, however, on the way back to Farndon our generator started playing up. She starts and runs fine - Sweet as anything, but there is no output current at all - Yesterday was working fine, now we have nothing. Lifted the panels off (it's a b'stad to get to it on this boat, all pretty tight and you are working 'under the bench seats') and the only thing odd I noticed was the Neutral, on the output cable, was free of the little ceramic terminal block - Presumably vibrated it's way out. Fixed up that problem, and then tested the little breaker on the front panel with a multimeter (it had continuity, so no issues there) BUT on checking the outputs with a MM nothing. Seen above there is some discussion about a capacitor that may have failed or may need a 12v charge to kick it in, but there is no indication of where to find it I can see - Does anyone have a manual or diagram (or even better a photo) so I can take a quick look at what I'm shooting at [trying to peer in the front and back end with a torch I couldn't see an obvious capacitor anywhere]. There is a black block with a circuit diagram near the terminal blocks at the front, I'm guessing thats some sort of voltage regulator (looks to be bolted on) - I'm assuming the generator isn't "smart" in that if it detects low input voltage on the 12v starter supply that it will prioritise a charging circuit over the 240v [possible we have ran our batteries down a bit over the week] - If it does have anything like that can it be disabled as we have a 240v charger on the circuit anyway.
 
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