Re: [MBZ] OT: Emergency power has been deployed

[Dan Penoff via Mercedes]

Two kinds of governors on these:

Mechanical, or “droop” governor. Runs on flyweights. No load frequency should 
be set at or around 62-63 Hz so when under full load the generator set is at or 
near 60 Hz.

Isochronous or electronic governor. Uses a speed pickup on the flywheel, much 
like our crankshaft position sensors. Maintains generator frequency (speed) at 
60 Hz under all conditions.

Mechanical governors are more common on less expensive sets, as they’re 
relatively cheap. Electronic governors are much more expensive and typically 
found on more expensive units.

-D

> On Oct 9, 2020, at 5:52 PM, Scott Ritchey via Mercedes 
>  wrote:
> 
> I hear you.  
> 
> Power outages at our NC house were  common in the past, but rare recently.  I 
> think we had less than 10 hours of actual power outage over 15 years since we 
> installed a generator.  I'm still glad we have it, especially if (when?) one 
> of us needs powered home medical equipment in the future.
> 
> We moved to NC in 2005. Our previous house in the FL panhandle had days-long 
> power outages every year.  We are getting older and wanted reliable power at 
> the new house.   The "new" NC house was built in 1854 so the major 2005-2006 
> remodel included a complete rewire/replumb plus a 15KW Generac  automatic 
> standby generator and a 500 gal underground LP tank.   
> 
> In retrospect:
> I think LP was a good choice for fuel ; it also feeds  the stove and 
> fireplaces. The generator gets an annual oil change (usually) with same 
> Mobile 1 5W30 I use in gas engines.  The generator case is steel and it's 
> starting to rust, ugly but not a problem.  This is an older model with a 
> mechanical governor that is load sensitive.  It runs just above 60HZ at light 
> load; cheap UPS systems don't like that and switch to battery, which doesn't 
> last long.  I bought two APC Smart UPS systems (from ExcessUPS.com) which run 
> fine even of the frequency is a slightly high.
> 
> -Original Message-
> From:  Dan Penoff via Mercedes
> Sent: Friday, October 9, 2020 11:30 AM
> 
> 
> That’s like the irony of installing a whole house generator system and have 
> no outages since it’s been deployed. Not that I want a hurricane, but...
> 
> -D
> 
> 
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Re: [MBZ] OT: Emergency power has been deployed

[Scott Ritchey via Mercedes]

I hear you.  

Power outages at our NC house were  common in the past, but rare recently.  I 
think we had less than 10 hours of actual power outage over 15 years since we 
installed a generator.  I'm still glad we have it, especially if (when?) one of 
us needs powered home medical equipment in the future.

We moved to NC in 2005. Our previous house in the FL panhandle had days-long 
power outages every year.  We are getting older and wanted reliable power at 
the new house.   The "new" NC house was built in 1854 so the major 2005-2006 
remodel included a complete rewire/replumb plus a 15KW Generac  automatic 
standby generator and a 500 gal underground LP tank.   

In retrospect:
I think LP was a good choice for fuel ; it also feeds  the stove and 
fireplaces. The generator gets an annual oil change (usually) with same Mobile 
1 5W30 I use in gas engines.  The generator case is steel and it's starting to 
rust, ugly but not a problem.  This is an older model with a mechanical 
governor that is load sensitive.  It runs just above 60HZ at light load; cheap 
UPS systems don't like that and switch to battery, which doesn't last long.  I 
bought two APC Smart UPS systems (from ExcessUPS.com) which run fine even of 
the frequency is a slightly high.

-Original Message-
From:  Dan Penoff via Mercedes
Sent: Friday, October 9, 2020 11:30 AM


That’s like the irony of installing a whole house generator system and have no 
outages since it’s been deployed. Not that I want a hurricane, but...

-D


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Re: [MBZ] OT: Emergency power has been deployed

[Curt Raymond via Mercedes]

 There is nothing automatic about our emergency power system, fully manual.
In fact during "normal" times I'd need to either pull a battery from one of the 
cars or drive the 7 miles down to the ASV and steal one of its batteries. It 
was only that I had it here on maintenance charge...
For the frequency that we need the emergency power system it makes not sense to 
keep an extra battery, the poor thing would die before it got much use.

-Curt

On Friday, October 9, 2020, 11:10:35 AM EDT, Jim Cathey 
 wrote:  
 
 There is no more smug feeling than when you're enjoying the comforts
of civilization while your less-prepared brethren are not.  ESPECIALLY
if they ridiculed you while you were working on setting it up.

The only trouble is when you make it TOO automatic, and you don't get
the credit you deserve from those who share your house.

-- Jim

  
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Re: [MBZ] OT: Emergency power has been deployed

[Craig via Mercedes]

On Fri, 9 Oct 2020 12:18:15 -0400
Dan Penoff via Mercedes  wrote:

> Good question. A lot depends on the prime mover being used and type of
> fuel. With propane you get very little oil dilution, which is good, but
> you’ll still have breakdown over a relatively short time due to the
> internal forces, I would think.

But with propane being so much cleaner than diesel (or even gasoline),
would not the contamination level (soot, et al.) be so much lower that
the internal forces would be much lower as well?


Craig

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Re: [MBZ] OT: Emergency power has been deployed

[Dan Penoff via Mercedes]

Good question. A lot depends on the prime mover being used and type of fuel. 
With propane you get very little oil dilution, which is good, but you’ll still 
have breakdown over a relatively short time due to the internal forces, I would 
think.

The business uses a “once a year or 100 hours” approach for most units, as I 
recall. Understand that no one uses synthetics or expensive oil in these 
things, either. It’s usually pretty generic stuff for the most part. When I was 
in the business we pretty much used Rotella 15W-40 across the board in 
everything unless something specific was specified by the manufacturer.

-D

> On Oct 9, 2020, at 12:09 PM, Mitch Haley via Mercedes  
> wrote:
> 
> 
> What is the oil life like on a 3600rpm genset under constant usage?
> I'd think around 100-200 hours instead of 25-50 hours, but even that would be 
> once or twice a week in constant duty. I do my mom's LP Generac once a year 
> or after every 24+ hour outage.
> This year, I serviced it a month after a two day outage, and it had a four 
> hour outage less than a week after that.
> 
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Re: [MBZ] OT: Emergency power has been deployed

[Mitch Haley via Mercedes]

What is the oil life like on a 3600rpm genset under constant usage?
I'd think around 100-200 hours instead of 25-50 hours, but even that 
would be once or twice a week in constant duty. I do my mom's LP Generac 
once a year or after every 24+ hour outage.
This year, I serviced it a month after a two day outage, and it had a 
four hour outage less than a week after that.


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Re: [MBZ] OT: Emergency power has been deployed

[Dan Penoff via Mercedes]

Believe me, I am.

I’ve been following a story on a generator forum I belong to as a SME (subject 
matter expert) about a guy in Lake Charles who has been keeping his generator 
running while they’ve been without power. He was finally able to take it 
offline a week or two ago to perform much needed maintenance on it, as it had 
been running continuously since their last hurricane.

-D

> On Oct 9, 2020, at 11:51 AM, Andrew Strasfogel  wrote:
> 
> Just be glad you're not in Lake Charles, Louisiana.
> 
> On Fri, Oct 9, 2020, 11:30 AM Dan Penoff via Mercedes  > wrote:
> That’s like the irony of installing a whole house generator system and have 
> no outages since it’s been deployed. Not that I want a hurricane, but...
> 
> -D
> 
> > On Oct 9, 2020, at 11:10 AM, Jim Cathey via Mercedes  > > wrote:
> > 
> > There is no more smug feeling than when you're enjoying the comforts
> > of civilization while your less-prepared brethren are not.  ESPECIALLY
> > if they ridiculed you while you were working on setting it up.
> > 
> > The only trouble is when you make it TOO automatic, and you don't get
> > the credit you deserve from those who share your house.
> > 
> > -- Jim
> > 
> > 
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> > 
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> > 
> > 
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> > 
> > 
> 
> 
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Re: [MBZ] OT: Emergency power has been deployed

[Andrew Strasfogel via Mercedes]

Just be glad you're not in Lake Charles, Louisiana.

On Fri, Oct 9, 2020, 11:30 AM Dan Penoff via Mercedes 
wrote:

> That’s like the irony of installing a whole house generator system and
> have no outages since it’s been deployed. Not that I want a hurricane,
> but...
>
> -D
>
> > On Oct 9, 2020, at 11:10 AM, Jim Cathey via Mercedes <
> mercedes@okiebenz.com> wrote:
> >
> > There is no more smug feeling than when you're enjoying the comforts
> > of civilization while your less-prepared brethren are not.  ESPECIALLY
> > if they ridiculed you while you were working on setting it up.
> >
> > The only trouble is when you make it TOO automatic, and you don't get
> > the credit you deserve from those who share your house.
> >
> > -- Jim
> >
> >
> > ___
> > http://www.okiebenz.com
> >
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> >
> > To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to:
> > http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com
> >
>
>
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Re: [MBZ] OT: Emergency power has been deployed

[Dan Penoff via Mercedes]

That’s like the irony of installing a whole house generator system and have no 
outages since it’s been deployed. Not that I want a hurricane, but...

-D

> On Oct 9, 2020, at 11:10 AM, Jim Cathey via Mercedes  
> wrote:
> 
> There is no more smug feeling than when you're enjoying the comforts
> of civilization while your less-prepared brethren are not.  ESPECIALLY
> if they ridiculed you while you were working on setting it up.
> 
> The only trouble is when you make it TOO automatic, and you don't get
> the credit you deserve from those who share your house.
> 
> -- Jim
> 
> 
> ___
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> 
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> 
> To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to:
> http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com
> 


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Re: [MBZ] OT: Emergency power has been deployed

[Jim Cathey via Mercedes]

There is no more smug feeling than when you're enjoying the comforts
of civilization while your less-prepared brethren are not.  ESPECIALLY
if they ridiculed you while you were working on setting it up.

The only trouble is when you make it TOO automatic, and you don't get
the credit you deserve from those who share your house.

-- Jim


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Re: [MBZ] OT: Emergency power has been deployed

[Mitch Haley via Mercedes]

Winchendon, Massachusetts?

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[MBZ] OT: Emergency power has been deployed

[Curt Raymond via Mercedes]

We had a heckuva storm Wednsdayday afternoon, lots of the town still without 
power. Interestingly here in the center of town the power didn't even blink.
Well this morning the power went off about 8:30am and National Grid says it'll 
be off until noon. I've got to be online working for class at 11am so the 
Raymond emergency power system has been deployed.
I've had the batteries from the ASV in the garage running maintenance cycles 
one at a time for a couple weeks so I hauled that in and set it up with my 400w 
Coleman (product plug) inverter. That's powering my laptop the cable modem and 
wifi router.Water is boiling on the little pink butane stove 
https://youtu.be/6LYxox-EUGA (shameless self promotion) and all is right with 
the world, or it will be once that hot water becomes coffee...
-Curt
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