[Electric Boats] Re: Inverter Duty versus Standard Duty Generators

 

Hi Kevin,

I'm not sure what parts of my post you had issues with, but I will stand behind every one of my statements as absolutely accurate. For example, part of my sampling included two friends did buy the Kipor knock-offs and were not pleased with the results. The generators did not not meet the published noise specs when tested with a handheld meter (nearby Hondas did meet specs when measured minutes later), although both could be considered "quiet" under low load. Both Kipor generators stopped working in less than 20 hours of usage (however, that is a statistical sampling of only 2 cases). Both generators were replaced with Hondas and the owners are more satisfied with the new generators. I should note that I own a Yamaha EF2000iS, but I'm just a satisfied consumer.

I've never met anyone with a Honeywell or Champion version of these generators, so I can't speak to the quality or personal customer satisfaction of those specific units, nor did I make any claims about them.

It sounds like even you agree that the argument of "US made" doesn't really come into play in this market segment, but you'll notice that I didn't make any references to the countries of origin in my post.

So, I guess that you could consider my post to be "sided", but it is just my personal opinion based on the experiences of myself and personal friends, which is exactly how I presented it.

If you have personal experiences with some of these or other generators, please share some those experiences. We all know that personal recommendations seem to carry more weight than marketing materials.

As for the discussion about installed systems, my generator is not installed on my boat, it lives in my garage. In fact, my boat has no AC system on board (except when the Yamaha is sitting on deck). The only installed AC device on my boat, the charger, is plugged directly into either a shorepower outlet via an extention cord, or the generator. Nothing is connected when not in use. Is there anything about that configuration that doesn't comply with any published standards or guidelines?

Fair winds,
Eric
Marina del Rey, CA

--- In electricboats@yahoogroups.com, Kevin Pemberton <pembertonkevin@...> wrote:
>
> Hey Eric,
>
> Your post is either uninformed or sided. There are inverter generators
> sold by other manufacturers than Honda. All Inverter generators I know
> of work on the same principal. All are quiet when compared to standard
> gensets. Kipor,Champion, Honeywell, and other china produced products
> are on the market that are inverter units and quiet. Fact that many of
> the parts for Honda are sourced from China opens question to quality.
> The Champion unit sold by Sam's club has a better price. The Honeywell
> unit supported by Honeywell and is sold by Costco. Both units are sold
> at a considerable savings to the Honda unit of same size, and all of
> these are inverter quiet generators.
>
> I will gladly say that I prefer keeping my money in the US, but hey
> Honda is not US produced. Most parts these days are made in China so
> where do I turn.
>
> On another note. How do we justify running a 120vac generator in our
> boats when we have not considered installing our conversions not to the
> above 50vdc standards set by industry organizations. I have done it but
> really, are we trying to install our upgrades to standards or not?
>
> Kevin Pemberton
>
>
> On 03/11/2011 11:57 AM, Eric wrote:
> >
> > I've know a couple RV people that have owned some of the cheaper 2kW
> > generators. Some have not been particularly reliable and all have been
> > noisier than the Honda or Yamaha i-series. Everyone of the RV owners
> > that I know have replaced their "off-brand" generators with one of the
> > i-series for either noise or reliability.
> >
> > The cool thing that the inverter generators do is adjust the throttle
> > of the engine to match the load. Most non-inverter generators run at
> > one setting, wide open, regardless of how much electricity is being
> > used. This makes a big difference when you're running lights or other
> > random loads for backyard or on-shore parties.
> >
> > For my boat, I want to get as much power as possible into my batteries
> > to minimize the time on the generator. So if your charger input is
> > sized to the continuous generator output, the inverter feature will
> > not have much effect, the generator will be running flat out just to
> > cover the load. If your charger is less than capacity for the
> > generator (like a 15A 48V charger, about 1000W input) then the
> > inverter generator will be noticably quieter because it will throttle
> > down to match the load. Even more so for a 10A 48V charger.
> >
> > So it all depends on your specific set-up. But for me, the reliability
> > of the product makes the brand name inverter generator a best buy.
> >
> > Fair winds,
> > Eric
> > Marina del Rey, CA
> >

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