Hi Anne,
When you say "engine" I assume that you mean your electric drive. For most of our conversations, engine implies internal combustion, "motor" is a more accepted term for electric drives.
Yes, I can power my electric drive using my shore charger plugged into my poratable Yamaha generator. There are two considerations about doing this.
First, the charger must be built for continous output. Some chargers, like the Dual Pro chargers will not work, they tend to heat up and shut themselves down before doing any damage to the charger. Others have programming that thinks that a battery that doesn't start to get "full" (because you're using the energy to drive your boat, not to charge the battery) is damaged so the charger will shut itself down to prevent further "damage" to the battery.
Second, you need to make sure that the generator has enough capacity to handle the 120VAC load of the charger while "charging" at full bore.
My Yamaha EF2000iS is rated for 1600W continuous output, that works out to 13.3A @ 120VAC. My Elcon PFC2000+ pulls less than 14A @ 120VAC to produce 27.5A @ 54VDC. So when driving the boat directly from the generator/charger combination, the generator is right at the rated capacity. I've driven my boat directly from the generator for an hour as a proof of concept, but have not yet needed to go "hybrid" while underway. 1450W is only about 1/4 throttle for my boat, but that is enough to drive the boat at 4.3-4.4kts as long as I've got gas for the Yamaha generator.
The DC output of the charger is not neccessarily indicative of how much current the charger will need from a source, either generator or shore power, the overall efficiency of chargers can vary a lot from one type to another.
I hope that this helps.
Fair winds and a following sea,
Eric
1964 Bemuda 30 ketch, 5.5kW Propulsion Marine drive, 8kWh Lithium battery
Marina del Rey, CA
--- In electricboats@yahoogroups.com, amracel@... wrote:
>
> I borrowed a friend's generator the last time I did this trip. But,
> since I hadn't needed it at all on the way down or back, I figured it
> was extra weight I could do without (heading to a race). But, since
> the rental place only charges $25/day for the things, guess I'll be
> safe next time.
>
> So you did run the engine while using the charger, even though it's
> not rated to do that? What is the possible danger in that practice then?
>
> Anne
>
> > I carry a little Honda generator for that situation. My charger is
> > also rated to cope with that sort of 'abuse' (batteries under load
> > while the charger is trying to charge them). The charger only puts
> > out half the current required to run the motor at full speed, but
> > running at half power gives me more than 3/4 of top speed anyway.
>
> > Other than testing the concept (I ran for about an hour one day
> > balancing the motor current against the output of the charger with
> > the Honda fuming away on deck) - I've never needed to use the Honda
> > in 'series hybrid' mode to get home. But I test and pack the Honda
> > each outing anyway. My boat is a launch not a sail boat - so if my
> > electrics fail, it's try to row the thing back or call for a tow. :-)
>
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