I'm looking for a small generator to take onboard the boat this
summer. I like the looks of the Honda EU1000 ($700) and the
EU2000 ($950). In todays paper I noticed a Coleman Powermate
for $350....cheap by comparison.
Anyone have experience with these? Or an alternative?
Norm B

From my experience, living in an anchorage, those boats with Coleman or
other cheap portable gen/sets, weren't very popular with anyone within a
1/4 mile.

Pay the extra and get a quiet, reliable Honda and you and your neighbors
will be more happy..

Steve
s/v Good Intentions

Yeah... What he said!!!!

"Steve" wrote in message
...
From my experience, living in an anchorage, those boats with Coleman or
other cheap portable gen/sets, weren't very popular with anyone within a
1/4 mile.

Pay the extra and get a quiet, reliable Honda and you and your neighbors
will be more happy..

Steve
s/v Good Intentions

I have a follow-on question:
What will happen if I hook a Honda EU1000 to a Heart 2000 charger, which would
like to charge at 100 Amps? Will it settle at some compromise charge rate, or
will it roll over and die?


"Steve" wrote in message
...
From my experience, living in an anchorage, those boats with Coleman or
other cheap portable gen/sets, weren't very popular with anyone within a
1/4 mile.

Pay the extra and get a quiet, reliable Honda and you and your neighbors
will be more happy..

Steve
s/v Good Intentions

Interesting question Jeff. I did a quick search at
http://www.xantrex.com/support/ to get the specs on that unit, but the
manual doesn't seem to address whether the unit is self limiting on the A/C
draw. I have a Prosine unit that you can set the charging circuit so that
there is a limited a.c. amperage draw. Because they have made so many
changes to these units over the last few years, you may have to contact
Xantrex, who bought out Heart and provide them with the s/n of your unit to
obtain an answer. Wish I could have helped more.

"Jeff Morris" wrote in message
...
I have a follow-on question:
What will happen if I hook a Honda EU1000 to a Heart 2000 charger, which
would
like to charge at 100 Amps? Will it settle at some compromise charge
rate, or
will it roll over and die?


If you connect a 1200 watt load to a 1000 watt source I would expect that it
would pop a circuit breaker or something.

I have a Heart 2000 inverter with the remote panel. The Heart inverter has
a "load sharing" feature which will automatically cut back the battery
charge rate when the "pass through" current exceeds the set point. With the
remote panel I can set the current limit to 20, 15, 10 or 5 amps. If you
set it to 5 amps then the battery charger would never draw more than 5 amps
from the generator.

Rod

Thanks Steve, I suspected that might be the case. I think there's
a Honda in my future. I'm leaning towards the EU2000....twice the
power for aprox 1.5 times the cost.
Norm B

On Thu, 27 May 2004 10:47:41 -0700, "Steve" wrote:

From my experience, living in an anchorage, those boats with Coleman or
other cheap portable gen/sets, weren't very popular with anyone within a
1/4 mile.

Pay the extra and get a quiet, reliable Honda and you and your neighbors
will be more happy..

Steve
s/v Good Intentions

Glad you asked the question below. I was wondering the same thing.
I suspect that the choice of the charger, considering the price of
the "smart" ones, is important for compatibility.
Norm B

On Thu, 27 May 2004 14:26:46 -0400, "Jeff Morris" wrote:

I have a follow-on question:
What will happen if I hook a Honda EU1000 to a Heart 2000 charger, which would
like to charge at 100 Amps? Will it settle at some compromise charge rate, or
will it roll over and die?


"Steve" wrote in message
...
From my experience, living in an anchorage, those boats with Coleman or
other cheap portable gen/sets, weren't very popular with anyone within a
1/4 mile.

Pay the extra and get a quiet, reliable Honda and you and your neighbors
will be more happy..

Steve
s/v Good Intentions

On Thursday 27 May 2004 7:26 pm in rec.boats.cruising Jeff Morris wrote:

I have a follow-on question:
What will happen if I hook a Honda EU1000 to a Heart 2000 charger, which
would
like to charge at 100 Amps? Will it settle at some compromise charge
rate, or will it roll over and die?

100 amps at 12 volts is 1200 watts, but add some ineffiency and the load
will probably be about 1400 watts. This type of overload is nasty - it is
too small to blow a fuse or trip a breaker.

What happens will depend on the actual available power of the engine.
If the engine is only just good enough for 1000 watts it will slow down
and may eventually stall, but it will almost certainly overheat.

If the engine has power in reserve the generator becomes the weak point.
Once again a sustained overload will cause overheating, in this case
the enamel insulation in the windings will be damaged causing internal
shorts. This leads to the escape of the magic smoke, requiring expensive
repairs or consignment to the rubbish heap.

On Fri, 28 May 2004 01:02:49 +0100, Chris Newport
wrote:

100 amps at 12 volts is 1200 watts, but add some ineffiency and the load
will probably be about 1400 watts. This type of overload is nasty - it is
too small to blow a fuse or trip a breaker.

==============================================

It turns out to be a lot worse. The Heart Interface inverter/chargers
are not corrected for power factor. As a result they present a highly
inductive load to the generator and the result is a waveform which
tends to change shape under load. They are VERY tough on even large
generators. My previous boat had a new 7.5 KW gen set which could
barely keep up with the KVA demand from a 150 Amp Heart Interface
charger. Heart recommends something like a 10 KW generator to supply
the 1800 watts to the charger.