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Re: home standby generator

To: john niolon <jniolon@bham.rr.com>
Subject: Re: home standby generator
From: Trevor Boicey <tboicey@brit.ca>
Date: Thu, 22 Sep 2005 00:04:46 -0400
john niolon wrote:
> tell me all I need to know....   I'm looking at 7-10 grand (25-30kw) and
> that's a lot to swallow...  I need all the info I can gather..

   At my office I installed a coleman powerstation 25kW. With automatic 
exerciser and transfer switch. This one is natural gas/propane, backup 
for a small computer room.

   A lot of the decision was made on price, but for occasional duty this 
one has seemed excellent.

   You can spend 4 times that much to get one that is designed to run 
continuously for months, but as a standby generator this price class 
seems acceptable. They are car engines so they are good for a few 
thousand hours, which is a lifetime as a backup generator.

   The only problem I had was a loose connection on the onboard trickle 
charger, which I think is actually dealer installed. The display and 
electronics are powered from the battery (and the charger) so it all 
works when the power goes out. When the trickle charger failed, after 
about a week the battery no longer could start the unit and the self 
test failed that week. No downtime, just fixed trickle charger connection.


-- 
Trevor Boicey, P. Eng.
Ottawa, Canada, tboicey@brit.ca
ICQ #17432933 http://www.brit.ca/~tboicey/






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