Adding a 6.5 Cummins Commercial 120/240v Genset to the collection.

[WarWagon]

Need More Power, Scotty!

Not found out if it's a boat anchor or a gem at the moment. Sticker says it's a 120/240v Single Phase made in 1999. ~2593 hours on the hour meter as it's a foggy lens now. (A lot of these are a 3 Phase setup that's not as useful.) Regardless this is why you shouldn't lend me your SUV. Patch is down for the count with a leaking injector body, but, is still useful. Did I mention I have a steep driveway? I will mention that a 6500w Commercial 1800 RPM twin cylinder Onan is slightly beyond two people carry heavy esp. with the included pan and mounting tray. No you don't want to know how I loaded it and made the skid marks.

Some minor improvements for a "Commercial" grade is a real starter drive vs. nylon. This one has electronic ignition via a weak plastic arm magnet trigger between the genhead and engine. If it goes "SNAP!" I will be drilling a hole in the flywheel for 'the' magnet like they should have done in the first place.


When the SHTF there is a 6v flashlight with a good battery. The Fire Extinguisher, not shown, was moved to the back seat.



This is how I unloaded it. My Buddy and I made a half-hearted attempt and he asked if I was going to say "Uncle" first? Then my buddy suggested I make use of the cherry picker. Patch was used to make sure it didn't go down the driveway in a 'we should have filmed that' sort of way. Stepstools, not rims.

 

[MrMarty51]

Nice find on the gen. Yeah, My back cried uncle at the first glance of the pic. LOL

 

[Will L.]

So I have an hour or two experience with such a generator.
That is what was on my Mac Tools truck. It supplied juice for the two 1350 roof a/c units that were on for 8-10 hours a day 5 days a week 6 months of the year.

Had same route and truck as guy before me.
He shad the engine rebuilt by Cummins Onan out here 3 months before I bought business from him. Hit the start button and she went vroom every time but once. It doesn’t have a separate starter, it excites the generator to spin the engine as a starter. The last year I was on the truck in August she failed me. One of my customers here in Boulder City just so happens to be the expert for Nevada on generator half, so it came out and he rebuilt the generator half. It got two more months of use. Then I went out of business that December.

The tool truck was sold, but generator remains in my garage. It doesn’t have the built in fuel tank or compact muffler like yours. Mine stole gas from the main tank that fed the 454.
Yes, the local Sinclair gas station appreciated the $100 a day.

I still haven’t ran it sitting outside the truck yet. I can’t bring myself to sell it, cuz I know it won’t sell for alot and then if I need another, it is lost money to buy a new one.
Truthfully with the fuel consumption, if I had known about the Honda 3000 inverter generators, I would have bought 2 of them instead and ran one to each roof unit. Another Mac tool guy in Vegas area did his 2 months before mine when his onan threw a rod. He had same a/c units, ran same hours per week as me, and gas cost ended up $6 less per day. Not much, but over time counts at that volume. Then when using only 1 a/c - saves more to only run 1 unit. Also more convient to steal one for camping.

Now days, with the daisy chain capable 2200 watt units that are so easy to carry by yourself and so small- I would just buy 3 of them in that situation, and the new this year 2200 is quiter and same fuel usage and the 2000 watt one I own now. Granted, I have no idea how many years they would last compared to the near indestructible onans. I think I will dig up the number of that other Mac guy and make a call...

And on the cherry picker- YUP! Definitely 3 men and a boy to heft it without leverage device. Strapped mine to a harbor freight furniture dolly for life, and same lifting tool.

 

[Will L.]

I got a text from someone wishing to remain anonymous-
1 of the new Honda generators (or at elevation below 4500 feet even the older 2000i) with an easy start from micro air can run the big 15,000 rv a/c unit.

So 2 are enough to run 2 a/c units, but is still only 4400 watts, but 3 will get you to the 6600 watt to match the big onan. At full power they kill 3/4 gallon per hour.

But at $1000 each- POW! I am guessing WarWagon got a better deal than that. Haha!

Sorry @WarWagon - didn’t mean to turn your thread into “other options” thing. Just that as you experienced the fuel price crunch on the job with gm turbo vs ATT, I did it in the generator drinking gas thing. And as pointed out in texting- it sounded like generator only used $100 a day- no- that was about 40 miles driving and idling a 454 AND THE GENERATOR to hit $100 a day. Onan Generator used about 1/4 gph more than the 2 honda 3500 did with same exact load on same exact days, just a few miles apart.

But the addition of the new soft starts would save on costs by using 2 of the 2200 watt units instead of the 2 of the 3500 watt units. Also 3500 watt units cost more and way too heavy to lift by yourself.

I texted the other Mac guy (retired now) and am waiting a reply.

@WarWagon - mind if I ask how often you run yours? I obviously ran mine a lot- so never worried about the rest too long problems, until now. Now on zombie day it is something i could get running in a couple hours if needed.

 

[WarWagon]

@Will L. Clean the slip rings before even cranking it. Some models will pop a voltage regulator with high resistance slip rings. Flight systems makes a tool, but a kitchen scrubber sponge will do.

Run mine hard 4x a year or more just from nuisance power failures. Should run the Onan every month. I use mine to power an oil fryer when grilling now to not have the gas go bad and be a total waste.

Found this one has a 10A battery charger under the flywheel. Needs some TLC on broken muffler mount and heat shield.

Honda have a fear and habit of walking off. Clearly this lead brick isn't going to walk away easy.

 

[Will L.]

Thanks cor the slip ring info. Gonna write that on instruction sheet along and keep with the couple of spare parts I have for it.
Nv people are now pushing for energy deregulation again. These folks don’t get how cheap and trouble free it is here with the one company and public utilities commision.
The last set of monster storms that came through (highest winds ever recorded in valley including Nellis AFB). Knocked out power to just over 63,000 people in the end. Almost everyone(iirc less than 50 to go) had powerback by end of day 3 was final count. Only 3 weeks or so before that was 20,000 lost power. Worst outage in NV history, and was less than half day for most affected!

These idiots are gonna pay more for less service and drag me with them. Might REALLY need to get mine freshened up for if it all comes.

Gonna see tons more foreclosures in Nv if it does. So many attachments to mortgages for solar power rental systems that are only paid by mandatory buying power because they are monopoly. Once that is gone - people have to pay the cost themselves and will just walk away from houses to get out from under it. Hopefully some good pricing on used panels will come up.
Bigger used Generator prices will bounce up here like they are there. Here the 6500 onan will only get $250-300 if it runs great and looks perfect. Rougher looking ones like yours and mine- $150 so most people dont even bother selling them.

 

[WarWagon]

I am buying them in the wrong area then!

Guess the Commiefornians moved out to your neck of the woods after their CA power bill went sky high from the "open market" fraud that went on. Yeah, the "fake" blackouts from supposedly no power so you pay extreme prices for power put insane hours on the Homelite of mine. Window AC in the kitchen, Sat TV, and powered the microwave.

Never cleaned the slip rings on the Homelite. Here is a tool for cleaning the slip rings on the Onan's : PDF instructions attached.

https://www.flightsystems.com/rv-generator-controls-repairs/slick-stick-slip-ring-cleaner.html

 

[ak diesel driver]

I have a similar genset cept mines diesel

 

[WarWagon]

So the slip ring clean up tool arrived. The redistance was 80 ohm, 119 ohm, and open(!) as measured from the brush connection by the brushes in different spots as I turned and stopped the engine. This condition could have let the magic smoke out of the regulator.

I pulled the brushes and deglazed them. Was some dust or dirt under them. I then disconnected all the wires on the starter going elsewhere and hot wired the starter. Pulled the spark plugs, changed oil, new oil filter. I then spun the engine on the starter and cleaned the slip rings with the new tool. 24 ohm resistance when done.

Muffler bracket busted in half, worn at the break, and a couple bolts into a adapter loose on the exhaust. The cage on the muffler blocks the clean out plug and needed 2 welds. So a friend welded the bracket and muffler cage. Painted the muffler with header paint.

One of the base to frame bolts is pounding the muffler bracket. Not at the broken spot.

The 10A PMG battery charger was disconnected with a twist on wire nut by the starter. Will have to check it and see why.

Looks to have had a remote fuel pump. The airbrake hose used for a fuel line indicates some real remote use or...

The 220v plug had got hot with burn marks. I took it apart and one 220 black wire had melted the plug inside. Some insulation from the wire still melted in it. Of course the unsafe repair done was cut the bad section of wire off and screw it down. Should have gotten a new plug. I am not using the plug anyway. Again may have been a remote jobsite with a need to fix it now.

 

[WarWagon]

So I need the engine lift back... Dropped this on a wagon. Still needs a fuel pump, brush access cover, and "winter" carb ice heat tube. Muffler fixed and painted with high temp paint.



Burned connector that was "fixed" by PO rather than replaced.

 

[WarWagon]

So "Doghouse" time!

Welder buddy finally made time to do this for me. Keep in mind this is a vacuflo cooling system that blows hot air down. I may need to put a deflector under it to keep hot air from coming back under the suction side as the table is just a grate.











Detail and rattle stop being installed via hardware store door gap seal.



Keep the critters out. Both Openings.

 

[WarWagon]

I had tested this awhile ago. It started and then shut down when the start button released. Typical popped voltage regular indication: no AC generated so engine shuts down. Holding the start button in to see how the engine runs I noticed, by ear, that it's running too fast. In fact speeding up slowly. Looking at the throttle, running, it's pinned on the idle stop screw. Couple turns backing that screw out and as soon as it's in the proper RPM/frequency range the voltage kicks on. Now the engine stays running from a simple adjustment. Suspect this is why they pulled a 'non-working' genset out and sold it.

Bag of parts for it:

 

[Will L.]

Yeah, I bet they threw parts at it to to fix the “reason” it kept dying. Does it have a full new tune up kit on it including fuel filter?

 

[WarWagon]

Maybe a new carb as it was the cleanest part on it, but, had filthy air filter. So maybe just retired it without trying to fix it. Or took new parts off for another unit.