After Action Report- Texas Gulf Coast

[Bluevic443]

First off, I bought the generator for HURICANES!!!

Highlights: MEP-802
37 hours of continuous run time.
15 gallons of diesel used. Averaged .4 gallon/hour.
First time to blow the VR protection fuse during cranking over. 3A automotive blade fuse, not a slow blow. No veristor at this time.
Oil was down to half the range on the dip stick. This is a low hour unit, 77 hours to date. Next oil change will get John Deere break in oil and filter.

House: 1850 sq/ft. Natural gas heat, water heater, stove and oven, and clothes dryer.
Current draws:
Everything off- L1 (2A) L2 (2A) parasitic draws I guess.
Heat on day- L1 (6.8A) L2 (2.6A) heat, few lights.
Heat on night- L1 (11.5A) L2 (6.5A) heat, all lights on. Testing for max.
No heat all lights on- L1 (6.2A) L2 (6.5A) Testing
Tested with a clamp meter at the meter box. Never saw the load meter on the unit go over 25%
There is signs of "wet stacking". Will run the generator this weekend at 100% load to clean out.

Question/concern: How much imbalance is acceptable? 5A is the max I saw. Assuming the heating unit blower fans are 110 volt and all draw on L1.
Why would the 3A VR fuse blow in cold weather and not hot??? Is this the reason for a slow blow fuse?

Added the neighbor's two refrigerators and was the charging station for the other neighbors devises.
Still need to have a manual generator disconnect installed.

Stay warm!!!!

 

[Scoobyshep]

First off, I bought the generator for HURICANES!!!

Highlights: MEP-802
37 hours of continuous run time.
15 gallons of diesel used. Averaged .4 gallon/hour.
First time to blow the VR protection fuse during cranking over. 3A automotive blade fuse, not a slow blow. No veristor at this time.
Oil was down to half the range on the dip stick. This is a low hour unit, 77 hours to date. Next oil change will get John Deere break in oil and filter.

House: 1850 sq/ft. Natural gas heat, water heater, stove and oven, and clothes dryer.
Current draws:
Everything off- L1 (2A) L2 (2A) parasitic draws I guess.
Heat on day- L1 (6.8A) L2 (2.6A) heat, few lights.
Heat on night- L1 (11.5A) L2 (6.5A) heat, all lights on. Testing for max.
No heat all lights on- L1 (6.2A) L2 (6.5A) Testing
Tested with a clamp meter at the meter box. Never saw the load meter on the unit go over 25%
There is signs of "wet stacking". Will run the generator this weekend at 100% load to clean out.

Question/concern: How much imbalance is acceptable? 5A is the max I saw. Assuming the heating unit blower fans are 110 volt and all draw on L1.
Why would the 3A VR fuse blow in cold weather and not hot??? Is this the reason for a slow blow fuse?

Added the neighbor's two refrigerators and was the charging station for the other neighbors devises.
Still need to have a manual generator disconnect installed.

Stay warm!!!!

A 5 amp imbalance is not the worst I have seen, if you really wanted to you could move some loads around to improve. as for the fuse a good spike is the likely cause, and yes, slow blow would help prevent surge trips.

 

[Coug]

I didn't see any numbers in the manual, but general rule of thumb is to run no more than 1/2 the rated capacity of the generator when operating split phase (120/240) for either side of the split.

As these are 26 amps of 240, that's 26 amps each side for 120V, 5 amps imbalance is very little all things considered (10% rated output)

Of course it's always best to run at 0% imbalance, but that's not always possible.

 

[DieselAddict]

With zero concern given for how most residential panels are installed regarding load balance, a 5a difference is quite good and is of no consequence to the generator.

From the fuel burn perspective you must have had some load on it to burn 0.4 gph. The fuel burn at MAX load on one of those should be just under 0.5 gph. 0.4 gph seems a little high for an average 6 a load. Keep a close eye on fuel burn during your load test and make sure you don't have a problem.

 

[Bluevic443]

With zero concern given for how most residential panels are installed regarding load balance, a 5a difference is quite good and is of no consequence to the generator.

From the fuel burn perspective you must have had some load on it to burn 0.4 gph. The fuel burn at MAX load on one of those should be just under 0.5 gph. 0.4 gph seems a little high for an average 6 a load. Keep a close eye on fuel burn during your load test and make sure you don't have a problem.

DieselAddict,
I think you caught my mistake. Started the run with a full tank. Put 5 gal in when the gauge read 1/2 tank twice. Put a final 5 gallons in to bring it back to full right before I shut it down when the power returned.
So I only went through ~10 gallons of fuel for the 37 hours. Which gives me a .27gal/hr burn rate at 6 amp load.

 

[DieselAddict]

Roger that. 0.27 gph sounds closer to what I would expect. Maybe a little higher but not so bad.

 

[Guyfang]

If you are worrying about a 5 Amp imbalance, please get your wife to beat you for a half hour. Thats a good fuel rate burn also. BE HAPPY.

 

[frank8003]

really nice write up, an Attaboy here ...................

 

[Bluevic443]

If you are worrying about a 5 Amp imbalance, please get your wife to beat you for a half hour. Thats a good fuel rate burn also. BE HAPPY.

Always good to hear from you Guyfang!!!
Read user's talk about the balance/imbalance of their service. Just did not remember what the max these units can take before there is an issue. FIRST EMERGENCY RUN

As for the beatings from the wife. Those came months before as I was buying these generators, now 3, and getting one running to tip top shape.
FLIPPED THE BREAKER FOR THE HEAT TO COME BACK ON AND THE BEATINGS CEASED!!!!

 

[Mullaney]

Always good to hear from you Guyfang!!!
Read user's talk about the balance/imbalance of their service. Just did not remember what the max these units can take before there is an issue. FIRST EMERGENCY RUN

As for the beatings from the wife. Those came months before as I was buying these generators, now 3, and getting one running to tip top shape.
FLIPPED THE BREAKER FOR THE HEAT TO COME BACK ON AND THE BEATINGS CEASED!!!!

.
Amazing how the little woman can instantly be happy when the house gets warm and the lights come on!
Congratulations on planning ahead and being prepared when the time came!

.

 

[DieselAddict]

Totally get that. My wife gave me SOOOO much grief for all the time and effort I was putting into the MEPs THEN we had a serious power outage and all was forgiven. Now she doesn't blink when I'm doing these projects.

 

[Chainbreaker]

Yeah, my wife wasn't all that cool to having that "ugly generator/trailer" parked up by the house. Well after a couple of week long outages with life as usual running on generator power, she now is down right protective of it and reminds me to always keep it maintained and at the ready.

 

[Guyfang]

Wife's are often wrong. But NEVER unsure of themselves. After 44 years of marriage, I still haven't figured mine out.

 

[Bluevic443]

Wife's are often wrong. But NEVER unsure of themselves. After 44 years of marriage, I still haven't figured mine out.

If we figure them out we will stop "tinkering" with them. Tinkering is the fun part!!!




We are still talking about generators? Right?

 

[reallybigboat]

After Action Report. North Texas. Dallas/Fort Worth Area. Record cold temperatures and no utility power.

My wife and I both kissed our MEP-005a after utility power was finally stable (generator was off during picture). 48.7 running hours on the MEP-005a.

Fuel burn rate tracked closely to specs; 1 gallon per hour per 10kW of load. Actual burn rate between 1.4 and 1.8 GPH.

The MEP-005a was a Rock Star and performed flawlessly. Some wet stacking, as the max I could load it to was 18kW. (60% of 30kW). I will load bank it with all four central A/C units, as the weather warms. The only small issue (small because I was able to correct it within a couple of hours, I consider it small), was the fuel jelled when temp dropped to mid-single digits. I found location of jell (basically fuel line from tank to fuel pumps), warmed the area, un-jelled, and greatly reduced the airflow through the unit. Started again in +2 degree temps and ran the remainder of the time with no issues). Bought-out my local O'Reilly's of all Sea Foam (that is all they had in stock, no other brands) the next morning, added 1 oz per gallon of diesel from that point forward, no issues.

Full house power distribution via Square D manual transfer switch and Hubble 4100 series connectors.

 

[Guyfang]

The 004A and 005A are simply great gen sets. Simple, easy and dependable.

 

[Scoobyshep]

I love my 004. Things a workhorse.

Sent from my SM-G973U using Tapatalk

 

[MrShawn305]

Man I got left out of the party. El Paso didn't get any serious outages. My folks down in Victoria were hit pretty hard, so I took them my old Kubota 6kw set. It's not a military set, but was already on a trailer with 30 gallons of diesel on board. Now I need to figure out a way to get them an 803 to their new house as it's all electric in Port O'Connor. Problem is, they have an HOA there . I might just put it on a trailer with a big fuel tank and take it down to them ahead of any storms.

Glad to see everyone's units took good care of them!

 

[MTVR]

We are located outside of Waco.

As soon as the ice started accumulating, I pulled our MTVR motorhome out of the shop and parked it next to the house, as it has a small CAT generator mounted to it.

We only lost power for about an hour, but I'm thankful that we had the generator.

 

[Waukesha]

Glad y'all made it through unscathed! I also bought my trailer mounted 803A when I moved to Houston to prep for hurricanes! Who would have thought a winter storm would give us 40 hours of run time on it... I was sitting at my computer working remotely and the gelling issued dawned on me, southern fuel isn't winterized!! Thankfully a quick search online led me to some anti-gel treatment and we never had an issue. Every house in our cel-de-sac had pipes burst, but not us.