sewerzuk
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I have one service wired to L1, L2, L0 and the second service wired to L2, L3, L0. This means that I'm using all 3 phases and I can get close to the rated power out of the genset, but it is never balanced. I tried to set it up so that most of my constant 120v loads were on L1 (house) and L3 (shop), since L2 is shared. If I were to turn on everything in the shop and the house at the same time, the overload on L2 would be the first to trip. But, because of how I have the set loaded, I can get the full 15kW out of it.Good thread.
Sewerzuk how do you have the 2 services hooked to the generator? Do you use 2 wires to each L1 & L3 terminals and not use L2?
I will eventually be doing the same thing, powering both house and shop with mine as well. For now it's just the shop and I hooked up L1 & L2 and didn't use L3.
I was thinking once I added a second service (when I build the house) that I would need to get a transformer to take 416v 3ph and deliver 240v 1ph to both. Then an electrician friend told me that would be a waste of money, not sure what his reasoning was.
Transformers don't change 3 phase to single phase; they only step voltage up or down. So, you could take 1 phase of 416, and get a transformer to step it down to 120/240, but doing that wouldn't gain you anything over just pulling 120/208 out of the generator. You would still be limited by the overloads on whatever phase you pull the 416 off of.
The best solution, IMO, is to do the low zigzag conversion I am planning. That's the best way to get a full 15kW single phase 120/240 out of the generator.
The advantage I see to leaving one of these generators 3 phase, is that it allows you to power some 3 phase equipment AND power your single phase service. Lots of people I have sold these do do just that; they don't want to pay for 3 phase service, so the generator provides single phase backup power for their shop and lets them run their lathe/milling machine/whatever. That is the whole reason I initially set mine up.
I hope to have a video up this weekend, showing the conversion process, load testing, waveform analysis with the oscilloscope, etc. I plan to do the CT re-wiring next week. I am working on repairing my "test" -004a this morning....
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