Didn't know where to post this since it kinda goes all over the place for a topic but here is the start of my home generator project(s) The 1115 on a converted boat trailer frame. Still cant tell you guys the Mfg as the only English marking says Powermart, book say Changfa Mfg but have been advised probaly not. Ordered two ST gen heads w/avrs today, a 5KW for the Listeroid in the back ground and a 15KW for the 1115 from Tom at Georgia Generator (highly reccommend him A1 guy) Both willl be belt driven. The 1115 will be back up power for the house and prime power at our farm. The Listeroid is pure toy. Notice no headlight, I am truely dissapointed :'(
(http://i44.tinypic.com/mcx30n.jpg)
Head off the 1115 as I am doing some research for the gasket guy. Should have a pair of his head gaskets any day for testing for fit, and durability when we can load up the 15KW. The bore size kind of amazed me, it Big. Also have removed the hopper to fit a plate and 'stat and radiator per what a lot of us guys have done.
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Nice project...I don't know if is to late, but there is a recommendation not to use those legs...they are not strong enough...
Good Luck :)
Shipo is right. I just reported that one of the cast legs on my new Changfa 1115 broke during preliminary testing. Could not stand up to the forces involved in the belt drive.
I am really impressed with the 1115 engine so far. Has a lot of power and is a real fuel miser at the same time.
Nice project!
it is my belief that those stands were only meant as a means to support the engine for transport down the assy line
and to aid in crating the engine for shipping.
they are just cast iron and not very heavy cast iron to start with, its not hard to imagine some very bad things happening
should one or both fail with the unit under full load operation.
also, as you are using square tubing for the main members and the unit will be mounted and used on the springy boat trailer
you might want to add some pipe cross members between the two main members, the use of pipe will add much rigidity
from twisting that will likely be useful if you are planning on direct drive.
bob g
You beat me to it Bob, I was just wonderin if the Chinese dudes actually used the legs, or just put 'em on there to facilitate shipping.
I've got a spare set that I'm kinda tired of tripping over, if anybody wants 'em.
Ron
The legs on my engine are not cast,they are fabricated steel but you are correct about them being lightly constructed, I had wondered about them,now I will replace them with shop built H-D units, thanks for that tip. Plans are for a couple adjustable stiff legs on the rear frame so it will not have to be operated on the springs. We had it running before I removed the head and it was VERY stable sitting almost motionless at the planned 1800 RPM even when sitting on the springs. However this was of course not under load. We are going the V-belt drive route for now, why? Because I have the belts and driven sheave on the shelf and need only to buy a Gen head QD bushing to complete the drive. As I posted earlier I do wonder about that generator rotor life when it is direct coupled, a concern shared by Tom, he didnt say that there had been problems, but that it was a concern. Will post more pics as it progesses.
Quote from: vdubnut62 on April 28, 2010, 08:54:50 AM
You beat me to it Bob, I was just wonderin if the Chinese dudes actually used the legs, or just put 'em on there to facilitate shipping.
I've got a spare set that I'm kinda tired of tripping over, if anybody wants 'em.
Ron
Ron,
With some hardwood, paint and stain might make an attractive set of book ends.
I have seen various agricultural equipment which use the legs on the changfa's.
I don't think they are just for transport purposes.
I do not use them on my current changfa generator, however I did not have any problems with them on previous units.
veggie
Playdiesel,
Your shop looks just like mine! :o
Quote from: rcavictim on April 28, 2010, 03:08:51 PM
Playdiesel,
Your shop looks just like mine! :o
Too many wants, not enough shop space. I have to move something to work on anything, get a few bucks saved up for a building and along comes another bargain<<< :'(
shop space?
hell you got unused floor space all over under that trailer!
:)
bob g
Who's that guy... Smiling in the background?
He looks like he could use a better dental plan :D
Sorry... could'nt help myself
RCA they just ain't enough paint to make 'em look good. ;D
Ron
Quote from: rl71459 on April 28, 2010, 05:35:40 PM
Who's that guy... Smiling in the background?
He looks like he could use a better dental plan :D
Sorry... could'nt help myself
My daughter, when about 10 (now 26) put that on the shop fridge. I keep it on there now to embarass her, LOl
Welcome, playdiesel!
Thanks for the pics. You'll probably get tarred and feathered around here for your choice of vee belt drive (shields on!). I'm a big vee belt believer. They are cheap, dependable, easily available and proven for over a century. They also can live with misalignment and abuse, and act as a shock absorber in the drive system.
To get efficiency from a vee belt drive system you need larger diameter pulleys than what I see in your photos.
A single B series belt is enough for an ST5 head if the pulleys are in the ten to twelve inch range. The slip and hysteresis losses will then be very low. Small pulleys have small contact area, high foot per minute speeds and require multiple belts and high tension to prevent slip. You can get away without the expensive common backed belts if you have the right pulleys.
Regards,
Tim
Quote from: TimSR2 on April 28, 2010, 09:05:15 PM
Welcome, playdiesel!
Thanks for the pics. You'll probably get tarred and feathered around here for your choice of vee belt drive (shields on!). I'm a big vee belt believer. They are cheap, dependable, easily available and proven for over a century. They also can live with misalignment and abuse, and act as a shock absorber in the drive system.
To get efficiency from a vee belt drive system you need larger diameter pulleys than what I see in your photos.
A single B series belt is enough for an ST5 head if the pulleys are in the ten to twelve inch range. The slip and hysteresis losses will then be very low. Small pulleys have small contact area, high foot per minute speeds and require multiple belts and high tension to prevent slip. You can get away without the expensive common backed belts if you have the right pulleys.
Regards,
Tim
LOL, wont be the first time I went against the grain
Have you ever looked at a Dodge V-belt drive engineering catalog? LOTS of info to design the drive but a person needs to be a smidgen or two smarter than me to figure it out so I called Reliance(dodge) for assisance told them 23HP at 1800 RPM 6" pulley with 4 B section grooves, will it hold the power? Guy says need to know the arc correction factor ??? I said what? he said how big is driven pulley going to be and I said same size? Seems that arc correction has something to due with how far the belt wraps around the sheaves in degrees. Anyhow same size sheaves equals no correction. Best I can tell 4 belts equals no problems, 3 equals better keep'em good and tight and 2, no way. Using 4 belts is cheaper way to go than redesigning the wheel on the engine sheave I think. Going to redo the the engine mounts (Old ones make trading material for a headlight yes? No? Maybe? :-[) and ad some braces as advised here, do you guys know what steel costs??? LOL Need to go to junk yard to find radiator for it over the weekend. How to heck do you create a load to check a 15KW genhead anyway? 150 light bulbs? Got a electric range at the house and lectric cloths dryer?
go to a used appliance shop or scrap yard and recover a stack of the large top heating elements, they are about 2800watts each
don't forget to get the sockets they plug into as well.
you can then hang them up overhead with tie wire to support the elements and keep from burning your hair off while testing
i use a large element in some tests, and also use 4 of the 750/1500watt space heaters as well, they allow for a variety of steps
in loading, and are fairly inexpensive and useful later for,,, well... what they were designed for.
the cook top element should be the cheapest route in my opinion, i gave a buck a piece for mine, and then had to buy new sockets
at about 10bucks each because i was in a hurry and needed them, so i bought new ones at a hardware store.
whatever you use, remember not to accept the value as gospel, just because you have four 1500 watt heaters does not mean you
necessarily have 6000watts of load, if the frequency droops, or the voltage droops, or a wind blows in the door the heaters will change
value sometimes dramatically.
the use of an accurate kw/hr meter is the only way to get an accurate measurement of load if accuracy is important to you, it will
account for shifts in voltage, drafts, etc and calculate kw/hrs to a much higher degree of accuracy than a clampon ammeter and a voltmeter
or simply trying to gauge based on name plate rating of a heater.
bob g
Aw heck Bob, I just hooked mine to the house and started turnin' stuff on till the engine was struggling. That equaled all the normal parasitic loads, lights, tv, satellite, aquarium etc. the water heater and 2 burners on the cooktop. If I killed the water heater, it would manage 3 burners and 1 section of the double oven.
Yeah I'm way too picky about my testing ::) and I'm no stranger to being called a smartass.
Ron
my mistake
i misread "check" as "test" which changes the required load by quite a stretch
apparently after rereading the OP is asking how to "check" the output of the 15kw st head
that can be done as you describe easy enough, however
had he instead asked how to run some "tests" perhaps a more accurate load and metering would be in order.
i get so caught up in testing that is is hard for me to remember that there is a whole nother world out there!
:)
bob g
Quote from: mobile_bob on April 29, 2010, 11:12:50 PM
remember that there is a whole nother world out there!
:)
bob g
Yup, think of me as the local micro generation redneck, LOL
Well sorry for no pics guys but the dang camera was at home. We removed the chinsy legs and fabbed up some H-D units. Mounted a '90 Honda Civic Rad up high and have it plumbed to my homemade plate. Had it running today and the thermo syhon works great. Have the Civic fan switched with a Civic temp switch, no clue what the turn on temp is becausewe havent got it warm enough to trip it. Found we need to remote mount the fueltank also as without the hopper to hold it it shakes bad. Should have my second shipment of gen heads here by the first of the week and wont take long for that to be attached and tried out. Anybody know what the amp rating is of the flywheel alternators?
Quote from: playdiesel on May 15, 2010, 07:19:40 PM
Have the Civic fan switched with a Civic temp switch, no clue what the turn on temp is because we haven't got it warm enough to trip it.
On another different small 3cyl Honda that I monitored the fan activity with an led tied into the circuit, and monitoring the temp with OBD II reader; the fans were coming on at 208F and would go off at around 203/204F.
Randall
Got a few pics today.
We took removed the fuel tank today and remote mounted it. If you do this make sure you oput the fuel line bango fittings where they should have been to start with the valve on the TANK end, gesh! The plate is shopmade and showing the Honda fan sending unit. The wiring is tempery for testing.
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From the end. The motor is ticking over at about 1200 here and almost vibration free. The ole china diesels kinda look like motors when you get all the funky covers and tanks off em eh??
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Yeah they do. It just looks like it ought to have another flywheel though!
Ron
Nice job on the radiator adapter plate! BTW: did you install the cold water return
dip tube under your plate? Mentioned this just in case.
If you decide to add the T-stat you can buy a 1" dielectric plumbing
union and a standard NAPA termostat will seal inside it between the
two halves.
Quote from: OilCan on May 18, 2010, 05:38:04 AM
Nice job on the radiator adapter plate! BTW: did you install the cold water return
dip tube under your plate? Mentioned this just in case.
If you decide to add the T-stat you can buy a 1" dielectric plumbing
union and a standard NAPA termostat will seal inside it between the
two halves.
Oilcan
You wouldn't have the thermo numbers that fit that union would you?
Billswan
By dip tube do you mean an extension under the return side? Remember I'm a noob I extended the return side down into the hopper as far as possible with 1" pipe. It seems to work well as far as we can tell with no way to load it. The engine warms up to around 170 pretty quick and stays there without the fan running. 170 is borderline warm enough I think? I should have my generator heads today so real testing can begin. I forgot to mention that the thread on the Honda sending unit is VERY close to 5/8 SAE. I have no idea what the exact metric thread is as I have no metric taps/dies that large. I spun a 5/8 SAE die on the sending unit with my fingers, it cut almost nothing, tapped the hole with a 5/8 SAE tap and used a 45 degree counter sink to form a chamfer for the sealing ring. The sender wont handle fan loads so we used a Ford relay( one was laying on the bench) To tell you the truth I'm a little bit bothered by all the gadgetry required to run the fan and the radiator location was chosen so I can easily drive a cooling fan with a V-belt from the engine in the future. The primary use is going to be at our house for emergency power and maybe some prime power if I can find a suitable (read cheap) source of fuel. If we end up using it for prime power I'm thinking about plumbing the cooling lines into our outdoor wood boiler loop. Several advantages to that in heat recovery when operating, rust prevention chemicals are present and keeping the engine warmed for wintertime starts.
the sending unit should be pipe thread, and from what you are describing it is 3/8"NPT
i run a 195 degree stat and the fan does not come on the radiator until the engine is running 205deg F
i am running 50/50 antifreeze and a 7lb rad cap
i run a bosch auxilliary electric heater pump to circulate water from the radiator and admit it back into the
block via the drain port
the engine runs very well at that temp level, burns clean and makes its best efficiency there.
bob g
I don't know if that will be a future problem, but just in case I'd recommend tilting the radiator toward the engine to prevent that arc in the lower radiator hose or find the way to fix it since you don't have a water pump...
see my setup here ...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eN5-nhcjH_A
I appriciate all the tips and sugggestions, thanks.
Well, we are officially generating with the 1115/15KW. Happy to say that my ST head from Tom Osborn at Georgia Gen is doing it's job nicely with none of the bad traits I have read about. I was worried about wierd things with voltage since I need to be wired for 220. I read too much I guess? Last night I fired it up and set the unloaded RPMS for 61 hertz, my 110 legs read 128 and 129 unloaded. I then loaded up one side of the 110 with two 1500 watt heaters, a box fan and a couple 100 watt lights (all I had handy) just too see what happened. I am happy to say that it was a boring test, no squeals or wierd noises, the loaded side voltage was 121, the unloaded side 125. I think my avrs are going to stay in the boxes for now. Another nice thing is the 1115 governor is VERY responsive. No load Hz was 61 and with the load I applied last night it dropped to 60.3. I cant vouch for wave form, da, da, da as I wouldnt know how to hook up a o'silly scope if I had one but I am impressed so far, both with the ST and the 1115. Pics will come, I never remember the camera, LOL.
OK, Finaly remembered to bring the camera, sorry for no movies, canna do with my old Sony Mavicta, it takes floppy disks and not enough meory to do a movie, laugh, it paid for, LOL
The 4-B belt drive and tightener system. One thing I have learned over the years is to put tighteners on both sides as the motor or gen head in this case will always try to twist sideways towrds the load. As you can see I still have some tidying to diwith hoses ad wires.
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Took John Fergusons advise and mounted an 8x8 junction box and terminal strip
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Here is the terminal block I chose, came from Grainger, about $23 but a nice piece, you can TIGHTEN the wires without worry of breaking or stripping screws. Takes up to 2/0 on one side and up to 4 #4s on the other.
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The distribution boxes. Main to the left 50 amp. Next box contains another 220 breaker at 50 amps and two 30s to feed each outlet, one on each winding. This is so we can use the unit for prime power at our farm and emergency power at the house. There will be a 15ft length of 4-4 SO cord and a female plug hanging on the unit to plug into an RV recepticle on the back of the house and a mechanical interlock on the main of course. At the farm we will feed the sub panel same way with no grid power to worry about. The recpticles are for other generator duties we can come up with.
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Guess I have drug the Chanfa forum off topic enough eh? LOL
Quote from: playdiesel on April 27, 2010, 08:54:05 PM
Head off the 1115 as I am doing some research for the gasket guy. Should have a pair of his head gaskets any day for testing for fit, and durability
Did you ever get these gaskets? And I'm guessing you are talking about Gaskets to Go?
If you did get them, how are they?
Yes they came from GTG and they work just fine. The packages were marked S1100 and the drawing used to be on the Gaskets to go Changfa site but it has dissapeared.
Thanks, When I get my Laidong from John F I'll order a few spares.
The Laidong gasket is differant than this engine. The Laidong comes with a spare and looks to be very well made.
Thanks, Ya know I was afraid someone would say that. I assumed all 1115s was the same, no matter who cloned it.
Randybee1,
Those Laidong engines that JohnF has are very nice engines. From what I seen of them I feel they will last a long time.
Henry
That's what I'm hoping!!!!
Here is a youtube clip from John F:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S34ZCnWPXOE
Here is some more info about the Laidong 1115.
http://www.utterpower.com/laidong-1115-the-best-choice-right-now-article-by-butch-38c/
It's always fun to read George's and his guest author's musings at Utterpower, and the article by 38ac is an especially good one. The photo of the wooden "DIY commuter" car got me laughing. Thanks for the link hwew.
Playdiesel, Where did you get the 4 groove pulley that you have mounted onto the ST generator head?
Motion Industries for the pulley.