Micro CoGen.

Quote from: Ronmar on February 26, 2012, 04:19:51 PM
Was this one of the Utterpower "kit" engines, allmand drive pully and ST-5?  Or more specifically, one of the non-factory test run engines George was importing?

I cannot confirm that it was not run at the factory. Yes, it was spring of '04 and the package a joint effort between George and Joel: 6/1, allmand drive pully and ST-5. This is why I had initially asked if it would be important to perform any inspection: as Tom said I had my eyes opened to what George was finding out while my 6/1 sat on a pallet in my garage. What could be the worse case for a prospective buyer? Crank scored probably. Most anything else is pretty repairable.

Thanks Bob for the reassurance...

Good point on the value being somewhat regional due to shipping expense. While I'd be open to shipping, of course the real value is to an individual who can pick it up in person in what amount to a day's drive. For example anyone from NJ, eastern PA & NY and all of New England could potentially do that so that is quite a bit of population. When I purchased it, it was sent from the West coast and it cost a chunk of change back in '04 and it is probably about double to make the same trip now.

So in the ballpark of $1500 is a fair price these days? I've no use for the ST-5 and pulley so maybe around $2000 for all? Yes I've seen a couple on ebay and Craig's list for double or triple that (and who knows if they'll ever sell) and I'm not in the least interested in chasing that.

The engine is located in NH. Does the location in the US really have a bearing on this (outside of AK and HI)?

This thread was not intended to serve as a sneaky "for sale" thread. I can understand where someone might be interested. However if this does not continue on the intended path then out of respect for the forum I will delete it.

Ed

Sad to say I've not been very active on this forum. Really the biggest reason is due to health issues for the past several years. After a serious illness I joined the forum in 2010 in hopes of sorting out my backup genset woes (my gear had already been laying around in a unheated garage for several years and had accumulated some surface rust). The good news is that I now have a Changfa genset. The bad new is that the Listeroid that drew me toward this DIY effort will likely not ever get finished (by me). I have decided to move the Listeroid down the road. In doing so I'm undecided as to just (1) list the 6/1, ST5 and pulley as-is which are as received from Joel - not checked for sand or run-in to further embed anything that could be there or (2) perform some sort of rudimentary inspection of crank journals, etc to verify some degree of integrity for the benefit of the "kit" builder. I am not prepared to carefully rebuild this thing just to sell it. I'm not interested in getting rich off this as some appear to on ebay but rather to get my money back and reclaim the space.

Anyone willing to lend a sentence or two of advice would be much appreciated. Thanks, Ed

I just traveled through NYC to NJ and just about had to wear sunglasses at 2:00AM while traveling on the NJ Turnpike when traveling southbound with the city on my left and refineries and Newark airport on my right. Good thing they're taking away my 100 watt bulbs 

Nice work on your pulley design. I really like the way you've thought ahead with that dual-rpm genhead operation. I see Mike's names salted throughout this forum as a pulley/machinist resource. Seem like a good name to have in your back pocket. Is he a member?

Hi Flywheel,

Old thread yes, but it was this thread that brought me to this forum in the first place while looking for more information on this engine. I saw it on Surplus Center's web site, entered the part number into Google and here I am 

Actually it wasn't quite that direct... I lurked for about a week sponging up everything I could and eventually registered. So what can you tell us about this engine - do you have a specific purpose for it? If I were interested it would probably be for a belt drive genset like I'm seeing done with the Cat and Perkins. Does your owners manual have some decent technical info? I was wondering whether the torque curve peaked in the mid 2000s like most engines in this class. Probably wouldn't be very happy @ 1800RPM

I also am looking to build a Diesel driven hydraulic power unit, need about 10HP for the application and that could be another possibility for justifying one of these.

Ed

The name is Ed (yes, like the horse if you will - 'been hearing that since grade school  ).

I found this board while using Google in an attempt to turn up some information on the Yanmar 2TNV70-PGA diesel engine at Surplus Center. I then proceeded to read a lot of the material here over the past week and have to conclude you folks do some very nice work on a variety of interesting themes so I registered.

I live in the densely populated northeast region of the US but surprisingly managed to find myself a rural pocket only minutes from a city of 100K on which I was able to afford some land and built on it about five years ago. I heat exclusively with wood and that is my primary renewable energy resource not being particularly well situated for solar, wind, hydro, etc. I do enjoy the felling and the hours spent outdoors in this world where children largely no longer go outdoors. We'll see how I feel about that in another ten or more years! My interest in the general theme of this forum is primarily for back up power. It seems as if power outages are becoming more frequent with the wind and ice storms we've been getting. Furthermore living in a rural setting and to make matters worse down a long driveway with many poles, I am afraid I am relatively low on the power companies' priority list so outages for the better part of a week are becoming annual events.

So on to the subject of a proper diesel genset. As I mentioned I was looking into the Yanmar. What I didn't mention was my Listeroid history - which is quite a story. As I was building the house and surfing the web I stumbled upon an "Utter" site. Yes, I drank the kool-aid. Then comes the unfortunate series of events. Soon after I received a certificate of occupancy for the new home, I received the boot from my employer of 20+ years. Living in a 85-90% finished home and dealing with financial matters killed 12-18 months. Then I became very ill and unable to work whatsoever. I was not properly diagnosed for seven months and when I was I learned I had a rare disease. Fast forward through more detail than you need to hear and I can report I completed a 2-year course of chemotherapy in December of 2009 and the disease is in remission. Oh, did I mention the Listeroid is still in the garage?

Let me say straight out that I can now see I was naive in approaching the Listeroids. However I was always with the understanding I would have to weld frames, tinker with governors, remove or replace poor quality panel meters on ST generators and still be saddled with a very less than automatic, low powered genset that could maim or kill if someone with a necktie decided to tangle with it. What I did not appreciate is that I would really have to detail strip and measure, possibly re-machine and reassemble every last part in order to assure myself of a decent degree of reliability. Now I do.

While I'm fascinated by this stuff I'd like a generator that works - not a hobby diesel. I'm not crying over the Listeroid. If I spent the time and expense blueprinting it like some of the talented forum members here have done and it poked a rod through the crankcase at 126 hours I might though. So that is where I'm at -  a decision point. Do I proceed along this course or switch strategies to a modern diesel or perhaps purchase one of the few straggler Changfoids out there as middle ground? I'm not sure that's really a question I posing though because I think the real answer is that is only something we can answer for ourselves. With the excellent collective experience posted on this forum I can probably make up my own mind.