Changfa running in Listeroid territory :-)

[mobile_bob]

if you paint it any other color than green, you will pickup an easy hp or two



bob g

[Apogee]

Just finished reading the other thread that you linked to Veggie.

Very, very nice job!!!

It has my wheels turning now...  That's a very cute setup!

You also did the same as I was planning with mounting the gen head above.  That was exactly my plan to save space...

Excellent work!   

Steve

[NoSpark]

Veg, that is awesome! and so compact! I want one!

[rcavictim]

I worry about the stresses on the counterbalance shaft drive gears and bearings running these engines at low RPMs.  You can really hear them thrashing about in your 450 RPM demo.

I am building a vertically stacked plant right now with my Changfa 1115 and a 24 kW STC 3-phase head.  Stacked because I want to put it in a small room that already contains my Petter plant for the necessity of some noise control and I had to reduce the footprint. It is rather huge compared to your very nicely compacted design.  I have gone the metal and sand equivalent of a massive concrete block however and once completed my machine which is on 4" steel castor wheels will weigh about 2000 lbs.  Being purpose built for a need it incorporates a day tank for the fuel which holds three to four times what the factory tank on a 1115 holds with option to hook up a remote fuel supply.  That is almost as large as your entire plant.  I also fabricated a first stage of a neighborhood nighttime critical grade exhaust silencing system on board to replace the original oversized lawnmower engine muffler.  I should be able to pull  a worthwhile amount of heat off this in addition to that from the radiator for indoor winter use in the shop.

You do nice work!

[BruceM]

Very impressive, Veggie!  With a  micro-controller for governor and one of the Midnight charge controllers that would make a quiet, efficient battery charger! The governor could  back off on speed as current demand drops, and an AVR could used if needed to  keep voltage up withing range for the Midnight despite dropping frequency. Since the new Midnight does boost, it wouldn't need the AVR, probably, but a lesser and cheaper unit such as the Tristar PWM unit would .

[veggie]

rcavictim,

I would be very interested to see your residential grade exhaust system once it's built.
Being that I have neighbors close by, a quiet exhaust is important for me.
Especially if I want to run at night.

veggie

[veggie]

With a  micro-controller for governor and one of the Midnight charge controllers that would make a quiet, efficient battery charger! The governor could  back off on speed as current demand drops, and an AVR could used if needed to  keep voltage up withing range for the Midnight despite dropping frequency. Since the new Midnight does boost, it wouldn't need the AVR, probably, but a lesser and cheaper unit such as the Tristar PWM unit would .

BruceM,

Thanks for those suggestions. The unit was designed primarily for battery charging.
A 55 amp Iota 4 step charger plugs into the generator 120 outlet.
It's a very simple setup at the moment.

Your idea of a variable system is good because I keep running into the same concern.
That is....what happens when the charger flips into float mode and the engine load drops to 15%?
The engine could run unloaded for hours until the charging is completed.
A system that scales back according to load would be ideal.

I am running the engine a lot lately for two reasons.
1] Testing the WVO fuel blend.
2] Durability testing on the Voltamaster generator head. (More to follow on that subject)

So the Changfa has become a test engine for fuels, generator heads, and battery chargers.

veggie

[rcavictim]

rcavictim,

I would be very interested to see your residential grade exhaust system once it's built.
Being that I have neighbors close by, a quiet exhaust is important for me.
Especially if I want to run at night.

veggie

I plan to post about my project at some point and will include any details about the silencer system I develop.  I did make one years ago that worked out eventually as good or better than what one would call a Hospital Grade critical silencer.  It is on a vertical stack on top of my shop and when I stand on the roof next to it I cannot hear any exhaust noise, just conducted sound of the engine running in the steel pipe which is not audible a few feet away.  Getting that to work was a bit of trial and error.  I remember one setup I had coming out of the roof that had a brap so loud you could hear it over a mile away.  I could hear backscatter echo from it from every tree and house in my immediate neighborhood.

Perhaps I should manufacture this as a product for the kind of folks here and on Lister Engine Forum.  The quiet one, not the loud one. 

[BruceM]

Veggie, There is likely a limit to how low a frequency AC input the Iota can handle, probably not so low as you'd like.  (~20Hz)  Maybe in a couple years we can all  switch to LiFePO4 batteries, and then you just charge them, flat out to full, with only a brief low current topping time (often less then a minute).

[vdubnut62]

If Ya'll don't get off'n  the John Deere Green kick, yore a-gonna give me a complex.
Ron