A proper suicide cable.

[TimSR2]

Veggie,

in your schematic t2 and t3 tied together are your neutral.  (white wire) T1 and T4 are your red and black.   Now you are on 120/240, call it 110 / 220 if you like it is the same thing.    2@120 is 240v on a 4 wire generator!
  Your green wire is your ground and should be bonded to the case of your genset housing or frame . Put in a ground rod if you have a stationary set especially important if you are on belt drive.  (ever heard of a van de graaf generator? ) Some people bond it to the neutral. Everybody likes to argue this point.   If I have no ground rod I bond it to neutral too. In any case your ground and neutral are bonded at your house main service as a matter of course.

Tim

[TimSR2]

Veggie ,

After reviewing the back of your 4 kw gen head I see the problem. You have a 220 volt connector there. It has only T1, T4 and GROUND.  The center tap is not available for 110volt loads with this connector. You will have to change this out if you want to power 110 and/or 220 volt loads via the Dryer cable method. Reconnect it internally. Use a strain relief bushing to a length of 12/4 cabtire flex cable to a 120/240v 30A twistlock female connector. Use this wiring schedule T1 black  T2/3 to white, T4 to red. Green to generator case.  Remember 11/220 and 120/240 are the same thing! Just a different way of describing them. I use them interchangeably.

Tim

[veggie]

Jens,

The schematic is for my newer model with the 20A, L14-20R 240volt connector.
I think Tim is referring to my older model (Picture) when he describes rewiring the 240V side of the unit.

Veggie

[TimSR2]

Yup, Jens is right on this one. That would definitely be a 1.5 Jesus Dryer cord. Or maybe a Siamese Jesus Dryer Cord....

Tim

[Henry W]

Scott,

Have you ever seen anything like this on the 240v side of a generator?
My older 4Kw head has two strange plugs. I am wondering if it can be converted to a single standard 20A, L14-20R receptacle like my newer model of the same brand?

Veggie

Hello Veggie,

That is a standard 250 volt 15 amp rated double outlet. It is used for 240 volt power tools like my Delta Unisaw rated at 15 amps.

A 4K gen-head is rated to  slightly over 16.5 amps @ 240 volts.

The reason they put that outlet on instead of a 240 @ 20 amp single outlet is because the 4K gen-head is not rated to handle a 240 volt, 20 amp load. And the manufacture did not want you to plug in a 240 Volt 20 amp load rated appliance or tool in the 4K gen-head.

I would stick with what is on the gen-head. I would also say you would be ok if that 240 @ 15 amp double outlet is fused to 15 amps.

Henry

[veggie]

Henry,

If I stay with the 240 volt, 15 amp rated double outlets, do you have any suggestions on how to connect it to a jesus cord, and in turn, to a dryer outlet ?

Veggie

PS: The funny thing is that my newer unit (same and also 4kw) make has a single 240V, 20 amp plug

[Henry W]

Hello Veggie,

A Jesus cord is a topic that I would like to stay away from. It is dangerous and I hate to see anyone get hurt.

About your newer 4K gen-head. Looks like the manufacture decided to up the rating to 4000 continuous and 5000 surge. That is probably why the newer gen-head has a single 240 volt 20 amp outlet.

Do you still have your ST-5? If you need to tie into the house that would be the one I would use. It would have more surge than the other gen-heads. And it would be capable to run a 240 volt @ 20 amp continous.

Henry

[lowspeedlife]

Hi Veg,
looks like we all agree on the fact that you have 240 volt gen heads. If you decide to put the 240 volt twist lock in your 2Nd gen set just make sure you fuse/breaker it at 15 amps & you should have no problems. Last time i checked Blast Wholesale on e-bay sold the generator end bell for your unit for about $30.oo.

Scott R.

[veggie]

Thanks very much for your input everyone.
Most helpful !

Cheers,
Veggie

[veggie]

Hello Veggie,

A Jesus cord is a topic that I would like to stay away from. It is dangerous and I hate to see anyone get hurt.

About your newer 4K gen-head. Looks like the manufacture decided to up the rating to 4000 continuous and 5000 surge. That is probably why the newer gen-head has a single 240 volt 20 amp outlet.

Do you still have your ST-5? If you need to tie into the house that would be the one I would use. It would have more surge than the other gen-heads. And it would be capable to run a 240 volt @ 20 amp continous.

Henry

Hi Henry,

I actually have a transfer switch, so the cord is not a concern.
My questions about fitting a cord was to enable me to convert the generator (the one with the funny 15 amp plugs) to a single 240v cable and standardize all my plugs. It enables me to use the genset for more applications. I was using the "jesus cord" term because it was already in use here in this thread. I got some good ideas from you and the others. Thanks.

Yes, I do still have the ST-5. I love it.

Cheers,
Veggie

[rbodell]

Since my house only has a 30 amp main, I used a three position switch. GRID _ OFF _ GENERATOR. You can't make a mistake like forgetting to disconnect the generator before connecting the grid or vice versa. It disconnects one before you can connect the other.

[jcyoungs76]

Posting here because i think it needs to be said , while #! the op was talking about an improvised situation and what to do it strikes me as strange that noone considers the suicide cord tripped on and live 220 on the end of it just to get you .

this is absurdly stupid akin to me saying here hold my beer and watch this  many times that has cost me a lump greater than i wanted at the least. Now i am just as backwoods as anybody here but survivability is the ultimate redneck trait and while loathe to admit it at least common sense must be an order . Now if the power were out on the homestead in missouri for say 2 weeks in 09 i would have
1) turned OFF the disconnect !!! 
2) locked out the disconnect
3) wired twist lock to 10-3 well pump wire ( what redneck dont have a couple hundred foot of this around )
4) turned off ALL breakers
5) connect bare leads to fuse box
6) plug in twist lock
7) start gen and bring necessary circuits online one at a time
Not to be a safety nazi but i felt somewhere something safe should be stated here
now i go back to lurking

[Mad_Labs]

A little bird told me that before he moved off grid what he did was:

He made the equivalent of a transfer switch with a breaker box. The only difference was that the breakers weren't tied together, so one had to be careful to switch the mains off FIRST and then flip the genny on. And then of course the opposite when switching back. He did it this way for many years and only ever did it himself.

He also said that he is happy he lives off the grid now and doesn't need to worry about it, especially as the power never goes out now. :-)

Jonathan

[mike90045]

My Midnight ePanel has a interlock breaker sliding cover, to only allow 1 pair on at a time.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Generator_interlock_kit     many images on the web.

[glort]

Those poor buggers working on power line repairs after a long outage must be wondering when some guy will unexpectedly fire up his 10kw genny and plug it into an outlet, forgetting to shut off the mains, and back feed the dead wires he's working on.

Yeah, that's one of my favourite internet parroted hypothetical 10 million to 1 gloom and goom senerios.
The more you try to hypothesise the conditions which would need to be in place if you WANTED to make it happen, The more far fetched and unlikley it becomes.
Why is it always a power failure HAS to have people working on the lines? I only know enough about grid power supply to know that line breaks are the only cause of power failure.  Then of course one has to presume that the generator  is fired up after the line has been tested and that no Short line has been used which i am told here at least is standard procedure.  Then of course the errant generator has to be capeable of energising many miles of line AND everything connected to it from all the neighbours and everyone else. I would think that the load just from refrigerators in one street would be enough to trip out or fry a generator when they all kicked in. But of course we must assume that the break dosen't occour in a neighbourhood to support the fable, the beckfeeding -will- happen when somoene dosen't have a neighbour for 50 miles or the other people connected between the break and the genny have nothing swwitched on.  Yep, that's the most likley thing to happen in reality although Convinently people like to assume the line break is right outside the person who has the gennys house. Yeah, that dosen't increase the odds of likelyhood any does it?   

And of course after we get through with setting the scnerio just right so we can off this poor lineman that add up to about a 100 million to one shot, that seems too great to take any risk although fact proves you are in more danger of getting killed driving to work, we have a look at that most inconvinent internet hype killer, actual reports of the event happening.  The US is a pretty big place so if this were anywhere near the sort of danger that it is made out to be, I assume there are hundreds of documented cases of this happening. I wouldn't know what to search for but surely with linemen being fried left right and centre as they surely must, loads of people must have links to it happening.  I wonder what sort of percentage in the fatality of linemen, back feeding home generators score?  I even wonder if it's happened once in the last 5, 10 or 50 years?

Yep, got to love the far fetched parroted fables of the internet that bear no semblance to reality and fact!