Cafnod

Known as a self exciting alternator. Some old sets had a small alternator belt driven off the big alternator in order to excite it.

Because the water cooled exhaust is quieter than a baffled or absorption silencing system. If I need to run the genset near other boats I want it to be as quiet as possible. It was much less hassle to keep the raw water cooling than to modify the genset.

I was not suggesting that a petrol engine suffered from running at light loads, it just seems pointless running a larger set if you do not need anywhere near its output, that is why, until recently I owned several gensets. A 4kw set that happily ran a 9 inch grinder, Hitachi 9 1/4 inch circular saw, 1800 watt router and similar large industrial power tools. A lot of the time I was using these I was running lighting as well. However if I were just going to be running a 600 - 900 watt electric drill or a jigsaw plus some lighting then I would take along my old 1600 watt unit that really belongs ing the science museum. Both of these are Hondas and both have run faultlessly for many years. The 4kw set was recently sold on this forum and I demonstrated it on delivery and have not heard back from th buyer. I have always used gensets sized to my needs. I cannot see the point in incurring the expense of running a large set for small loads. For 12vdc battery charging I used to use a dedicated DC Honda unit that switched between 6/12/24 vdc. It ran for hours on a litre of petrol and did an admirable job. I have recently sold this too, pending collection. What we now have is a 10hp Ruggerini single cylinder diesel which is raw water cooled. This drives a good quality 3.8kw 240vac alternator and a large 12vdc alternator. I will use this genset for both charging batteries and running mains equipment when we will be moored somewhere for a few days and our domestic batteries may become depleted. Installation of our dedicated genset. Channel section steel bolted to the longitudinal engine members and bolted to welded brackets on the swim plate. then two longitudinal members between these inverted L's with spacers and drillings to take the genset mounts (4 off, rubber). I used a filtered bronze fitting with a sea cock. A skin tank would have been far too much hassle and a mud box not necessary for the volume of water. There is a exhaust alarm on the engine if water stops flowing. On the outlet side the cooling water is injected into the exhaust manifold at the genset engine end and the resultant mix goes down a 50mm exhaust hose to a Vetus waterlock, then to a Vetus silencer and out to the world via a 5omm hose tail skin fitting. As the old loom had been cut I made one up using 8 way multiblock connecters and 2.5mm tri rated cable. That goes to the control panel inside the boat. Apart from plumbing the beast for diesel, for which we acquired an 18 gallon s/s tank the only other thing was to fit a stop cable on the outside control binnacle. All inall about 2 1/2 days work.

If it is an RYA course I believe their position on the evolutionary scale is instructor examiner. The next one up is examiner examiner. What they call the assesors of the examiners of the examiners I have no idea, possibly god?

Comparing the type of propulsion engine fitted to the type of generator in use is not a fair comparison. That same propulsion engine on rivers, against current will work much harder,and it is designed to be able to cope with these condtitions continuously. The fact that canal boats are often run for long periods under very low power output conditions does not make this either the accepted norm or even a particularly good thing for the engine. Most canal boats are fitted with modern Japanese plant engines, marinised by third parties, these engines are designed to work with a comfortable reserve, half to one third being the norm. If a set is rated at 900 watts continuous and it is being used at a third of this why should you need to use a bigger set? What size set are they suggesting you should use? I would have thought the one you were using was just about perfect. What I would wonder about was whether or not the cheaper two stroke sets were up to the rigours of day to day use. I cannot comment on that, all my petrol gensets for both AC and DC use have been Hondas, one of mine, 1600 watt is late 60's and still goes well, I ran it for most of my smaller power tool use in fitting out our boat. Anything over 4kw I have ran on diesel, usually much bigger sets, most were attached to a Gardner 6LX or a big Cummmins or similar, however the same equations applied, we certainly never kept a 75% reserve on our sets for continuous use and I have not on smaller domestic sets.

The 3kw genset will have the higher fuel consumption, load for load because the bigger engine is less fuel efficient and the bigger alternator will be heavier increasing fuel consumption too. In all honesty I would be surprised if anyone ran a genset at 1/4 load for any length of time, most of the time I use gensets at half to three quarters rated load, otherwise it is just not worthwhile running that size set. If I were going to only draw 400 - 700w I would run an 850w suitcase genset, no point putting the wear and tear on a big set to run it that light. So I would look at the sums at higher loads to see what consumption figures that gives.

Gas is more readily available as you say steve, it also gives a cleaner emission. Added to that all of us with enough room to carry a reasonably sized generator have a safe storage locker for at least two 13kg gas bottles. However there is the long term economic factor and the warranty issues of using gas. I have thought about it when I ran big petrol gensets but I am in the happy position where that is no longer an issue.

If you need heavy duty cables, fuses and isolators try Vehicle Wiring Products, not the cheapest but quick and easy to deal with and they have most of what you want in stock. Just what continous currents do you think you will be drawing BTW? Those little red key isolators take mains starter loads, our boat came with one and my motorhome has one on each start battery. Chris is right insofar as you should have the inverter after the isolator. Our inverter is run off a dedicated bank, isolator/fuse/50mm2 cable/inverter. Do remember that your cable run is the distance from the battery and back again, not just one direction. If your inverter is 7.5 feet away that gives a total run of 15 feet, you would be better off placing the inverter closer and running the mains cable from the inverter. 15 feet total needs some very hefty cabling to run 2500 watt inverter over that distance.

That is how I understand Moishas post too Bottle. Sterling sell a gadget that does this, I guess it uses diodes. As an alternative we have taken one alternators output straight to a bank of 2 X 110 ah batteries that feed the domestic 12vdc services. Fully charged our needs are met for about 7 days by this. The second alternator goes to a splitter and then charges the starter battery and a further pair of 110ah domestic batteries which run a 1850 watt inverter. This will happily keep the fridge and our fairly simple 240vac needs for about 3 - 4 days. It seemed the easiest way to do it and has many advantages for us.

Marks reply covers everything in a nutshell, however as to the type of inverter you buy that is up to you. Inverter/charger combinations simplify wiring and instalation, as they often give automatic changeover between the two functions when shorelines are connected or disconnected. However they tend to be quite big heavyunits and your needs may not be met by a combination unit if for example you have a lot of DC equipment you may need a large charger to keep the battery bank topped up when on shorepower but your 240vac needs may be minimal whilst cruising. Do bear in mind that if one component of a combination unit fails then the whole thing is out of action and will have to be sent away for repair, a friend of mine has had some real problems with two very expensive combis. We DO use an inverter, mainly for running a fridge and a microwave and a few power tools when cruising and it works fine, it is a good MSW unit and it has run everything I have asked of it. Gensets, well you pays your money, personally I would always put a scope on any that I was going to run anything delicate off.

Most of the European inland waterways are wider, deeper, full of commercial traffic and not safe places for narrowboats, there was an article in W/W a few years back on this very point, that is why the boats there require some sort of licencing in most cases. I think it is a bit like comparing the M1 to a footpath. Compulsary licencing would strike a huge blow to the hire industry overnight, resulting in a considerable loss of revenue in commercial C & R licence fees to BW, together with the DEFRA cuts it might sound the death knell to some parts of the system.

Hi B/R LPG is roughly 2/3 - 3/4 of petrol running costs, halfway between petrol and diesel. Engines definitely run hotter, and as you may know if an engine runs hotter, ie in adverse conditions, then oil changes have to be more frequent. I would imagine if Honda UK are reluctant to comment then they have not done the relevant research and development, which suggests to me that they are not interested in that area of the market. As R & D is a MINIMUM of 2 years ahead of market availability it suggests they may have something else in the pipeline. I am not going to comment on the cost of our genset, but I will say that it was very very cheap, it came out of a dutch barge on the Thames that was having a superstructure refurbishment and they needed it gone NOW. It was not outputting due to a wire having vibrated loose in the outlet socket, so it had to be sold as not working. So I sang them a song, took it home and fixed it and then fitted it myself, cost in steel and welding rods about £25.

We have an installed water cooled diesel genset with wet exhaust with vetus type water cooled silencers. It is very quiet and economical, however it is not cocooned yet so there is some mechanical noise even though it is below our rear cruiser deck.

Fully agree with you John, about opening the door to regulation, and where such things lead. I find boating one of the few areas where I can escape it, although each year that escape from regulation is to a lesser extent as more regulations come along. I have seen the same thing occur in the motorhome world where I was active for many years, owning motorhomes (self built and manufactured) up to 12 metres. One only has to go to any yacht club and the first thing people wish to find out is ones position in the RYA evolutionary scale. There was quite a funny piece on this very topic in this months Practical Boat Owner. Just to clarify matters about tuition I have held a class I LGV for a great many years, a car, motorcycle (both to IAM) licence and as a Travelling showman pulled up to three trailers, if they have not run out I also have somewhere, certificates for operating most kinds of plant as well. However as Daniel has expressed it, boating is something one tends to pick up, we did some very basic boat handling with a friend and when they were seriously ill, had to go and move their boat the obligatory ten lock miles, this turned into nearly a five month cruise. And yes accidents do happen, we were smacked rather badly by one hire boat twice in sucession last week, however all the courses in the world would not have helped, we were moored. The next day we were forced into bushes by another hire boat that was not properly controlled. I am not saying that it is just hire boats that do this, and most hire bases conduct BMF approved hand overs, which are to the highest industry standard. I would also say, in all honesty when we cruised virtually constantly, three years ago,we good do just about anything with our narrowboat but certainly not now, when we dont use it very often. And, the enemy of the narrowboat that we could never overcome was wind.

Hi Jon I did point out earlier that just to the NORTH of Banbury there is a secluded arm that is inaccessable exceot by water or road (if you know the way) It is private moorings, leased as a whole from BW and rented out by the leasee. Dont know if anyone picked up on it but IF the missing boat is in that area it is worth checking. There is also a mooring warden in Banbury itself and a guy to the north who does diesel and pumpouts, maybe called sovereign narrowboats, used to be a hire operator I believe, also there is the yard that used to be Tooleys yard right in the middle of Banbury. Hope this is of some help. BTW Tried PM'ing Trish woth the info earleier to get it passed on quicker and could not, dont know if there is anything wrong.