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My father just called. Said he just bought a 3500 watt gas generator from Harbor Freight. Something about it on sale for $199.00 and he got a bigger unit for the same price because they were out of the sale item. He's gonna use it solely to power his sump pump in the event of an outage during a storm. Anyone buy a generator from HF? Is so, how would you rate them? I've read the bad press on alot of HF stuff, and I'd hate to see that dad has thrown his money down the toilet.

So far the stuff I've bought from HF has been OK, but I don't think I'd ever buy a generator from them.

Nick, I have seen several posts on the SmokStak generator forum that seem to indicate some of the Chinese made sets are Ok for occasional use but don't last as long as other more expensive units. Opinions vary as to what is best but it seems that for small loads the inexpensive ones are OK but I suppose it all depends on the kind selected and the load placed on it.
Here is a link to one of the threads in which several of the different sets were discussed.
http://www.smokstak.com/forum/showthrea ... generators

Try searching on Chinese Generators on that forum, see what comes up and you be the judge. My opinion is that HF sets are most likely good for the occasional line outage.

I have a Chinese made Honda knock-off that is used when I don't want to fire up my military Onan PE95K or need all its capacity, like when I am on the road doing emergency repair work and need elec. power tools, lights ect. and it works fine for that purpose. Had it for several years and so far no trouble.

Yeah, I'm sure it will probably work ok for what dad needs it for. He's paranoid that he'll get water in his basement again. A few years ago they had an outage and they got alot of water in the basement because the sump shut down. That coupled with news from my aunt that they lost power for 11 days straight with that last storm. I think dad could've gotten away with a power inverter hooked to his truck, but I don't blame him in not wanting to run the truck to charge the battery during a storm. I'm hoping it works out for him.

Thanks for the link, I'll check it out.

It will likely spend more time sitting than being used and should be fine for it's intended purpose and occasional use. I suspect it will provide the peace of mind that he is intrested in having and give him one less thing to worry about.
During the last hurricane that dumped a lot of rain on us and killed our power my neighbor's basement was flooding and he ask me to start my Onan so he could "borrow" some elec. , the water in his basement was about to flood his furnace. After that he got his own set and never needed it but was happy just to have it "just in case".

The biggest killer of small 4-stroke stationary engines I have found is folks not worrying about doing the 10 hour oil change because the generator was "cheap" so they don't worry about it and almost invariably the things are shot in a hundred hours or so use depending on the load applied to them. Most of the Chinese engines I have had to work on are such direct copies of the Honda/Yamaha/etc. engines that the parts even interchange perfectly. The point is if you treat these engines well by servicing them at regular intervals you'll most likely get an acceptable run out of them. I run a Honda 1Kw inverter generator for light loads and I am restoring a Miller roughneck 2e for heavy load and welding applications, they will both be mounted in the back of the truck for vehicle support, civil emergency and maintainence applications. The Miller was poor when I got it, the Tecumseh was down to 40 psi compression at cold crank and would barely run, I adjusted the valve clearances and Lo - 170 psi cold crank and you barely touch the starter and it's away so a lack of maintainence on that one was the culprit - the welder/generator section is the next bit to tackle now.....

Regards - MM

Carter wrote:It will likely spend more time sitting than being used and should be fine for it's intended purpose and occasional use. I suspect it will provide the peace of mind that he is intrested in having and give him one less thing to worry about.
During the last hurricane that dumped a lot of rain on us and killed our power my neighbor's basement was flooding and he ask me to start my Onan so he could "borrow" some elec. , the water in his basement was about to flood his furnace. After that he got his own set and never needed it but was happy just to have it "just in case".

Nothing wrong with "just in case".....My snowblower was bought with Just in case in mind. So far its helped out at least once each winter. Also gets me some fringe benefits in the form of pies and gift cards from the neighbors when I help them out. I help the neighbors out of sheer caring, and don't do it for payment, but I guess the neighbors feel obliged to give something back, so I'm not going to be one to refuse.

Monkey Man wrote:The biggest killer of small 4-stroke stationary engines I have found is folks not worrying about doing the 10 hour oil change because the generator was "cheap" so they don't worry about it and almost invariably the things are shot in a hundred hours or so use depending on the load applied to them. Most of the Chinese engines I have had to work on are such direct copies of the Honda/Yamaha/etc. engines that the parts even interchange perfectly. The point is if you treat these engines well by servicing them at regular intervals you'll most likely get an acceptable run out of them. I run a Honda 1Kw inverter generator for light loads and I am restoring a Miller roughneck 2e for heavy load and welding applications, they will both be mounted in the back of the truck for vehicle support, civil emergency and maintainence applications. The Miller was poor when I got it, the Tecumseh was down to 40 psi compression at cold crank and would barely run, I adjusted the valve clearances and Lo - 170 psi cold crank and you barely touch the starter and it's away so a lack of maintainence on that one was the culprit - the welder/generator section is the next bit to tackle now.....

Regards - MM

Well unfortunately my dad is the type to not stick to regular maintenance schedules and whatnot. He'll probably change the oil in the generator once a year and will most likely forget to use fuel stabilizer, but he's elderly so I guess he has an excuse.

Nick,

Most likely component to fail on a chinese Honda Knockoff is the starter. as stated by others, they are such exact replications, that a lot of times, parts will interchange. There are several different brands of chinese engine knockoffs, ranging from very good, to very bad. We (Kohler Engines, where I work) are shorly going to be in direct competition with them, as Kohler is launching a new line of engines in this range, so we have done analysis on them. If you PM me the info on the genset, I can try to find out who makes it and how it ranks, as far as china knockoffs go.

On a side note, if it does die, you could always buy one of Kohler's when it comes out shortly to replace it!

Well it is raining here in Monterey this morning, and since I live in the pines my power always goes out-usually in short duration. Once of my best buys was a 1400 watt power inverter for just such an emergency: enough to at least run an extension from my M to get the TV on so I can check the storm forecast while everyone else seeks power at the mall....
Gary

Cal_Gary wrote:Well it is raining here in Monterey this morning, and since I live in the pines my power always goes out-usually in short duration. Once of my best buys was a 1400 watt power inverter for just such an emergency: enough to at least run an extension from my M to get the TV on so I can check the storm forecast while everyone else seeks power at the mall....
Gary

Yeah I gotta get me one of them to run our fridge when the power goes out in the summer months.

Gary, you run a 230ci 6cyl engine to spin a 25amp generator to charge the batteries that power a 1400 watt inverter so you can watch TV? Seems like a lot of engine for so little output. Wouldn't operating a little genset placed in the bed of your truck be more efficient and use a lot less fuel?

Hi Carter,
No, I don't run the M when the inverter is in use. Once the power is back on, I run the charger out to the M to freshen up the charge on the batteries. Since I also run a 60 amp alternator, I can also take 'er for a spin to warm 'em up!
Gary

Ok, got it, my error. How many amps does an inverter of that output draw and how long will the batteries last before a recharge is needed? I never owned one.

And how much do they cost?

I don't have the figures here at work-I'll post those in the morning, but it doesn't draw much, depending on what you're trying to power up. I will say this: it's a life saver if you are remote and need 110V AC power-I run my drill, saws-all, (Wagner) spray gun etc. from it, and painted my entire cab interior using this setup w/o running the 230 one minute, and the M still fired up hours later once the paint was dry enough to move it....

This one is a dual plug (700 watts per side) and cost less than $100-details tomorrow....
Gary