Hey James. I really appreciate your help on this one. I did call around looking to get stater rewound but could not find a shop to do it within a few hours drive. New stater ended up being a little over $2100 including shipping. Maybe I can convince you to come back when it warms up and see some of my other old engines. Rob.
$2100 for a new stator of that size is a good deal. Have seen 5500 watt stators listed at $1000. Would love to visit. Wish I could have filmed part 2, but the pandemic had other ideas.
Would love to pick your brain about a few gens I’ve got. Where to find wiring harnesses?? Love your channel, I’m learning a lot and it’s really inspired me! Thanks for sharing your knowledge!!
Its good that you repaired this generator, and you did not just throw it away or salvaged it for spare parts. I like it when people use their brains to do good.
Electrical contractor for 48 years Used to furnish and install Generac They are for the most part JUNK Had so many issues couldn’t get good tech support or parts timel I switched to CUMMINS. Have installed well over 100 units and not ONE service call The reason they cost more is because they are worth it !!!!!
I watched this video and was wondering whether rewinding was ever considered. We have a shop here in town that will rewind just about anything. It's unfortunate that you couldn't do that because I'm certain it would have been a more cost effective solution.
I'm a volunteer maintenance guy for a Christian school in NW PA. It was built in 52 and has one of those kohler generators. Still runs. Automatic start on power out
I served on and aircraft carrier in the navy in 1968. As an electricians mate, I worked in the rewind shop. We serviced motors mainly however there is very little difference between motors and generators. One of the technical things we did was to dip, and bake. We frequently brought equipment back to life, grounds were a major problem and the dip and bake was a tool we used to rescue dead equipment. We would also rewind the equipment if the dip and bake did not work. Just a thought
Would love to get into that at some point. Just not enough time. I tried my local electric motor shop and unfortunately they want nothing to do with rewinding a generator :(
Here is what I love about James whenever a Tech admits they missed something you know you can trust that person! Good job James you are the honset Gen man!
?...man ?...okay here goes...Spiderman....Batman.....Bat Masterson....Bat out of Hell....(song). ...and Superman = James Condon.....(wonder woman has her place, ....somewhere.......?/
Back in the 70s I moved to Florida and bought a house to fix up. The first year I put in air conditioning with the help of my father who was a mechanical contractor. Couple years later he came down to visit me and we had a hurricane. Power was out for about a week. He was a big man about 290 lbs. And he couldn't take the Heat. The next year he came down and installed a huge generator that was plenty enough for the whole house. He said he was not going to suffer another summer visiting me without air conditioning. It was natural gas and propane. I remember a few years later another hurricane came through and I had a hurricane party and we lost power. All my friends stayed for about two weeks until the power was restored to the neighborhood. I never had another hurricane party I couldn't take all those people for two weeks.
I have a 22k Generac whole house generator here in Florida, pretty much a must have due to hurricanes, And after it starts up you can barely hear it run. The advanced technology on these things is truly amazing! Oh and as usual a really cool video very informative on troubleshooting a bad power head.
I haven't seen selenium rectifiers in a while. Where I come from, that stator would definitely be re-wound, re-varnished and baked, maybe for 500 USD or less.
I have an adjustable bench power supply that uses them. Its from the 50s and somehow still produces rock solid ripple free power. Iv checked it on my oscilloscope. Its smoother than my ebay supplies.
Thanks for bringing us along. And thank you Rob for sharing your love for those classics and the update. Glad to see you got it working and kept one from the scrap yard.
James and Rob thanks a bunch very interesting information learned today. Since you both knew something was going to need being replaced it wasn't as bad as you both thought. It was still a "happy ending". Thanks for sharing your video and knowledge with us. Ed
I recommend that you use a megaohmmeter when testing components that generate current and voltage, and only then can you see the true value because 500,000 ohms is not a short circuit, when you have an instrument that generates a voltage of 230v or 240v or 500v, only then can you accurately see if it is a short circuit connection, excellent channel
Very cool and what a killer deal on the Generac for Rob. Even if he had to buy the stator as you said. Was hoping you'd tune the voltage up a tick on that old Kohler generator too. Neat to see you collab or helping Rob out on this one.
Wow what a find and repair. Rob is lucky to have you as a friend. Now that was a great purchase. But I know nothing about these machines so I would/could never do that. So glad to see professionals at work. Thanks for the video's.
I like the yellow O ring for cooling the engine. This is what one has to do when original parts are obsolete. As they say, necessity is the mother of invention.
Great videos as always. While it may be a wash to get new stator and rotor, one would have basically a new 36000w generator for $5000, and last many many years.
The biggest gensets I ever saw were ten locomotive sized ones sitting in a row in a data center in Quincy WA. They were, of course, diesel powered and had constant heaters on the oil and diesel to make them easier to start. Beside them was a basketball court sized room full of lead-acid batteries to power things during transition to and from utility power. Their contract with the power utility made it nearly impossible to test them. If they didn't draw power from the utility for a certain period of time, they paid a huge fee because the utility incurred excessive costs to reduce their output. I believe the utility power came from the Grand Coulee Dam. Remarkably their biggest cost was cooling water for the computers and not the utility power. Across the street was a potato processor and they were trying to figure out a way to use their waste water for cooling.
Besides all of the plumbing,,, You would need an evaporative cooling tower,,, and a large air compressor to run heated compressed air through the tower and back out at normal psi to the data room,,, Easy Peezy,,, Can either be a closed or open system depending on ambient air temp,,, :-)
When I first came to Canada in 1979 I started to work with CFPL radio in London, Ontario. They had one of these Kohler generators, 5 kw single phase, as standby power for the studios. We ran it every week and I only ever knew it to fail once when a transformer in the control box failed. A part was obtained in less than a week from Kohler in the states and it was back in service. It was cooled by mains water supply and as I remember actually used the DC generator as the starter. The engine reminded me of the flat four's that Ford of England used in their pre 1957 Ford Anglia and Prefect cars. Terrible vehicles. Three speed transmission on a less than 1000cc engine . Had to rev the hell out in second gear and then phuts along in third. They figured it didn't need a ratio between. I begged to differ. Fortunately after 1957 they went to over head valve engines and four speed transmission. What a difference.
I was actually expecting you to disassemble the power head to see if the shorts and grounds were obvious and easy to fix. You have almost worked miracles before.
WOW! Told you it was only a matter of time! I don’t even know where to start on this video but loads of cool factor! Shame that old school Kohler lives outside but amazing it still works as it should considering that! How did he get the monster to and from his house? Ebay would be his best bet to sell this thing! Sucks about fees but there is plenty of meat on the bone! He could even make more money if he is willing to ship it over seas! He seems well equipped for this type of work (work truck). Bigger the machine the bigger the prize! You should be super proud as a teacher to see your students excelling!
Another great video! Glad to see a larger generator.. Just worked on a kohler 200kw last week myself.. These things aren't too bad as long as they keep all the electronic nannies out of them.. 😁
About the Kohler…I have a 1974 Honda EG1500 with the same type of voltage drop compensation…it still works!! That Kohler electric “avr” 😅 is the most reliable thing you can have! Basically those generators have the fields on the stator and the rotor is what produces 120VAC (yes that voltage is supplied to the outlets from the brushes 🤣). One of the fields is connected directly to the 120VAC through the bridge rectifier and the variable resistor (to tune the voltage)! The second field is the compensation field and is connected to a resistor, rectifier, and to the secondary of the transformer, where the primary is in line with the phase (phase enters one leg and come from another on the primary) and connects to the outlet! When there is no current consumption that transformer is not producing voltage on the secondary. No compensation! But when a current is being consumed that generates a magnetic field on the transformer, a voltage is produced on the secondary side of the transformer…rectified…into the field! And that compensates the voltage drop from current consumption! Old school stuff 😅!
Thanks for the look back in time. The Kohler unit looks like it has a magneto for spark as there was no ignition coil visible in the pictures. Additionally, the Kohler does not have a standard 12-volt system for recharging the battery. Instead, it has a step-down transformer and a selenium rectifier to capture power from the generator unit and uses that to charge the 12-volt battery. The Mitsubishi engine in the more modern Generac unit has a standard belt drive alternator for the 12-volt system.
Jim, I made mistakes like that a couple of times. One was, the test was running through an indicating light bulb; thus showing a short where there was none, and also through a voltage meter which showed a short also...Everyone makes a mustake; some people just won't admit to them.....BTW, I loved that little Kohler. A good choice for propane or natural gas ( continuous running, and no stopped up carb jets)..... .
Thank you for your great videos, they relax me a lot and help me forget the stressful everyday life. You can acquire a lot of knowledge through your videos. They help you to relax and are very instructive. Greetings from Germany. 👋👋👋
Good morning, James & Rob. An interesting video. A little different video that the normal. Field work on this one. Not the usual, like working in your workshop. The only difference is the size of the unit. Great job James. Rob, you choose the right person for advice on the generator.
I have a Koler 4 cylinder propane that's 7000 watts on a telephone company trailer that looks almost identical. That band in the resistor broke in half and caused mine to not make power at one point. Nice quiet unit, Thanks James.
Great share James ! I really like old engine .. That Hot tube is a piece of history that most folks don't know about .. Glad he got it up and going . Hope you and your family are OK through this Covid deal . I put up a vid the other day and were doing alright now ! God Bless you and yours .. ENJOYED
Very cool video today. I really liked the older gennys and the history behind them. Also the genny he used to power his house was really quiet. I'm happy he was able to rebuild the one he bought.
Really liked the Kohler power plant....I have 3 of them! 1 is fully functional, the other 2 need some parts. Slip rings for the second side of the 240 volts. They'd been robbed for parts before I got them. They have an auto start feature when hooked to any load source over a 50 watt draw, they start. Nice feature. Those selenium rectifiers STINK horrible if you let the smoke out!
I have replaced many selenium diodes Dave. The silicon replacements are a good deal smaller in size. You are quite correct in saying that the smell of failed selenium diodes is reminiscent of rotten eggs or Hydrogen Sulfide. Replacing them with silicon diodes was easy enough but It is wise to be aware that the max reverse voltage most seleniums would take was around 20 to 25 volts. In higher voltage applications they would be used in series. So using 2 or 3 in series was quite common. Each one had a forward voltage drop of 1V so 4 in series gave a 4 volt drop. This meant that the output dc voltage would be higher after replacement by one silicon diode,. I generally would replace the main reservoir capacitors as well. In older equipments some of the other components would be rated close to the max so it was always necessary to bear safety and longevity in mind with regard to those too.
We have the 27Kva unit at work. Have run for over 48 hours continuous a few times. Generac went to auto engines for parts availability and to be able to use a common engine across a large range of outputs. The larger versions use a GM small block v8. So only 2 engines to train their techs on, and less money spent on controllers, diagnostics/electronics and environmental testing/certification.
@@jcondon1 ... actually, Generac moved away from GM engines and went to Ford a decade+ ago. MId sized units were using the Mopar 3.9 and the Ford 4.2 V-6. Most of the larger units use the Triton V-8 or V-10. On the 4 cylinder versions, many of us techs pointed out that Generac had used 5 different engines over about 10 years worth of production, which caused us (and them) to stock too many parts. The factory claimed it was "more bang for the buck" to bulk buy 50,000 engines from the low bidder. Since we all bitched and pointed out that THEY also had to stock the parts, it's been a different story and hey have stayed with Mitsubishi. (probably 15 years now)
Sitting here at work on lunch break, I feel like I just went on a field trip. Thanks for that. I do believe we’ll have to school Rob on the finer points of youtube video recording though. Thanks, you guys 😁
Great video loved the little Kohler light plant. You're friend should put a Murphy shut down system on it though as extra protection for that little beauty
As far as checking the windings is concerned, I would consider using an inductance meter in addition to just measure the resistance as it helps in telling a short from a good winding. The heavy gauged wiring always seems to read next ti zero ohms…
We had a ‘64 Studebaker Onan 30kw genset at the small manufacturing plant where I used to work years ago. It had a Ford in-line six (a 230 I think) and it was set up for propane. I would clean and set the points, change the cap, rotor and oil and exercise it once in a while. Very reliable but pretty loud. Hard to believe how quiet that Generac is!
James its a pleasure/treat to see that Generac up and running smoothly at the end. It has a turbo to increase the combustion efficiency. The engine runs only at only 1800RPM. I guess the Kholer generator is also running at 1800RPM. The slower the engine rotates, the less noise, less vibration, less pollution, prolonged engine life and theoretically less fuel burnt . . . I wonder are there small 5KW/KVA generators with 4 poles available. Most of your mono cylinders generators repair videos have one piston and runs at 3600RPM for 60Hz, what if they had fuel injection system instead of a carburettor . . . I know carburettors are much simpler, but at the price of fuel per litre . . . Waiting for your next video.
I was wondering why not get a rewind... but the pinned message kinda answers me. This was my 1st look at your channel James, interesting stuff... I'll subscribe 😃 John, Thailand.
I see alot of those generic generators have a stator or rotor issue. I dont think there quality is as good as it use to be. I find good deals on these all the time but the cost to fix is not worth it. And there always somewhat new. 500 hours on the last one I fixed. $2600 in parts. Again at 780 hours it smoked the stator. And Im like you I do my research. Tested everything. Quality is not there best on these even the parts. Just found your channel its good stuff. Thanks for posting..
The older ones are better for sure. Gillette is a good alternative to Generac for larger standby units. The generator in this video was well made, but had no provisions to keep rodents out. Not a great design in that respect.
Nice job on the Generac and I waited to see if you caught that false ground issue. Yeah, that's happened to me as well, and I did it for a living over 25 years. Cute little Kohler too. I have worked on a bunch of those as well. BTW, one of those large resistors is for battery charging. Going from memory I believe it's the one on the rear / outside. As I recall, the cooling system uses gravity (heat rises) and not a water pump. Never saw one overheat as long as it was full. BTW, that 2.4 Mitsubishi engine has a magnetic pick up that usually needs adjusting, or there may be intermittent shut-downs. The PU is mounted on the rear of the engine and senses RPM via the flywheel teeth. Back probe the connector at the center (black) wire and the shielded (clear) wire and adjust to 3 volts AC while at operating speed. This is +/- a few tenths of a volt. Be sure to hold the sensor from turning while tightening the lock nut. If the sensor touches the flywheel, it will be damaged. (about $100 retail) Most of these came from the factory at around 1 volt and with an aluminum housing the readings got funky at extreme temps, then would shut down the engine. (RPM sensor loss, or similar fault) Making the adjustment solves the problem. Second note: A shorted or open mag sensor will yield a quick click of the starter and a "no crank" fault with a hard lock out. You must replace the sensor and adjust it again.
Thanks for the information on the Kohler and Mitsubishi. The smaller units I normally work on do not ground the brushes in that way. Learn something new every day. Glad Rob caught it.
On that old Koehler I’d recommend replacing that old rectifier with a more modern diode setup, it looks like it’s a selenium diode stack, which weren’t good to begin with, and are almost universally bad today. There’s no direct replacement for them, as they drop a lot of voltage, but there are ways of using zeners or MOSFETs to drop the voltage if the application demands it, sometimes the output voltage doesn’t matter and you can just replace it with silicon diodes.
PLEASE TRY THIS!. I see this is a year old but when I saw the debris inside of the generator end, I was appalled that there was NO screen to keep all that out. It may have been ok in antarctic or in Iceland. I would line the entire inside where debris can get in with a wire mesh or screen that have holes no larger than 1/4 inch. Don't make the hole size too small as it may effect the cooling of the unit.
When there is a dead short on the stator and you don't face this typical burnt winding smell you can check the leads for vibration damage at the frame or the housing. Sometimes there were terminal boards with hidden burn tracks to ground. When a rotor, especially those with sliprings, misbehaves you can check for faulty semiconductors like diodes (usually two of them) and/or voltage depending resistors. Also it may be that the rotor lost residual magnetism. In that case you can excite the machine by disconnecting any voltage regulator and aplying an external dc souce ( watch out for + and -) for a few seconds to the brushes while the machine is running. Everyime beware of high voltage. SAFETY FIRST!😁
I love these old oil engines. I wonder if a leather belt from a Singer sewing machine would work for this engine? It comes as a length of leather with a metal hook at the end, and you cut the belt to length and hook it together. I once fixed my mother-in-law's foot-pedal Singer with one of these and was surprised to find that they still stocked these leather belts at the "Sweep & Sew".
Neat JIm nice to see your friends small hit and miss engine. Their is a fellow from New Jersey that restores old engines like that, and brings them to engine shows. His you tube channel is small engine mechanic. His was from and old oil well from a Pennsylvania oil company.
I live in Indiana and when I bought my Generic 22kw and everyone thought I was nuts. Since I've had it, I have had to use it several times. Who's laughing now. I worked with a lady that had to be put in a hotel for 2 weeks because of an ice storm and when she got back home, she had $22,000 worth of damage due to water lines breaking, that convinced me.
I'd love one of those little Kohlers. Sounds quiet enough that a guy could set one up in the garage (obviously piping the exhaust outside) for a little backup generator.
@@jcondon1 That is very true. We approached a local motor rewinders who said that they don't work on generators, but could point us in the direction of a company who did. Rewinds can work out cheaper, though sometimes, and guess it depends on the construction method, it's cheaper to replace - Sad, but only too true. At a cursory glance though, I think that one could be reworked.
When doing some contract for the US Navy in the early 1990s was tasked to install a new 30 KW 3 phase Cummins gen set with a transfer panel. Installed same/ test full load and with pumping system. Worked great as loaded at 75% or less. Got a call 6-8 months later to come check the status and system out as to a system/ genset failure. Mice had eaten all the control wiring bare of insulation. A person checking the unit had left the door to the dipstick open and in one month the entire genset was just a pile of junk. 😞
I have one of those Kohler generators form the forty’s..... mine runs as well but is only 2000 watts but does work very well. It was given to me due to engine troubles but was fairly simple to resurrect.
Well if the rotor and stator had the brushes connected when tested they both could be showing to ground. You need to isolate each to test by removing brushes.
Correct, need to remove brushes to check rotor. Also, you might want to just set this 36KW aside and keep an eye out for a unit with a bad engine. That 2.4L Mitsubishi is used on a lot of Generac units, some with turbos some without. I work for a Generac dealer. I had a customer with a 20KW air cooled that had a shorted rotor/stator out of warranty and the customer just wanted to replace it with a new unit because at the time the new 22kw had a 10 year full parts and labor warranty whereas a replacement rotor/stator would only be covered for 90 days. The engine on that 20KW was like new so I removed it from the generator before it was scrapped and took it home. A year later a customer had a bad engine on the same model unit and for the same reasons as the other customer they decided to replace it with a new 22KW and scrap the Nexus 20KW. I took it home rather than send it to the scrap yard. BOOM, just like that I had both a good engine in my garage and 20KW Nexus with good rotor/stator complete with the Aluminum housing and all controls. Patience and room to store junk is the secret to life, lol.
My old employer had a office facility that had power backup via a brand new v-16 caterpillar powered generator.. I think they used it twice before they destroyed it.
Loving that little Kohler! We have a Perkins 4-108 diesel that we've been thinking of pairing up with a BKB 6kW gen-end. I always thought it would be a bit of an overkill, but that little Kohler now makes me think otherwise. Great little oilfield pump engine too! I've often wondered, was the engine lubrication system kept replenished with oil from the well? I know these things ran for years on end without a break, so it would be kind of difficult for a guy to come along and change the oil while it was running, and they might say "When the pump ain't running, the dollars ain't coming"!
Generac design criticisms. The generator and the engine could have been separate units, i.e., not connected to the crankshaft directly. For a relatively small additional cost, light duty thrust bearings, HD mounts, enclosed gears, so any compatible power head could be used. Also, to think about critter protection. Kohler. Honda in those days (50s) would have been tempted to build a 6 cylinder model. Like their Isle of Man screamer (250cc). Speaking as a dad: Be very wary of 'fame' James, it can lead to 'rookie' errors. Solution: do the initial testing off camera and include those 'near mistakes' as a teaching tool. It works because we humans need to give ourselves the time to think about one thing.
I serviced Generac for near 25 years and I have to say unit is critter proof if installed properly on a cement pad. What someone forgot to do is install the plugs where the factory has lift holes.... or an electrician drilled extra holes and didn't seal them up. That said, some of the older Generac air cooled units were belt driven. Some of the larger liquid cooled units were driven by a gear reduction unit to take advantage of the engine's power curve. Those gear units were problematic as they got older because few remembered to keep after the oil level. The belt drives did the same thing to address engine power.... and the belts were never a problem. OTOH, it's a proven fact that direct drive is cheaper to produce.
@@rupe53 Belt drive also loses another 10-20% of the power - I did a hybrid design for a Genie lift with a small diesel engine powering a massive alternator to recharge the batteries, and I was shocked at how much power loss there was using typical V-belts. Of course the toothed/cogged belts are much better but cost more. No free lunch!
@@redmondjp Generac used a special belt similar to the wide / flat ones you see on the newer cars. They also had spring-loaded constant tension. When installed correctly they lasted more than 20 years. Matter of fact I never replaced one that was worn out in all my time as a tech. The RPM reduction also made the engine's life easier.
2:30 lots of older mechanic stuff such as woodchippers and the like used to use the old "Iron Duke" GM 2.5L 4 cylinder engines. Some with and without a turbo. Of course those were older built, and had blocks made of cast iron. Looks like this one uses a Mitsubishi but similar in makeup. I wonder if this was done "aftermarket" to replace the "purpose built generac" engines. They show a 1.5 a 2.4 and a 5.4 as well as a 6.8L engine.
wash it out dry it in an oven and use some varnish to reseal the windings ...these low temperature cleanings and revarnishing make it better than new ... bit of time but well worth the labor
The Kohler has an L600 engine, which was used for a long time, and eventually upgraded to the L652. Great engines - 1800 RPM, quiet and smooth. I have one on a 7kW alternator, and I don't know where to get parts. I heard Rob say something about a place in Florida, but if anyone knows where parts are available for these old machines, I would appreciated it.
Strip it all down to components which is a big job but with patience time and prob investment you could get it up and running hopefully in full working order
the fastest way to check windings is pull the neutral bond and check to ground, it will check all the windings to ground at the same time. after that you can isolate them if you need to check winding to winding short, 99% of the time it will be shorted to ground if it's between the windings. i bet if you cleaned all the garbage out of the can you'd be able to to see the rodent damage, even maybe isolate the windings and reseal them. there are a ton of the kohler 5R's on the west cost still in service. they are neat, and very basic controllers, i've always wanted to put an electronic governor on one and see how it performs.
Hi James... Just thinking that there may be a winding shop that could possibly re-wind the stator on that Generac for less $$$. One that I am familiar with is C.W. Silver in Salt Lake City. I'm sure someone in the Northeast could do the work.
Great stuff!! You guys don't have any motor repair shops close by? Seems like it would be a whole lot less just to have it re-wound. Kudos from northern Vermont.
Hey James. I really appreciate your help on this one. I did call around looking to get stater rewound but could not find a shop to do it within a few hours drive. New stater ended up being a little over $2100 including shipping. Maybe I can convince you to come back when it warms up and see some of my other old engines. Rob.
$2100 for a new stator of that size is a good deal. Have seen 5500 watt stators listed at $1000. Would love to visit. Wish I could have filmed part 2, but the pandemic had other ideas.
Would love to pick your brain about a few gens I’ve got. Where to find wiring harnesses?? Love your channel, I’m learning a lot and it’s really inspired me! Thanks for sharing your knowledge!!
Its good that you repaired this generator, and you did not just throw it away or salvaged it for spare parts. I like it when people use their brains to do good.
Electrical contractor for 48 years
Used to furnish and install Generac
They are for the most part JUNK
Had so many issues couldn’t get good tech support or parts timel
I switched to CUMMINS. Have installed well over 100 units and not ONE service call
The reason they cost more is because they are worth it !!!!!
I watched this video and was wondering whether rewinding was ever considered. We have a shop here in town that will rewind just about anything. It's unfortunate that you couldn't do that because I'm certain it would have been a more cost effective solution.
I'm a volunteer maintenance guy for a Christian school in NW PA. It was built in 52 and has one of those kohler generators. Still runs. Automatic start on power out
I served on and aircraft carrier in the navy in 1968. As an electricians mate, I worked in the rewind shop. We serviced motors mainly however there is very little difference between motors and generators. One of the technical things we did was to dip, and bake. We frequently brought equipment back to life, grounds were a major problem and the dip and bake was a tool we used to rescue dead equipment. We would also rewind the equipment if the dip and bake did not work. Just a thought
Would love to get into that at some point. Just not enough time. I tried my local electric motor shop and unfortunately they want nothing to do with rewinding a generator :(
Here is what I love about James whenever a Tech admits they missed something you know you can trust that person! Good job James you are the honset Gen man!
I am glad Rob double checked.
@@jcondon1 It can be a good thing to have a second pair of eyes give it the once over in case you have missed something.
?...man ?...okay here goes...Spiderman....Batman.....Bat Masterson....Bat out of Hell....(song). ...and Superman = James Condon.....(wonder woman has her place, ....somewhere.......?/
Back in the 70s I moved to Florida and bought a house to fix up. The first year I put in air conditioning with the help of my father who was a mechanical contractor. Couple years later he came down to visit me and we had a hurricane. Power was out for about a week. He was a big man about 290 lbs. And he couldn't take the Heat. The next year he came down and installed a huge generator that was plenty enough for the whole house. He said he was not going to suffer another summer visiting me without air conditioning. It was natural gas and propane. I remember a few years later another hurricane came through and I had a hurricane party and we lost power. All my friends stayed for about two weeks until the power was restored to the neighborhood. I never had another hurricane party I couldn't take all those people for two weeks.
I have a 22k Generac whole house generator here in Florida, pretty much a must have due to hurricanes, And after it starts up you can barely hear it run. The advanced technology on these things is truly amazing! Oh and as usual a really cool video very informative on troubleshooting a bad power head.
Junk
I haven't seen selenium rectifiers in a while. Where I come from, that stator would definitely be re-wound, re-varnished and baked, maybe for 500 USD or less.
Thinking much the same thing here. Straight round to Holly Park Rewinds - Back in a couple of days, looking like brand new and ready to refit.
I have an adjustable bench power supply that uses them. Its from the 50s and somehow still produces rock solid ripple free power. Iv checked it on my oscilloscope. Its smoother than my ebay supplies.
500 would be an absolute steal considering it has about 25lbs of copper in it
@@MillersMotors The get to keep the old copper from the broken windings
@@erik_dk842 I never seen a motor shop hurting for money...
Thanks for bringing us along. And thank you Rob for sharing your love for those classics and the update. Glad to see you got it working and kept one from the scrap yard.
Bravo......Wow...what a gem ......first motor....like to see teardown.........cheers.
That was a really neat exposition on the oilfield engine.
James and Rob thanks a bunch very interesting information learned today. Since you both knew something was going to need being replaced it wasn't as bad as you both thought. It was still a "happy ending". Thanks for sharing your video and knowledge with us. Ed
17:47 very creative trailer out rigger. I never would of thought that.
I recommend that you use a megaohmmeter when testing components that generate current and voltage, and only then can you see the true value because 500,000 ohms is not a short circuit, when you have an instrument that generates a voltage of 230v or 240v or 500v, only then can you accurately see if it is a short circuit connection, excellent channel
Very cool and what a killer deal on the Generac for Rob. Even if he had to buy the stator as you said. Was hoping you'd tune the voltage up a tick on that old Kohler generator too. Neat to see you collab or helping Rob out on this one.
The Kohler generator is really nice. I'd protect it with a roof. Leave the sides open for ventilation.
Wow what a find and repair. Rob is lucky to have you as a friend. Now that was a great purchase. But I know nothing about these machines so I would/could never do that. So glad to see professionals at work. Thanks for the video's.
I like the yellow O ring for cooling the engine. This is what one has to do when original parts are obsolete. As they say, necessity is the mother of invention.
Glad he got it running properly! Interesting video on the antique stuff
Always enjoy your videos. We all make mistakes but when we learn from it that is the important thing.
Great videos as always. While it may be a wash to get new stator and rotor, one would have basically a new 36000w generator for $5000, and last many many years.
That was going be my reply also until the error in the rotor troubleshooting was discovered,, :-)
The biggest gensets I ever saw were ten locomotive sized ones sitting in a row in a data center in Quincy WA. They were, of course, diesel powered and had constant heaters on the oil and diesel to make them easier to start. Beside them was a basketball court sized room full of lead-acid batteries to power things during transition to and from utility power. Their contract with the power utility made it nearly impossible to test them. If they didn't draw power from the utility for a certain period of time, they paid a huge fee because the utility incurred excessive costs to reduce their output. I believe the utility power came from the Grand Coulee Dam. Remarkably their biggest cost was cooling water for the computers and not the utility power. Across the street was a potato processor and they were trying to figure out a way to use their waste water for cooling.
Facebook test their gensets on huge resistor load banks. 250 gallons per genset every month
Besides all of the plumbing,,, You would need an evaporative cooling tower,,, and a large air compressor to run heated compressed air through the tower and back out at normal psi to the data room,,, Easy Peezy,,, Can either be a closed or open system depending on ambient air temp,,, :-)
That flat head Kohler is really cool!
When I first came to Canada in 1979 I started to work with CFPL radio in London, Ontario. They had one of these Kohler generators, 5 kw single phase, as standby power for the studios. We ran it every week and I only ever knew it to fail once when a transformer in the control box failed. A part was obtained in less than a week from Kohler in the states and it was back in service. It was cooled by mains water supply and as I remember actually used the DC generator as the starter.
The engine reminded me of the flat four's that Ford of England used in their pre 1957 Ford Anglia and Prefect cars. Terrible vehicles.
Three speed transmission on a less than 1000cc engine . Had to rev the hell out in second gear and then phuts along in third. They figured it didn't need a ratio between. I begged to differ.
Fortunately after 1957 they went to over head valve engines and four speed transmission. What a difference.
James thank you for the great video also the education on larger generators. Also thank you for the extra footage. 😀👍
I was actually expecting you to disassemble the power head to see if the shorts and grounds were obvious and easy to fix. You have almost worked miracles before.
Nice score on the Generac 13KW,,, Thanks for sharing,,, :-)
WOW! Told you it was only a matter of time!
I don’t even know where to start on this video but loads of cool factor!
Shame that old school Kohler lives outside but amazing it still works as it should considering that!
How did he get the monster to and from his house?
Ebay would be his best bet to sell this thing! Sucks about fees but there is plenty of meat on the bone! He could even make more money if he is willing to ship it over seas! He seems well equipped for this type of work (work truck). Bigger the machine the bigger the prize! You should be super proud as a teacher to see your students excelling!
Another great video! Glad to see a larger generator.. Just worked on a kohler 200kw last week myself.. These things aren't too bad as long as they keep all the electronic nannies out of them.. 😁
I remember seeing those Myrick engines all over southwest Arkansas in the early 80s. All were still pumping oil.
About the Kohler…I have a 1974 Honda EG1500 with the same type of voltage drop compensation…it still works!!
That Kohler electric “avr” 😅 is the most reliable thing you can have! Basically those generators have the fields on the stator and the rotor is what produces 120VAC (yes that voltage is supplied to the outlets from the brushes 🤣). One of the fields is connected directly to the 120VAC through the bridge rectifier and the variable resistor (to tune the voltage)! The second field is the compensation field and is connected to a resistor, rectifier, and to the secondary of the transformer, where the primary is in line with the phase (phase enters one leg and come from another on the primary) and connects to the outlet! When there is no current consumption that transformer is not producing voltage on the secondary. No compensation! But when a current is being consumed that generates a magnetic field on the transformer, a voltage is produced on the secondary side of the transformer…rectified…into the field! And that compensates the voltage drop from current consumption! Old school stuff 😅!
There are companies that can rewind the rotor and stator and again.
That can save a lot of money.
Thanks for the look back in time. The Kohler unit looks like it has a magneto for spark as there was no ignition coil visible in the pictures. Additionally, the Kohler does not have a standard 12-volt system for recharging the battery. Instead, it has a step-down transformer and a selenium rectifier to capture power from the generator unit and uses that to charge the 12-volt battery. The Mitsubishi engine in the more modern Generac unit has a standard belt drive alternator for the 12-volt system.
We used to take large electric motors to get rewound when I worked in the oilfields. Its likely that could be repaired if you can find the right shop
WOW That is a cool hit and miss engine. Shopdogsam would be excited to see this rare oddity.
Jim, I made mistakes like that a couple of times. One was, the test was running through an indicating light bulb; thus showing a short where there was none, and also through a voltage meter which showed a short also...Everyone makes a mustake; some people just won't admit to them.....BTW, I loved that little Kohler. A good choice for propane or natural gas ( continuous running, and no stopped up carb jets).....
.
Thank you for your great videos, they relax me a lot and help me forget the stressful everyday life. You can acquire a lot of knowledge through your videos. They help you to relax and are very instructive. Greetings from Germany. 👋👋👋
The stator can be rewound at a local pump repair facility. Don't know if that would be cheaper, but worth looking into.
Pretty slick a LP turbo 4 cylinder.
Good morning, James & Rob. An interesting video. A little different video that the normal. Field work on this one. Not the usual, like working in your workshop. The only difference is the size of the unit. Great job James. Rob, you choose the right person for advice on the generator.
I have a Koler 4 cylinder propane that's 7000 watts on a telephone company trailer that looks almost identical. That band in the resistor broke in half and caused mine to not make power at one point. Nice quiet unit, Thanks James.
Great share James ! I really like old engine .. That Hot tube is a piece of history that most folks don't know about .. Glad he got it up and going . Hope you and your family are OK through this Covid deal . I put up a vid the other day and were doing alright now ! God Bless you and yours .. ENJOYED
Glad to hear you and your family are well. Had a little COVID in our household recently. All is well now.
@@jcondon1 Thanks James ! glad you folks came through alright to ..
Enjoyed the variety of this video!
Thanks James and thank your friend for showing us his antiques!
that was a good find,and fix,Great video
Very cool video today. I really liked the older gennys and the history behind them. Also the genny he used to power his house was really quiet. I'm happy he was able to rebuild the one he bought.
Really liked the Kohler power plant....I have 3 of them! 1 is fully functional, the other 2 need some parts. Slip rings for the second side of the 240 volts. They'd been robbed for parts before I got them. They have an auto start feature when hooked to any load source over a 50 watt draw, they start. Nice feature. Those selenium rectifiers STINK horrible if you let the smoke out!
I have replaced many selenium diodes Dave. The silicon replacements are a good deal smaller in size. You are quite correct in saying that the smell of failed selenium diodes is reminiscent of rotten eggs or Hydrogen Sulfide. Replacing them with silicon diodes was easy enough but It is wise to be aware that the max reverse voltage most seleniums would take was around 20 to 25 volts. In higher voltage applications they would be used in series. So using 2 or 3 in series was quite common. Each one had a forward voltage drop of 1V so 4 in series gave a 4 volt drop. This meant that the output dc voltage would be higher after replacement by one silicon diode,. I generally would replace the main reservoir capacitors as well. In older equipments some of the other components would be rated close to the max so it was always necessary to bear safety and longevity in mind with regard to those too.
Not only is that smell bad, the fumes are also quite toxic...
This was great! Thank you both for sharing! Love and blessings from Ontario Canada!
Things aren't made like that 1920s Motor No more run for years with no maintenance so cool 😎
We have the 27Kva unit at work. Have run for over 48 hours continuous a few times. Generac went to auto engines for parts availability and to be able to use a common engine across a large range of outputs. The larger versions use a GM small block v8. So only 2 engines to train their techs on, and less money spent on controllers, diagnostics/electronics and environmental testing/certification.
Makes sense.
@@jcondon1 ... actually, Generac moved away from GM engines and went to Ford a decade+ ago. MId sized units were using the Mopar 3.9 and the Ford 4.2 V-6. Most of the larger units use the Triton V-8 or V-10. On the 4 cylinder versions, many of us techs pointed out that Generac had used 5 different engines over about 10 years worth of production, which caused us (and them) to stock too many parts. The factory claimed it was "more bang for the buck" to bulk buy 50,000 engines from the low bidder. Since we all bitched and pointed out that THEY also had to stock the parts, it's been a different story and hey have stayed with Mitsubishi. (probably 15 years now)
Thats so awesome he fixed it sounds super Quite
It is. Runs at 1800 rpm.
Thanks to James for this cool video.
wow excellent repair and the dynamo seems as if it was damaged but in the end you are working well greetings from Mexico
Sitting here at work on lunch break, I feel like I just went on a field trip. Thanks for that.
I do believe we’ll have to school Rob on the finer points of youtube video recording though.
Thanks, you guys 😁
It takes a while to learn how to make watchable UA-cam videos. Just watch my earlier ones.
Love and appreciate the vintage engines,... Great video!!!
I don't know how I found your channel I'm glad I did and I subscribed
That's a sweet score!
Great video, learned a lot about the original generators!!
Great video loved the little Kohler light plant. You're friend should put a Murphy shut down system on it though as extra protection for that little beauty
Nice !!!! You should do service calls on those things !!!
As far as checking the windings is concerned, I would consider using an inductance meter in addition to just measure the resistance as it helps in telling a short from a good winding. The heavy gauged wiring always seems to read next ti zero ohms…
We had a ‘64 Studebaker Onan 30kw genset at the small manufacturing plant where I used to work years ago. It had a Ford in-line six (a 230 I think) and it was set up for propane. I would clean and set the points, change the cap, rotor and oil and exercise it once in a while. Very reliable but pretty loud. Hard to believe how quiet that Generac is!
This one runs at 1800 rpm instead of 3600 rpm. Makes a big difference on the noise level.
It'd be a great backup for the house and shop.
man that kohler is pure gold, you should restore it, it might worth a lot.
James its a pleasure/treat to see that Generac up and running smoothly at the end. It has a turbo to increase the combustion efficiency. The engine runs only at only 1800RPM. I guess the Kholer generator is also running at 1800RPM. The slower the engine rotates, the less noise, less vibration, less pollution, prolonged engine life and theoretically less fuel burnt . . . I wonder are there small 5KW/KVA generators with 4 poles available. Most of your mono cylinders generators repair videos have one piston and runs at 3600RPM for 60Hz, what if they had fuel injection system instead of a carburettor . . . I know carburettors are much simpler, but at the price of fuel per litre . . . Waiting for your next video.
I was wondering why not get a rewind... but the pinned message kinda answers me.
This was my 1st look at your channel James, interesting stuff... I'll subscribe 😃
John, Thailand.
Great video James, Rob has some cool stuff, thanks for sharing with us!
I see alot of those generic generators have a stator or rotor issue. I dont think there quality is as good as it use to be. I find good deals on these all the time but the cost to fix is not worth it. And there always somewhat new. 500 hours on the last one I fixed. $2600 in parts. Again at 780 hours it smoked the stator. And Im like you I do my research. Tested everything. Quality is not there best on these even the parts. Just found your channel its good stuff. Thanks for posting..
The older ones are better for sure. Gillette is a good alternative to Generac for larger standby units. The generator in this video was well made, but had no provisions to keep rodents out. Not a great design in that respect.
Jim, one day I think you should rewind a stator by hand, just because you can. That would be great content. Maybe not a 36kW stator though!
Like the piece of pipe or round bar rob stuck under the edge of his winch trailer as an outrigger.
Nice job on the Generac and I waited to see if you caught that false ground issue. Yeah, that's happened to me as well, and I did it for a living over 25 years. Cute little Kohler too. I have worked on a bunch of those as well. BTW, one of those large resistors is for battery charging. Going from memory I believe it's the one on the rear / outside. As I recall, the cooling system uses gravity (heat rises) and not a water pump. Never saw one overheat as long as it was full. BTW, that 2.4 Mitsubishi engine has a magnetic pick up that usually needs adjusting, or there may be intermittent shut-downs. The PU is mounted on the rear of the engine and senses RPM via the flywheel teeth. Back probe the connector at the center (black) wire and the shielded (clear) wire and adjust to 3 volts AC while at operating speed. This is +/- a few tenths of a volt. Be sure to hold the sensor from turning while tightening the lock nut. If the sensor touches the flywheel, it will be damaged. (about $100 retail) Most of these came from the factory at around 1 volt and with an aluminum housing the readings got funky at extreme temps, then would shut down the engine. (RPM sensor loss, or similar fault) Making the adjustment solves the problem. Second note: A shorted or open mag sensor will yield a quick click of the starter and a "no crank" fault with a hard lock out. You must replace the sensor and adjust it again.
Thanks for the information on the Kohler and Mitsubishi. The smaller units I normally work on do not ground the brushes in that way. Learn something new every day. Glad Rob caught it.
On that old Koehler I’d recommend replacing that old rectifier with a more modern diode setup, it looks like it’s a selenium diode stack, which weren’t good to begin with, and are almost universally bad today. There’s no direct replacement for them, as they drop a lot of voltage, but there are ways of using zeners or MOSFETs to drop the voltage if the application demands it, sometimes the output voltage doesn’t matter and you can just replace it with silicon diodes.
Nice James.....👏👏👏👏👏
PLEASE TRY THIS!. I see this is a year old but when I saw the debris inside of the generator end, I was appalled that there was NO screen to keep all that out. It may have been ok in antarctic or in Iceland. I would line the entire inside where debris can get in with a wire mesh or screen that have holes no larger than 1/4 inch. Don't make the hole size too small as it may effect the cooling of the unit.
When there is a dead short on the stator and you don't face this typical burnt winding smell you can check the leads for vibration damage at the frame or the housing. Sometimes there were terminal boards with hidden burn tracks to ground. When a rotor, especially those with sliprings, misbehaves you can check for faulty semiconductors like diodes (usually two of them) and/or voltage depending resistors. Also it may be that the rotor lost residual magnetism. In that case you can excite the machine by disconnecting any voltage regulator and aplying an external dc souce ( watch out for + and -) for a few seconds to the brushes while the machine is running. Everyime beware of high voltage. SAFETY FIRST!😁
I love these old oil engines. I wonder if a leather belt from a Singer sewing machine would work for this engine? It comes as a length of leather with a metal hook at the end, and you cut the belt to length and hook it together. I once fixed my mother-in-law's foot-pedal Singer with one of these and was surprised to find that they still stocked these leather belts at the "Sweep & Sew".
Neat JIm nice to see your friends small hit and miss engine. Their is a fellow from New Jersey that restores old engines like that, and brings them to engine shows. His you tube channel is small engine mechanic. His was from and old oil well from a Pennsylvania oil company.
I live in Indiana and when I bought my Generic 22kw and everyone thought I was nuts. Since I've had it, I have had to use it several times. Who's laughing now. I worked with a lady that had to be put in a hotel for 2 weeks because of an ice storm and when she got back home, she had $22,000 worth of damage due to water lines breaking, that convinced me.
I'd love one of those little Kohlers. Sounds quiet enough that a guy could set one up in the garage (obviously piping the exhaust outside) for a little backup generator.
It was very quiet
I guess size Doesn’t Matter Jim! Can’t wait for part 2!
Great design for a standby generator, perfect mouse house, come on engineers, THINK. Wish I could find deals on a generator like that.
Talk to your local motor rebuilder about rewinding the rotor and stator.
My local shop will not touch generator stators.
@@jcondon1 That is very true. We approached a local motor rewinders who said that they don't work on generators, but could point us in the direction of a company who did.
Rewinds can work out cheaper, though sometimes, and guess it depends on the construction method, it's cheaper to replace - Sad, but only too true. At a cursory glance though, I think that one could be reworked.
@@jcondon1 Then take it to someone not so local. Bear in mind this generator is orders of magnitude larger than your usual suspects
Nothing like the old engines. No plastics...
The 4 cylinder unit had an old school selenium finned rectifier. I had those on my model trains as a kid in the 50’s.
Hit and miss
Thank you mick Australia
Another great video James. I would love to see/hear you explain what the “legs” of the stator are, and how to test them. Thanks again for all you do.
When doing some contract for the US Navy in the early 1990s was tasked to install a new 30 KW 3 phase Cummins gen set with a transfer panel. Installed same/ test full load and with pumping system. Worked great as loaded at 75% or less. Got a call 6-8 months later to come check the status and system out as to a system/ genset failure. Mice had eaten all the control wiring bare of insulation. A person checking the unit had left the door to the dipstick open and in one month the entire genset was just a pile of junk. 😞
Crazy the damage mice can cause.
I have one of those Kohler generators form the forty’s..... mine runs as well but is only 2000 watts but does work very well. It was given to me due to engine troubles but was fairly simple to resurrect.
It is a very well made generator.
Well if the rotor and stator had the brushes connected when tested they both could be showing to ground. You need to isolate each to test by removing brushes.
Correct, need to remove brushes to check rotor.
Also, you might want to just set this 36KW aside and keep an eye out for a unit with a bad engine. That 2.4L Mitsubishi is used on a lot of Generac units, some with turbos some without. I work for a Generac dealer. I had a customer with a 20KW air cooled that had a shorted rotor/stator out of warranty and the customer just wanted to replace it with a new unit because at the time the new 22kw had a 10 year full parts and labor warranty whereas a replacement rotor/stator would only be covered for 90 days. The engine on that 20KW was like new so I removed it from the generator before it was scrapped and took it home. A year later a customer had a bad engine on the same model unit and for the same reasons as the other customer they decided to replace it with a new 22KW and scrap the Nexus 20KW. I took it home rather than send it to the scrap yard. BOOM, just like that I had both a good engine in my garage and 20KW Nexus with good rotor/stator complete with the Aluminum housing and all controls. Patience and room to store junk is the secret to life, lol.
My old employer had a office facility that had power backup via a brand new v-16 caterpillar powered generator.. I think they used it twice before they destroyed it.
Facebook, Amazon, Google and Bloomberg all have had less than a year old Caterpillar V16's self-destroy.
At IBM we had Cats, Onans, a waukeeshaw, a stewart-stevenson, about 14 in all across the site. Emergency power for building egress.
Very cool video James
I keep waiting for you to take the next step in generator repair and start rewinding stators and rotors
makes sense to not buy a new one but to rewind this one! Way more economic!
Loving that little Kohler! We have a Perkins 4-108 diesel that we've been thinking of pairing up with a BKB 6kW gen-end. I always thought it would be a bit of an overkill, but that little Kohler now makes me think otherwise.
Great little oilfield pump engine too! I've often wondered, was the engine lubrication system kept replenished with oil from the well? I know these things ran for years on end without a break, so it would be kind of difficult for a guy to come along and change the oil while it was running, and they might say "When the pump ain't running, the dollars ain't coming"!
Generac design criticisms. The generator and the engine could have been separate units, i.e., not connected to the crankshaft directly. For a relatively small additional cost, light duty thrust bearings, HD mounts, enclosed gears, so any compatible power head could be used. Also, to think about critter protection.
Kohler. Honda in those days (50s) would have been tempted to build a 6 cylinder model. Like their Isle of Man screamer (250cc).
Speaking as a dad: Be very wary of 'fame' James, it can lead to 'rookie' errors. Solution: do the initial testing off camera and include those 'near mistakes' as a teaching tool. It works because we humans need to give ourselves the time to think about one thing.
I serviced Generac for near 25 years and I have to say unit is critter proof if installed properly on a cement pad. What someone forgot to do is install the plugs where the factory has lift holes.... or an electrician drilled extra holes and didn't seal them up. That said, some of the older Generac air cooled units were belt driven. Some of the larger liquid cooled units were driven by a gear reduction unit to take advantage of the engine's power curve. Those gear units were problematic as they got older because few remembered to keep after the oil level. The belt drives did the same thing to address engine power.... and the belts were never a problem. OTOH, it's a proven fact that direct drive is cheaper to produce.
@@rupe53 Thanks. Covers it all.
@@rupe53 Belt drive also loses another 10-20% of the power - I did a hybrid design for a Genie lift with a small diesel engine powering a massive alternator to recharge the batteries, and I was shocked at how much power loss there was using typical V-belts. Of course the toothed/cogged belts are much better but cost more. No free lunch!
@@redmondjp Generac used a special belt similar to the wide / flat ones you see on the newer cars. They also had spring-loaded constant tension. When installed correctly they lasted more than 20 years. Matter of fact I never replaced one that was worn out in all my time as a tech. The RPM reduction also made the engine's life easier.
2:30 lots of older mechanic stuff such as woodchippers and the like used to use the old "Iron Duke" GM 2.5L 4 cylinder engines. Some with and without a turbo. Of course those were older built, and had blocks made of cast iron. Looks like this one uses a Mitsubishi but similar in makeup. I wonder if this was done "aftermarket" to replace the "purpose built generac" engines. They show a 1.5 a 2.4 and a 5.4 as well as a 6.8L engine.
wash it out dry it in an oven and use some varnish to reseal the windings ...these low temperature cleanings and revarnishing make it better than new ... bit of time but well worth the labor
The Kohler has an L600 engine, which was used for a long time, and eventually upgraded to the L652. Great engines - 1800 RPM, quiet and smooth. I have one on a 7kW alternator, and I don't know where to get parts. I heard Rob say something about a place in Florida, but if anyone knows where parts are available for these old machines, I would appreciated it.
Strip it all down to components which is a big job but with patience time and prob investment you could get it up and running hopefully in full working order
the fastest way to check windings is pull the neutral bond and check to ground, it will check all the windings to ground at the same time. after that you can isolate them if you need to check winding to winding short, 99% of the time it will be shorted to ground if it's between the windings.
i bet if you cleaned all the garbage out of the can you'd be able to to see the rodent damage, even maybe isolate the windings and reseal them.
there are a ton of the kohler 5R's on the west cost still in service. they are neat, and very basic controllers, i've always wanted to put an electronic governor on one and see how it performs.
Hi James... Just thinking that there may be a winding shop that could possibly re-wind the stator on that Generac for less $$$. One that I am familiar with is C.W. Silver in Salt Lake City. I'm sure someone in the Northeast could do the work.
Great stuff!! You guys don't have any motor repair shops close by? Seems like it would be a whole lot less just to have it re-wound. Kudos from northern Vermont.