I walked out side and to my surprise I found that the UPS man had left me a gift, funny he didn't even walk up to the house, rather left it a few feet inside the gate.
I have been playing with it off and on all day, and yes I have already been under the petty coat. Must be two pounds of plastic right there.
I would like to show you more about how its put together and point out little things but I am just not up to the task of organizing the pictures right now. I will only post one more.
First thing to say is I have lots of Generators, even Hondas, To be frank I have stuff people would drool over. I bought this just for one dedicated job, Battery charging, and to get a rough idea on how it will perform ( it will work well cause thats what people around me use) under the conditions I will use it under.....Its a paying gig for me so a excuse to buy a new toy. Its a business expense that I will get to keep. I will be doing some paying projects over the winter, and while my system can run my house, in no way can it run my garage turned shop, and the associated tools i will be running. I suspect I may run up 400- 600 hrs this winter on this unit, just a wag.The gas is deductable for me.
So here is what I have found out so far, I am not impressed but i am not real dissapointed either. This is not Honda 2000 quality. This unit runs louder than the honda 2000. Not by much, I am not complaning about it but it is louder. I tested this Firman out with a 1500 watt heat gun and it works fine, snaps to attention right out of economy mode. At 1500 watts, it is much louder not a big deal, 750 watts to 1000, sounds like asweet zone for noise. Though at any level the noise is Fine, 25 feet from the house (when I am inside) and I cant hear anything, but I mention the difference just in case thats some ones big thing, if it is get a honda.
I am not happy with the brand of caps on the inverter board, and frankly I can wind better alternator coils by hand than is in this unit, but they did epoxy (clear) the windings well so even a slopping winding wont really matter, there will not be coil (winding) movement causing abrasion of the insulation.
So, so far i am not really complaining...now to the first thing I observed negatively. In the crankcase was oil, it looked low, but above the minimum mark on the stick. I filled the crankcase up to midway right between the high and low mark.
I could not start the unit, pulled and pulled and the low oil indicator kept coming on, ok then I added more, turns out I had to add enough to bring the level up to where it would flow out of the hole if I put more in!
But it started up and ran then, (maybe just my unit like this). Anyway I got it running, so no big deal.
After some use I shut it down and moved it to another location, when I went to start it, it would not go, I thought being warm that it would fire right up but no...it took a few pulls. On Honda's they fire up before you have finished the first pull (97% of the time), even on high hour 25 year old units. I also observed a little rough engine idle, but this is a brand new engine and still breaking in...so I would give it some time.
Here is one thing i would do to this unit if any one has one, is take the damn spark arrester components out and toss over your shoulder.
Too much restriction for my liking, and there is still a third screen further up inside. This was some US forest service requirement, and California State requirement, that makes better since on atvs, motor bikes and such than on small stationary gas generators.
Give a man a gun, and he can rob a bank. Give a man a bank, and he can rob the world.
Hmmm. For fun I went outside this AM and fired up the inverter. Temperature was +4, it took 2 pulls, and only just caught at the end of the second pull. Stumbled roughly for 10-15 seconds, then ran fine. I am much the same in the mornings.
Look at that first picture again, see the brown on the evergreens, lots of dead needles on all my trees from the little rain we had.
Voltage when loading the unit over its range stays steady at 120-121 vac. Unload voltage starts at 124 vac. Nothing wrong with that.
con- it does not have a fuel gauge, that's a handy thing to have.
con- the choke is too close to the pull cord and easy to hit with your hand (Pushing it in) when the cord retracts.
con- don't believe the db rating
con- you need to remove 6 screws to take the side panel off just to change to oil, not a con if this unit is just used once in a while.
con-sort off, the manual specs 10W30 oil for this unit, maybe ok for most of the USA, but not here where I live, 99% of the time I will be using this unit below 0 , I will be switching to 5W30.
Here is the spec sheet, Note it says 12 hr run time at half load,on 3.41 L of gas,.... not on this planet. I question whether it can do that NO load!
Take spec sheets with a grain or two of salt.
Brand
Firman
Depth
50.8 cm (20 in.)
Dimensions - Width
30.73 cm (12.1 in.)
Engine Displacement
80 Cubic Centimeter
Fuel Capacity
3.41 L (0.9 gal.)
Fuel Type
Gasoline
Generator Type
Inverter
Height
42.42 cm (16.7 in.)
Noise Level
54 dB
Number of Outlets - AC
4
Peak Wattage
2,100 W
Run Time at 50% Load
12 Hour
Start Type
Recoil
Give a man a gun, and he can rob a bank. Give a man a bank, and he can rob the world.
did a test today, filled it right up and let it run with a 500 watt load on it...greater than 6.5 hrs, I say greater caused I missed when it did run out of fuel, but I know it made it to 6.5 hrs. Nothing wrong with that, that's roughly .52 liters a hour at 500 watts.
Had a visitor over who has over 9000hrs running Honda 2000s and he concurs...its louder than a Honda, If I had to guess I would say 60-61db.
Give a man a gun, and he can rob a bank. Give a man a bank, and he can rob the world.
Another test run done. This one a full 7 hours. 2 hours 20 minutes at 1000 watts, 4 hours 40 minutes at 400 watts.
All measurments done with a killowatt meter. Only thing different was I filled the tank right to the rim, over the fill mark that is on the strainer basket. So this must be 50 ml more fuel than before, but could be as much as 100ml.So maybe 3.5 liters total.
Give a man a gun, and he can rob a bank. Give a man a bank, and he can rob the world.
in another thread I posted the repair manual for a Honda 2000 inverter. https://halcyontimes.files.wordpress.com/2012/10/eu2000i-repair-manual.pdf This manual has a schematic for the Honda, my unit (Firman) came with a manual but no schematic. In looking at the wiring inside the firman I can tell that it is wired up the same way. I suspect all units are likely the same. What I have been able to determine is that these units have a paralling feature, and from the literature each manufacturer says you can hook up a identical unit to double your power.
From what I see with the schematic is they are doing nothing more than locking rotors right off the 120 volt line, in other words, no communication protocals, handshaking, or other proprietary communication between the two units.......So this means you dont have to stick to matching brands. I could parallel a Honda up to my Firman, or other brand. Naturally they wont tell you this because each manufacturer will want to sell you another unit, but this is handy to know if your in a pinch and need more power.
Give a man a gun, and he can rob a bank. Give a man a bank, and he can rob the world.
I am around 60 hrs on this unit, broke in now and should be running fine.....its not. twice now I have left it running only to return and find that it has shut itself off. Checked the usual suspects....low oil, out of gas, not sitting level, couldn't find any reason for it to quit. Both times I started it up and away it went.(yes fresh gas)
tonight it happened a third time, I was home this time and caught it in the act. I had about a 350 watt load on it, it had been running this load for about 3 hours when I could hear the engine start to stumble and surge, this went on for 5-8 minutes or so, I threw on another 500 watt load to see what it would do and the unit stalled right out. I fired it up again and away it went. Its running fine at the moment, I will have to do some thinking....
Give a man a gun, and he can rob a bank. Give a man a bank, and he can rob the world.
Thanks for the update Peppercorn. You've made some interesting comments. How about value? Would you have [aid a premium price for the Honda, or stay with the Firman?
Mine is a different unit (as you know), but mine has started on less than one pull every time. I guess I should count myself lucky...
None you improvise, one (or more) is luxury.
Thanks for the update Peppercorn. You've made some interesting comments. How about value? Would you have [aid a premium price for the Honda, or stay with the Firman?
Mine is a different unit (as you know), but mine has started on less than one pull every time. I guess I should count myself lucky...
Well so far I still would have stayed with the firman, 700 more for a Honda eu2000 is enough to buy me firewood to heat my home for 2 years, so for a non critical application like I am using it for its getting the job done and saving a good bit in fuel. The only issue I really fault right now is the random stopping of the unit, this may take me a while to figure out as its so random.
Give a man a gun, and he can rob a bank. Give a man a bank, and he can rob the world.
I may have figured out the random stopping of the engine, its a little to soon to say but I think I have it solved.
Once I started this unit up and everything looked good, I went in the house and about a hour later I noticed the charger wasn't charging but I could hear the generator running. I went out to look at the generator and the engine was running but the little green light that indicated it was putting out 120v ac was off.
I shut it off, restarted the engine and the 120vac output came back on. Don't know what was up, as this only happened once. I will assume it was a one off.
Good news is at -12 the unit fired right up on 2 pulls of the cord, needed to let it run a bit on choke then all was good.
Give a man a gun, and he can rob a bank. Give a man a bank, and he can rob the world.
Ok, I think I figured out why the engine would sometimes quit (3 times). The gas cap of all things looks to be the culprit. There is a lever on the cap that needs to be put in the "open" position when the unit is running. I of course had it in the open position, I could even blow through the cap with my mouth to confirm that it was open, but with the cap removed the engine has not shut off. I am suspecting the tolerances are just too tight on the cap, nothing a 1/8 inch drill bit cant fix.
Give a man a gun, and he can rob a bank. Give a man a bank, and he can rob the world.
I love simple solutions. 🙂
None you improvise, one (or more) is luxury.
So with a small hole in the cap added this unit has been running along all tickity boo..I could still complain about things like the pull cord handle that's made for littler fingers than mine, but I really only care about fuel economy, and its checked that box for me so considering the cost savings vs a Honda, I am going to give it a thumbs up. Starts on one or two pulls down to -15 when sitting out side.
I am annoyed that they have a sale on these now, until the 25th of November they are 499 including delivery!
Give a man a gun, and he can rob a bank. Give a man a bank, and he can rob the world.
This has been a expensive month for me, I may not be able to afford Gifts for Sir Issac Newtons gift exchange coming up next month. Yes that means a second unit is now inbound....This one is going to be hacked though. I will rip out the inverter board, fix the RPMs, and rewire the stator so that this unit becomes a straight DC producing machine....and this begs the question why don't they produce such a machine to begin with?
Give a man a gun, and he can rob a bank. Give a man a bank, and he can rob the world.
Generator is here...I will operate tonight!
Give a man a gun, and he can rob a bank. Give a man a bank, and he can rob the world.
In taking this unit apart I am finding things that do bode well regarding its construction... Its hard to see as the picture is a little out of focus but all the wiring is nicely tie strapped in place, and you can see that even on the molex connector a tie strap has been added so they cant come apart. A nice detail, this isn't a automated process someone had to take the time to do that.
on the DC rectifrier right where the tip of the knife blade is you will note that they have added clear condom boots to the push on connectors, and I think a good grade of silicone ones too.
I mention these as this is something you will not see with a casual look over of a unit, there doing this where they could get away with not doing so.
Most wiring is sleeved for fire/heat protection. A little detail that's nice to see.
Now this is of interest...Standard ignition coil, you can see where a magnet would normally be sweeping past the two curved poles and inducing a pulse into the steel and thus the coil....NOT here, look out the back side of the ignition coil and you can see two wires (blue and yellow) these ar being used to directly fire the spark plug, I am guessing from the output of the permanent magnet, 3 phase alt. I suspect this is giving it a hotter more reliable spark, and easier starting when cold.
Give a man a gun, and he can rob a bank. Give a man a bank, and he can rob the world.
