So late this afternoon a Nordic Tug pulls into the anchorage we are in and about 30 minutes later, even above the 10-12 knots of wind and 130+ yards separating us I hear the distinct and annoying sound of the frustratingly popular Honda EU2000..
I immediately think nasty thoughts of people who use these things in idyllic pristine and QUIET anchorages and then I was forced to turn on some music to try and drone it out.
About 20 minutes later I needed to run the dogs over to the island for a walk and as I go by in the dinghy he flags me down.
"So sorry about the noise we lost charging off Ipswich and have no charging. This is the only way I can get some charge into my batteries. I will shut it off before 7:00 unless it is too noisy and I'll shut it off now. I have it here in the cockpit to keep the noise down and am trying to baffle it more with the grill cover."
Nice guy and he cared about the noise so I offered to take a look at it for him. After walking the dogs I grabbed my clamp meters and headed over. To make a long story short his factory stock alternator on the large Cummins engine was dead and not putting anything out at all. The poor alt is trying to feed a 460 Ah house bank (four Duracell/Deka EGC2's), a 4D starting battery and two 4D windlass / bow thruster batteries. This is all being done through an isolator with no voltage sensing other than at the alternator.
The poor little Honda was left feeding a charger that was pumping out nearly 80 amps of charge current into the house bank and another feeding about 25A to the start battery. We ran the start batter charger while I was there until the battery began accepting under 20A and we then fired up the house charger again and the generator ran without shutting down on over load.
The weird thing about the boat is that his "electrician" did some odd things in that his start battery for the main engine has no way to serve as a back up house bank nor can the house bank serve to ever start the motor. The thruster and windlass bank could potentially also be used but it too lacks the wiring to make this happen. Three total banks and only one bank that can ever start the engine... No redundancy at all and plenty of need and opportunity for it...He had killed the start battery pretty badly as this engine burns some decent current, just to run, and with no charging for many hours of engine run time it eventually refused to start the motor.
I gave him a contact to help him get it sorted out so he can continue cruising. I would have loved to help him but I am just too busy..
Oh and this nice "power boater" offered to pay me for my time and when I declined he gave me a nice and expensive bottle of wine...
I still really, really dislike the noise of these Honda generators but in this case it was a perfect scenario for one and he DID turn it off at exactly 7:00 pm and was VERY courteous and polite about it... I'll still leave mine at home for the sanity of those around me.....
I immediately think nasty thoughts of people who use these things in idyllic pristine and QUIET anchorages and then I was forced to turn on some music to try and drone it out.
About 20 minutes later I needed to run the dogs over to the island for a walk and as I go by in the dinghy he flags me down.
"So sorry about the noise we lost charging off Ipswich and have no charging. This is the only way I can get some charge into my batteries. I will shut it off before 7:00 unless it is too noisy and I'll shut it off now. I have it here in the cockpit to keep the noise down and am trying to baffle it more with the grill cover."
Nice guy and he cared about the noise so I offered to take a look at it for him. After walking the dogs I grabbed my clamp meters and headed over. To make a long story short his factory stock alternator on the large Cummins engine was dead and not putting anything out at all. The poor alt is trying to feed a 460 Ah house bank (four Duracell/Deka EGC2's), a 4D starting battery and two 4D windlass / bow thruster batteries. This is all being done through an isolator with no voltage sensing other than at the alternator.
The poor little Honda was left feeding a charger that was pumping out nearly 80 amps of charge current into the house bank and another feeding about 25A to the start battery. We ran the start batter charger while I was there until the battery began accepting under 20A and we then fired up the house charger again and the generator ran without shutting down on over load.
The weird thing about the boat is that his "electrician" did some odd things in that his start battery for the main engine has no way to serve as a back up house bank nor can the house bank serve to ever start the motor. The thruster and windlass bank could potentially also be used but it too lacks the wiring to make this happen. Three total banks and only one bank that can ever start the engine... No redundancy at all and plenty of need and opportunity for it...He had killed the start battery pretty badly as this engine burns some decent current, just to run, and with no charging for many hours of engine run time it eventually refused to start the motor.
I gave him a contact to help him get it sorted out so he can continue cruising. I would have loved to help him but I am just too busy..
Oh and this nice "power boater" offered to pay me for my time and when I declined he gave me a nice and expensive bottle of wine...
I still really, really dislike the noise of these Honda generators but in this case it was a perfect scenario for one and he DID turn it off at exactly 7:00 pm and was VERY courteous and polite about it... I'll still leave mine at home for the sanity of those around me.....
