Anyone have/use a diesel generator for backup?

[Cemoto]

Up here in the northeast a back-up is a good idea.

I've been thinking about a diesel rather than gasoline or propane because I could tie it in to my oil tank which usually has a couple hundred gallons in it and I wouldn't need to deal w/ refueling concerns on a regular basis.

Any thoughts?

Thank you.

Regards,

 

[Montosi82]

Sounds like a good idea to me but I'm far from an electrician. I use a small Honda for the basics but eventually will get a mat gas setup like the rest of the house but if I had oil I'd be doing what your suggesting

 

[CNGsaves]

If you're set on using diesel genset, you ought to read thoroughly the Steel Soldiers forum on military generators. One of those 5 Kw (ie 2 cyl diesel - - air cooled) are virtually indestructible and lots for sale at www.govliquidation.com auctions. Step up to 10 Kw and you could have all the power you'd need as military gensets are conservatively rated (ie 4 cyl diesel, so it will use quite a bit of fuel).

Guru's over there are diesel genset to the core.

 

[some zilch]

i have a 16k watt genny powered by a detroit deisel 2-71 engine. its about the only diesel genny in its price range id rely on to run for 2weeks nonstop if it had to. it ran 94 hours straight after hurricane irene to power an oxygen machine ( and the rest of his house) for an elderly gentleman i know. it ran on a mix of diesel, waste oil, and hydraulic oil and never missed a beat.

 

[ixlr8]

I have been going thru a similar debate, gas or diesel generator. For me, answer is dependent on how often you are going to use it. I was leaning to a diesel generator as I too have an oil tank and diesel fuel for my tractor. But I can buy a whole lot of gasoline for the premium it would cost to buy a non-Chinese diesel generator. We have about 5 power outages a year, most are only 1-3 hrs long, only once a year is the outage more than 6 hours. For me, I find it hard to justify the cost premium of a diesel generator for only 15-20 hrs of use per year. Now to find a quality gas generator without spending the amount of money Honda wants for theirs.

 

[MScott]

I use one with my off-grid solar system, but it is a custom built unit using a 3 cyl Caterpillar diesel driving a 48 volt DC generator. I normally only need to use it for an hour or two on completely overcast days when I am getting little or no solar gain. It operates at little more than idle speed and fully charges my battery pack in an hour or two for a cost of about $1.00 per hour.

 

[Mike Miller]

The water company I worked for had one, it ran on liquid propane. That way the fuel in storage doesn't go bad from sitting. Once a month it was set to start automatically and run for thirty minutes. If the fuel in your oil tank gets replaced on a regular basis agile growth should not be a problem, just make sure you have a good coalescing filtration system to keep water out of your engines fuel system.

 

[davidlee]

I have a 23kw diesel generator. I got it in 1999 and it has served us well. It will run our whole house(11tons of a/c) plus lights, refrig, freezers ect with no problem. It will burn prox one gal per hr under full load, which it is rarely under. It has a 40 gal belly tank and I have a 50gal portable tank that I use to bring the fuel home and transfer to the gen. In the case of projected bad storms I will have both tanks filled. Our unit is out behind the shop so we can't hear it run inside the house.

 

[boosteddsm92]

I've been thinking about a diesel rather than gasoline or propane because I could tie it in to my oil tank which usually has a couple hundred gallons in it and I wouldn't need to deal w/ refueling concerns on a regular basis.

I considered that as well and did some reading on using heating oil in a diesel genset. Not a good idea as diesel is more refined and has additives that modern diesel motors require. I suggest doing some reading on the matter and draw your own conclusions.

 

[CNGsaves]

I've been thinking about a diesel rather than gasoline or propane because I could tie it in to my oil tank which usually has a couple hundred gallons in it and I wouldn't need to deal w/ refueling concerns on a regular basis.

I considered that as well and did some reading on using heating oil in a diesel genset. Not a good idea as diesel is more refined and has additives that modern diesel motors require. I suggest doing some reading on the matter and draw your own conclusions.

Heating oil . . . = . . . . #2 Diesel

This is discussed ad nauseum at Steel Soldiers forum who are guru's on diesel gensets.

If you have giant tank of heating oil for your home heating (so sorry that you don't have natural gas . . . but that's another topic), then you can work up a pump to fill your diesel tank for genset.

 

[john11139]

We had a major storm last year that knocked power out for 7 days. I had a gas generator and luckely we were planning a ATV trip and I had 20 gal of fuel to take with us so I had fuel for a few days. You couldnt even buy gas, stations had no power and a few that did had long lines, waiting up to 3 hours to get fuel only to find they had run out. I checked on diesel gen's and they were really expensive unless you bought a China made one. I ran on to a light tower, like they use along the highways. The mast had been destroyed. It has a Kubota 3 cyl diesel engie. I gave $1200 for it. I uaually have diesel around. I could probably scrounge up 100 gals if needed. My dozer, back hoe, 2 diesel trucks and a farm tractor. Diesel can be stored alot longet than gas. Now power hasnt gone off since.

 

[nehog]

First, I have a military surplus diesel generator. Massive and powerful. Uses a lot of fuel, you don't leave it running if you don't need electricity! But very dependable.

Heating oil . . . = . . . . #2 Diesel...

And will continue to be discussed as well!!! Yes, IMHO, as long as you have proper filters, and add a lubricant additive you can use HHO in a diesel generator. If cold, you should also add an anti-gelling agent too.

That said, I don't use HHO in my generator--the why is simple: off-road (dyed) diesel is cheaper than HHO in most cases, and has all the proper additives already, or requires a minimum of lubricant added to it. Oh, to be 100% fair, my house is heated electrically so I don't have a HHO tank either (thought my daughter does, and were I to need fuel I'd grab it from her.)

However this is for a military generator, and they are made to run on most any (diesel type) fuel there is, including JP-8 and Kerosene. The manuals do stress that fuels that have low lubricity such as kerosene must have additives added or it may impact the life of the injection pump.

Another 'thought' is never, ever buy a 3600 RPM diesel generator. Make sure it is 1800 RPM. The differences in both life span and noise are significant to say the least.

 

[matt151617]

You're better off looking into natural gas or propane. Regular gasoline generators can be set up to run off of either of these for a couple hundred dollars.

Or, just get a gas one, a bunch of gas cans, some stabil, and rotate the stock through your car every few months.

 

[wingfootedgodhead]

Water cooled, 13.5KW diesel generator with Isuzu 1800 RPM engine here:

http://www.hardydiesel.com/diesel-generators/isuzu-powered-12-kw-diesel-generator.html

Reasons:

1. Very long maintenance interval (hundreds of hours run time).
2. Diesel is relatively easy to store with long shelf life (years with proper care)
3. Diesel is relatively safe to store
4. If you have diesel trucks or tractors - diesel becomes a multi-purpose fuel

Mine has a triple filter arrangement on the front end. Bad fuel is about the only thing that can shut one of these diesel gensets down.

Fuel tank is a converted 55 gallon steel drum.

With genset, fuel tank, exhaust, filter and electrical into main breaker - I figure I have about $9000 into the system.

 

[Cemoto]

Thanks for all the suggestions -

This is why I'm considering diesel.

My HHO tank is 20' from where the genset will go - straight shot.
When we do lose power it is usually long duration 2-7 days (I'm in a very rural area, up on a ridge, we don't get priority service).
Those around me who presently use generators ***** about refueling hassles, and the guy across the road runs out of propane after a few days.

I have a deep well, no power, no water.

Looking at some of the options you guys have suggested got me thinking if I went w/ a tank under unit, if that tank ran out, I could tap into the HHO as a back-up. Also, an HHO provider has an autonomous truck not relying on the grid, they can deliver in outages if need be.

Thanks again for the tips!

Best Regards,

 

[rlitman]

>Heating oil . . . = . . . . #2 Diesel...
And will continue to be discussed as well!!! Yes, IMHO, as long as you have proper filters, and add a lubricant additive you can use HHO in a diesel generator. If cold, you should also add an anti-gelling agent too.

That said, I don't use HHO in my generator--the why is simple: off-road (dyed) diesel is cheaper than HHO in most cases, and has all the proper additives already, or requires a minimum of lubricant added to it. Oh, to be 100% fair, my house is heated electrically so I don't have a HHO tank either (thought my daughter does, and were I to need fuel I'd grab it from her.)

However this is for a military generator, and they are made to run on most any (diesel type) fuel there is, including JP-8 and Kerosene. The manuals do stress that fuels that have low lubricity such as kerosene must have additives added or it may impact the life of the injection pump.

Another 'thought' is never, ever buy a 3600 RPM diesel generator. Make sure it is 1800 RPM. The differences in both life span and noise are significant to say the least.

Diesel cheaper than HHO? Huh? I've never seen that.
You can ask for diesel in your home heating tank though, and it will burn just fine, so if you want to keep a reserve of fuel for both, that's what I'd do. Most fuel delivery places make trips with just diesel in their truck. Lots of people/businesses with generators or diesel equipment get this.
I would do that, before putting additives in my HHO tank.

Totally agreed regarding the RPMs. I have an 1800RPM gasoline unit, and there is no 3600RPM generator, gas or diesel, that can compare to it.

 

[nehog]

Diesel cheaper than HHO? Huh? I've never seen that...

Off road diesel, not road diesel. I wasn't clear, and the difference is not that great usually, and not always in favor of diesel. Lot depends on the market, the off-road stuff is kept cheaper because the construction uses demand a cheaper fuel while HHO has homeowners who are 'locked' into a given supplier.

 

[geotek]

Question from the peanut gallery <---

Wouldn't diesel be "slightly" more expensive since it has to undergo more refining from the crude oil as opposed to HHO. Wouldn't buying diesel in winter be cheaper since the fuel prices "kind of" decrease and the construction equipment demand is lower? And in the summer HHO would be cheaper? Also buying and locking into a price before the demand spikes would save money, as well as buying in bulk (if you can afford it).

 

[nehog]

Comments in red.

Question from the peanut gallery <---

Wouldn't diesel be "slightly" more expensive since it has to undergo more refining from the crude oil as opposed to HHO. Where did you get this information? Wouldn't buying diesel in winter be cheaper since the fuel prices "kind of" decrease and the construction equipment demand is lower? Not that I've ever seen. HHO demands go up and diesel goes down, but they are basically the same (different additives, tax status etc.) And in the summer HHO would be cheaper? Again, I'm not sure why? Also buying and locking into a price before the demand spikes would save money, as well as buying in bulk (if you can afford it).

We're headed into that debate of the difference between brands of gasoline here, but comparing HHO and diesel.

Some comments on the web:

http://www.enviroharvest.ca/dieselvsheating.htm

http://www.ehow.com/list_5970492_differences-heating-oil-_amp_-diesel.html

and

http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20090315212226AAw9aFB

 

[rkevins]

we have a 60kw air cooled genset from when we raised chickens, it does use a lot of fuel. All the gensets we have at the hospital where I work are diesel also sized from 60kw to 2mgw. you need to compare the usage per hour in gallons to the price per gallon to determine the cost per hour to run.

 

[nehog]

Rule of thumb is about 1 GPH per 10-15 KWH, plus 1 GPH for overhead for each 40 KW capability.

My generator will use about a gallon an hour unloaded, and up to two gallons with a reasonable load.

Gasoline generators do use more fuel than diesels.

 

[rlitman]

Gasoline generators do use more fuel than diesels.

Yep, but gasoline can be converted to natural gas. If you already have natural gas, you've essentially got an infinite storage reserve. If you have oil heat, then diesel looks pretty tempting.

Generac actually used to have a system called bi-fuel, where the generator would start on diesel, and then move over to get about 80% of its power from natural gas. I believe emissions standards have put a stop to that now.

 

[nehog]

...

Generac actually used to have a system called bi-fuel, where the generator would start on diesel, and then move over to get about 80% of its power from natural gas. I believe emissions standards have put a stop to that now.

That Generac is still a diesel, it just is being run on natural gas and not diesel fuel. The concept behind diesel engines (compression ignition) is what makes them so efficient. A compression engine (diesel) converts more of the fuel's energy into motion and produce less waste heat.

Side note: I have some diesel engines that when idling you can put your hand on the exhaust pipe a few feet from the engine, the exhaust is that cool! I wish diesel engines would become more popular in cars and small trucks in the US...

 

[Rookie2]

keep it as small as possible, find your largest demand ,240v pumps, range or dryer and manage their use while on emergency power .

Do you have a farm tractor ? they make PTO generators.

 

[Engineer61]

Diesel's have three advantages over gasoline engines, and the compression ignition isn't one of them.
1) No throttle plate meaning that the intake manifold is always at full atmospheric pressure to push air into the cylinders instead of being under a partial vacuum as in a spark ignition engine. This is usually described as gasoline engines having higher pumping losses; and doesn't apply as much to today's turbocharged or supercharged engines
2) Higher compression ratio for more efficiency in translating cylinder pressure into mechanical energy.
3) Diesel fuel has more energy per unit in it than gasoline, no it's not as flammable/explosive but it does deliver more energy when it is completely burned with oxygen.

 

[nehog]

... the compression ignition isn't one of them...

Oh yes it is! Compression ignition is simpler, no spark plugs, and no issues with flame front and unburned fuel/incomplete combustion.

 

[ixlr8]

Oh yes it is! Compression ignition is simpler, no spark plugs, and no issues with flame front and unburned fuel/incomplete combustion.

Compression ignition is simpler, a good reason to own, less to maintain... but not the reason for better efficiency. From a strictly thermodynamic point of view, a spark ignition engine is more efficient than a compression ignition engine... at the same compression ratio. For the rest of it, Engineer61 is correct. Please don't make me dig out my 40 year old college Thermodynamic books/notes to prove it.