3000W Chinese Gensets Info.

Old & Slow wrote:


I have lot's of fun with my 'sound level meter' I set the speakers so the sound level of the Champion read 67/68, at that level for the Champion the powermate read 69/70 ~ pretty close. Don't you think? But is there kind of a ring or clanging sound to the Champion? My Champion sounds the same. Anyway, the test was real. Wish others would give us the same kind of comparison test with other gens and the Champion.

The human ear/brain combination is way more complex than a meter. Not only does the ear hear things differently than the meter, one person's ear will hear differently than another's.

As an example, my Kohler Klanker measures 67 dbA, as does one of the inverter generators at high output. Can't remember which (and it doesn't matter). Observers all agreed that the Kohler sounded louder, but both read the same on the meter's A scale.

The beauty of a meter is that it "hears" the same for everything, so we are comparing apples to apples. The meter does not hear what we hear, but it hears exactly the same every time, and produces a number that can be recorded and used for comparison. Not perfect, but consistent and impartial.

My radio shack gets checked yearly by comparing it to a lab-calibrated and certified meter at my former employer, and it is always within 1 dbA. Textbooks say one db is the smallest increment the human ear can discern. With old men, it is a little more.

I have also gotten different readings on the same generators, particularly Champions. I suspect that they, or their components, are built in different parts of Outsource Heaven over there.

Time and again, I have seen the same product made of different materials or plastic parts from different molds. Most recent example was a bunch of Coleman stoves all bought at the same time from the same place. When we set them up, we noticed some differences. During use, I checked a few, and there were differences in the range of flame adjustment, so I know the internals were not the same, either. I helped wash them up after the event, and laid the controllers all out in a row. Over a dozen of them, and there were three obviously different production lines or factories.

Champion will tell you that they have their own factory, etc, etc, but even if they really believe that, outsourcing, official and unofficial, is rampant over there.

No, I am not a Champion-hater. If I needed a cheap gennie at home for power outage and noise wasn't a problem, I would have one. I presently have a red contractor gennie that is probably as loud. Way back when I bought it, a Champion would have been a better value if it had been available. My closest neighbor (the one who hears it the loudest) gets to plug his freezer and fridge into it.