My WFCO is taking a dump

So I should stick with wfco ??

All generators (pure sine or MSW) produce 120Vrms. The key question is what's the PEAK voltage. Pure sine has a peak voltage of 170V. MSW produces something lower. Converters rely on getting 170V. The PD is known to suffer if it doesn't get this voltage. You won't see 60A. The PD will charge your batteries at a slower rate.


There are others, but Onan Microquiet is known to adversely affect PD performance.

Sal

64thunderbolt wrote:
My onan 4K provides 121v ac and the conv starts @ 14.4 then after some time drops to 13.6. I have about .6v drop between the conv & batt.

My onan 4K provides 121v ac and the conv starts @ 14.4 then after some time drops to 13.6. I have about .6v drop between the conv & batt.

After checking all connections and fully charging my batt's it seems to be working fine. I'll stick with it one more trip.

Thanks, I was unclear about that. here is the Xantrex thing

"Many generators provide output voltage that is modified sine wave
(MSW) rather than the true sine wave (TSW) that your utility provides.
Xantrex does not recommend the use of Truecharge+ with MSW
generators due to increased heating of the charger."

Elsewhere they mentioned that output might be affected if the unit is overheated, but they might have meant it would be shut down, not that current would be lower.

BFL13 wrote:
The issue was that some generators don't make clean power while inverter gens do.

The advantage of an inverter gen is that it can run at low speed when minimal power is required. That reduces noise, pollution and fuel use. The shape of the sine wave ("clean" or not) is dependent on the design of the inverter circuit. Just like we have MSW and PSW inverters, there can be MSW and PSW inverter gens. I'd expect a good inverter gen making a perfect sine wave to work well with all chargers, but other inverter gens producing a different waveform might perform much worse than a non-inverter gen.

The issue was that some generators don't make clean power while inverter gens do. Xantrex had warnings about using their Truecharge models with 'some generators' too. ISTR it came out that some Onans are ok with PDs and others aren't. Been a while since those threads. Wayne D had some good info on that ISTR, where WFCOs were not bothered by that but PDs were. Maybe somebody can find that discussion.

BFL13 wrote:
ISTR there were reports that PDs don't work up to speed with Onans or some Onans due to wave form issues with the Onan's output. They work ok with inverter gens or shore power. Can't remember the details so whether it would apply here, sorry.

I have tested my PD9280 on an Onan CCK 4.0KW gen. It works great at any normal operating voltage (above 113 VAC, and I usually run at 120+ VAC). My PD has been modified to produce higher output voltage (14.8V instead of 14.4V), so it produces close to constant current for longer (to a higher final voltage) and still has no trouble. I had heard the opposite - that PDs had trouble with inverter gens, but I am very leery of some of these comments.

My Onan CCK is a rotating armature design, not a rotating field or inverter design, and that could have some bearing on my tests.

last summer our CG took a direct lightning strike to a utility pole frying several converters. I gave my brother=in-law a Progressive and a WFCO unit to see if they could be repaired...they could not. He did say however that the WFCO was much better designed and manufactured...a high quality unit...and he has a PHD in electrical engineering with patents for cell phone design....I think he knows what he is talking about.

My PD works fine with my Onan 4K. I am judging that it is good because it goes into boost mode for 2 to 4 hours, then drops to normal mode for a day, then drops again.