One more generator question.

Thanks everyone, I think I will just use the one I have and not spend the extra money for an inverter type. Like I said it would be used very seldom.
Safe travels to all.

I'll only fuss at you for watching TV powered by a loud 3500w generator. The only time I can see that done is in the infield of a Nascar event.

Do yourself a favor and get a small inverter for TV.

You run no risk of damage unless the generator malfunctions or is overloaded (and the voltage sags). A non-inverter generator outputs a (theoretically) pure sine wave, in as much as the waveform is generated by rotating a coil through a magnetic field. Distortion and minor noise from e.g. brushes can creep in to some extent, but it's still fairly clean. Were the engine governor to fail and/or the voltage regulator fail in the governor you may get too high an output voltage that could be problematic for some devices (though not a lot of modern electronics which have power supplies that are rated for 100-240V operation), but then again any malfunctioning generator could cause trouble.

The fridge electronics of a standard RV fridge would hardly care what the generator waveform looks like since they run on 12V power. The only 120V part is the heating element, and it's just a resistor and would work just as well on pretty much any 120V RMS waveform, including 120V DC. A residential fridge may be somewhat more picky about its power.

I wholeheartedly disagree with Bendorlarry. Making electricity the old fashioned way is the safest that there is. If either system suffers a failure, all bets are off, but in recent years I have had so much trouble with copped power things (inverters, transformerless converters and isolators) and the like running into aliasing issues that make something not work that I am rebuilding a 40+ year old Onan twin in spite of the noise because it is dependable and had a sense of humor. (It can take a little joke and not throw down and quit on you.)

Matt - Ship's engineer by trade and ex-electric machine specialist.

Non-inverter generator produces a natural sine wave and will generally run all things fine. Although some wave distortion can be induced from the system depending on such things as power factor and voltage regulation. Still a fridge or tv will run fine.

If you are worried frequency or voltage fluctuations with a conventional generator, couldn't you just use a power monitor like a lot of us use when we plug into a pedistal? Mine monitors for over/under frequency and under/over voltage. If the conventional generator is running correctly, it's sine wave should be pretty good.

Will one of the naysayers explain how a laptop powered by a wall adapter can be damaged by 120 volt 60 cycle alternating current from the Champion 3500/4000 watt generators? I can't see how.

I guess I should have let everyone know before I get fussed at, I would only use the open frame generator in a rest area ,or walmart. And I would only boon dock there in case we accidentally got caught with out a park. In 40 yrs of rv'ing we have never boon docked just planning ahead for our trip out west this summer.
Thanks to every one.

rving4us wrote:
I have one more generator question then I'll shut up about what to buy.
I had asked before about purchasing an inverter generator, and I already have an champion 3500/4000 open frame that camping world sells. My question, will the non inverter generators damage the electronics like on the fridge or tv's?

I'd never say never but these generators have nicer output vs. modified sine wave inverters..probably by far. People are running TVs etc of of those every day.. Personally if the voltage is steady and in spec, the frequency is close to 60 hz. I wouldn't worry about it. Oh and good neighbor policy w/ generator noise is followed..

Do you have the 120v only version of the 3500/4000? If so the sine wave is much cleaner than assumed here. Much, much better than a dual voltage and even some lower end inverter models.