3000W Chinese Gensets Info.

[professor95]

professor95 wrote:
EDIT ADDED 45/5/2013- When this thread started in March of 2005, I never expected to see it survive this long or amass the quantity of information that has been shared here.

In the eight year run of this thread we have amassed almost 10,000 postings and surpassed a million views. This creates somewhat of a dilemma for anyone who has just discovered the forum.

Since the amount of information is virtually overwhelming, I suggest you set your preferences for this thread to read "newest first" and then begin to page backwards.

What you will find in these pages is a wealth of info on virtually any make or model of Chinese manufactured synchronous (non-inverter) generator in the 3,000 watt performance class. Info will include how to rewire series coils to parallel to obtain maximum wattage from a single 120 volt outlet. Tips on further reducing sound levels, how to care for these generators, which ones are "RV ready" and provide the best overall performance for the dollar invested. Which companies NOT to deal with, where the best prices are, how to safely wire the generator into a home or RV, how to check your RV for electrical faults, sources for generator accessories, which 20/30 adapters are safe to use and which are not. How to convert a gasoline generator to propane or NG. This is only the beginning. The forum has a life of its own with the focus sub-topic switching frequently. Still, the main topic of utilizing the amazing, inexpensive Chinese gensets is always there. The amount of creativity and innovation presented in these pages is indicative of the talents shared in the diverse backgrounds of the folks who make up our combined RV community.

Many of the original brands and models of Chinese gensets mentioned in the introduction and early pages of the thread have since disappeared. New EPA and CARB emissions requirements, company bonds assuring the emissions warranty will be honored even if the company goes out of business, and fierce competition in the industry have changed the playing field. Champion Power Equipment has become the apparent "trophy team" providing an ever expanding retail outlet, an ample parts supply, a strong warranty and excellent customer service. CPE has continued to improve their product and now offers a new model (#46538) with exclusive convenience, safety and performance features aimed at the RV market. Big names like Cummins/Onan, Honda and Generac all now have Chinese built open frame synchronous gensets available. Ironically, the prices often found on these gensets has not significantly changed during the past eight years - even with the devaluation of the American Dollar and new EPA/CARB requirements.

I also encourage you to use the search function and even the advanced search options to find information. Key works such as "rewiring", "PowerPro", "Champion", "Onan Homesite", "Duropower", "ETQ", "Jiung Dong or JD", "Tractor Supply", "Costco", "Lowe's" and "Home Depot" are all examples of keywords that will give you specific information on different models being sold by retailers today.

Or, you can fill your glass with your favorite beverage (keep more close by - maybe some munchies as well :D, sit back at your computer, tell your wife (or significant other) that you will see her in the morning and spend the next 10 or so hours reading through the postings.

No one on the forum gets mad if you ask a question that is a repeat. Please do not hesitate to post to the forum. All questions are considered important and those active on the forum will do their best to respond with a valid answer.

Also note we are not out to knock the Honda, Yamaha, Kipor or other brands of high end digital gensets. We recognize the quality of these products and their suitability for quite, efficient RV use. But, there is a flood of reliable, inexpensive and comparatively lower cost gensets coming out of China that are excellent alternative choices for the RVer wanting power to run an air conditioner, microwave, etc. without excessive noise or breaking the budget.

Oh, one last thing. The folks on this forum are true gentlemen. We do not flame one another or the product discussed - period. Ugly contributors usually have their comments and remarks ignored by our masses. It is not a forum to start arguments to obtain a clear win. We do disagree on many issues, but we have all agreed to do that in a respectable manner.

We now have the introduction of more and more inverter gensets. There is a rather extensive thread named "The Official Unofficial Champion 2000i Generator" on this forum. Today, I added info on the new Champion 3100i inverter genset. Discussion on this product may get moved to its own thread at a later date.

Many have looked upon this thread with distain saying Chinese is cheap and doomed to failure. I remember saying exactly the same thing about Japanese products a few decades back. But, over the past eight years the track record for Chinese built generators has shown otherwise.

Please, join us in a fascinating journey down the Chinese built genset road of knowledge.

This is the question I posted that got it all started back in March 2005.......

Randy

For a little over a month now, I have been somewhat intrigued by the availability of a 3000 watt, 6.5 HP generator at Pep Boys and Northern Tool for under $300.00. The engine on this generator looks identical to a Honda 6.5 HP OHV engine. Knowing that the Chinese have become very adept at “cloning” reputable technologies from other manufacturers, I was not surprised at the similarities. Neither store could give me any information on the generator nor did they have a “running” display model.

I have done a little research. This is what I have discovered:

Many of these generators are imported by ELIM International (www.eliminternational.com) out of Buffalo, New York from Jiung Manufacturing in China. (The unit at Northern is identical but carries the JIUNG name.)

The engines are indeed a Chinese knockoff of the popular 6.5 HP 196cc Honda Engine. “Supposedly” Honda has licensed the engine technology to the Chinese manufacturer of the product.

The Chinese company that makes the ELM3000 generators is a rather large, diverse, long-standing company with a reputation for “above average quality” Chinese made products (Jiung Manufacturing). There are many more Chinese companies making almost identical gensets.

The generators at PepBoys do have a six month limited warranty. But, it is only on the engine (not the generator) and requires paying for shipping to and from Buffalo. Probably not a very practical thing to do if you have warranty issues.

ELIM does supply replacement parts (a PDF parts manual is available on the ELIM web site). No prices are given for replacement parts nor is there an “availability listing”.

The generator head itself is a brushless design. The only really significant wear parts in the generator are the bearings – most likely universally available.

The published dB rating is 67 at 23 feet. This is “reasonably” quite for a generator of this size as most comparabl.... The 67 dB rating is the same as Honda gives their 3000 watt CycloInverter with a “look alike” eng...

[professor95]

There are three things I would like to speak to based on recent posts and questions:

Starting air compressors with generators

"Dogbones" and adapters

67db being quite?

……. and where to find the ELM3000

First - air compressors take a tremendous amount of cu...

this location.

Item two deals with 67dB being quite or not. Remember, every 1 dB increase = 26% more than the base level. 3 dB is double the original level, and 10 dB is a ten fold increase. Anything below 50 dB is usually considered darn near silent to the human ear, so that is a very quite place to start. ... at 20 feet. (The S scale uses a larger audio frequency range to sample). The inside of the cab on ... – outside it was 86 dB. The inside of my gas powered TV with a 7.4L engine at idle was 56 dB (no radio or fans running). Under moderate load the readings for the powerstroke inside the cab re.... My gas TV reached 74 dB under similar conditions. Ambient noise levels outside the truck window in “town” sitting at a tra.... My family room with the TV on was 67 dB. Biggest deal with the 67 dB reading on the ELM3000 is the low frequency, monotonous drone of the engine more so than the noise ...


www.eliminternational.com

The big deal for the ELM3000 is low cost, Honda engine technology (exact copy?), reasonably low sound levels, EPA and NPS certification and the ability to direct all available power to a single 110 volt outlet (most similar generators split the power between two or more outlets) that will run a 13,500 BTU RV rooftop air conditioner. It is not a Honda 3000ci or Onan clone and does not have their features. It is an inexpensive (cheap?) Chinese manufactured generator that appears to meet the needs of the RVer occasionally needing a generator in remote areas,

I hope all this rhetoric helps answer your questions. If not, let me know and I will give it another shot.

[TubaPete]

Where besides Checkerauto or Pepboys can you find one of these elim gen sets? I don't have either near me in N.Idaho.

Check their website, ElimInternational.com. I believe there is a list of dealers.

[pedalpwr]

Where besides Checkerauto or Pepboys can you find one of these elim gen sets? I don't have either near me in N.Idaho.

[LittleBill]

My air compressor is 1 HP 17.8 amps at 110V, I can also tell you thast I normaly plug it into my standard 110volt 15 amp outlet in my house witjout a problem. I actually bought the Elm for my boat, but used my air compressor to test (challenge) Elm3000's performance. I switch the unit to 110V, set both circuit breakers on (up) What happened was both breakers tripped, I reset tried again same result.

Do I have to pull current from both 110v recepticals to utilize the generators full capacity or can I utilize the 220v outlet by use of the ceter tap (would that provide 110V 30 amps?

well it must only pull 17 amps at start up, or else it would blow the circuit breaker in the house. Full generator capacity is right from one recepticle, thats why you see it blowing both breakers due to them being parrellel, personally i think you have a problem with the generator, i plugged my 2 horse power one in, i said 3hp but it is 2, while i was running the 1500 watt cermaic heater, i had 0 problems and actually ran the compressor non stop since i was using a air hammer on some ice , i let it run for over 3 hours with 2 ceramic heaters one 1650 one 1500, and 0 problems. i think you have a problem

[FredHart08755]

My air compressor is 1 HP 17.8 amps at 110V, I can also tell you thast I normaly plug it into my standard 110volt 15 amp outlet in my house witjout a problem. I actually bought the Elm for my boat, but used my air compressor to test (challenge) Elm3000's performance. I switch the unit to 110V, set both circuit breakers on (up) What happened was both breakers tripped, I reset tried again same result.

Do I have to pull current from both 110v recepticals to utilize the generators full capacity or can I utilize the 220v outlet by use of the ceter tap (would that provide 110V 30 amps?

[TeamSlacker]

Why do you think 67 db is quite. It's not!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
There's a big difference between 58-59 which is what the honda EU series is rated at than 67. We use a Honda 3000 cycloverter at work. I would not want to listen to it while camping. But that there's a lot of people who don't seem to care about there nabors.( loud car's, loud stero's, barking dogs) and obnoxious generators.

I don't think anyone in this thread has boasted that these gens are as quiet as the honda EU so I'm not sure what your point is. Speaking for myself, I bought it because it was cheap and will serve it's intended purpose of powering my trailer while I'm at the track, so yes, 67db is very quite in my case.

[lectricman52]

Why do you think 67 db is quite. It's not!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
There's a big difference between 58-59 which is what the honda EU series is rated at than 67. We use a Honda 3000 cycloverter at work. I would not want to listen to it while camping. But that there's a lot of people who don't seem to care about there nabors.( loud car's, loud stero's, barking dogs) and obnoxious generators.

[LittleBill]

Hello Professor,
I have also pick up the Elm3000 at pep boys, NJ same great price $249.
Couldn't pass up the bargain. My unit also start right up, but wouldn't put out enough current to run my (110v) comressor. I have been following your posts, and need help understanding the "dogbone adapter"
is that using one high side of the 220v and the nuetral centertap or are you connecting the two 110v plugs together

Thanks for your help

what type of compressor are you running, this thing can put out around 24 volt at 120, i was running a 1600 watt heater, and then plug in my 3 hp air compressor, and it ran flawless

dogbone adapter switches the 30 amp rv connector down to a 20 amp regular recticple connector

[FredHart08755]

Hello Professor,
I have also pick up the Elm3000 at pep boys, NJ same great price $249.
Couldn't pass up the bargain. My unit also start right up, but wouldn't put out enough current to run my (110v) comressor. I have been following your posts, and need help understanding the "dogbone adapter"
is that using one high side of the 220v and the nuetral centertap or are you connecting the two 110v plugs together

Thanks for your help

[LittleBill]

runs at 3600 rpm, this is not a inverter type of generator, it used around a gallon and half in 3 hours at full load

[rgraham]

does this Elim run at wide open all the time are does it run at speeds as to how much wattage you are needing like the eu 2000 Honda does, this can make a big difference in the amount of gas it uses per hour, I think you have answered ever thing else,

[Andy88]

professor95: Thank you very much for the information-very helpfull.

[LittleBill]

I am on Harbour Freight's mailing list. I just looked at the flyer that I received in the mail Saturday. They now carry a generator that looks identical to my ELM3000, but it has their trade name of Chicago Electric on it. Harbour Freight has numerous stores as well as mail order. There is one in Richmond. So, I guess we have another source for the Chinese genset. HF's price is $329.00, but I would not be surprised to see them on sale any time. Remember, ELIM is an importer who puts their name on the Chinese product. There are other importers who do the same.

You can check ELIM's web site at www.eliminternational.com for photos, specs, manuals, parts list and warranty - even a picture of the Jung Dong plant in China where they are made.

professor, although it may look identical it is a bit different, one is they rat it at 2600 watt and 2800 surge, ours is 2800 and 3000, there doesn't have a 240 selector, it only runs on 110, and there's has a dc charger 8.3 unregulated, the run time has also been reduced from 11 hours to 7.6

[n7bsn]

I looked at the sound levels for these. At 7m, the EU3000is is 58dB while the ELIM is 67dB. My understanding of the dB scale is that 9dB is a significant difference in volume. Can someone who knows the math confirm this?

Someone correct me if I'm wrong but I think I read that for every 3db increase on the meter the sound level to the human ear is actually double, which would make a 9db higher rated genset quite a bit louder, assuming these ratings were found with similar loads and at similar distances. So - in other words- a 61 db rated genset would be twice as loud as a 58 db rated genset,a 64 twice that of a 61....

No, the human ear is non-linear and while 3dB is twice the energy, it's not twice as loud. Twice is loud is roughly 9 dB

[n7bsn]

I looked at the sound levels for these. At 7m, the EU3000is is 58dB while the ELIM is 67dB. My understanding of the dB scale is that 9dB is a significant difference in volume. Can someone who knows the math confirm this?

Yes, 9dB is 8 times the "energy" (not 8X is loud)