While the major focus of this forum has been about the many different types of small Chinese generators and their use on RVs, recent power outages due to hurricanes in the South has created a greater interest among both RVer and non-RVers alike to consider these units as power back-up sources for such emergencies.
For several years now I have wanted to convert my "contractor" series 5000 Watt Generac home back-up generator to propane. Thanks to another member on this forum, I was pointed to the US Carb website as an inexpensive source of a conversion kit. It took six weeks to get the kit once it was ordered, and several hours to install it.
The conversion is now complete. The US Carb kit worked as promised in their advertisements, but the conversion did not go as smoothly as I expected.
I selected the "tri-fuel, no drill" kit as I wanted to retain the ability to use gasoline. The customer service/order person at US Carb took my engine model number and advised me that I would need the Type "C" kit. This kit, even though it was supposedly specifically for my particular model 10 HP Briggs & Stratton engine, did not contain the parts or instructions to retain a functioning choke. It took an additional hour to design, fabricate and install a bracket/lever assembly to retain the choke function in the gas mode. It is also necessary to extend the crankcase vent tube. While the instructions address this, and the parts kit shows an extension tube, this type kit does not include the necessary extension tube. I had to come up with that myself - luckily I had a scrap piece of 1/2" copper pipe in the Junk Box that worked fine.
I also ordered a six foot flexible (rubber) propane hose with the kit. The 3/8" pipe thread fittings on the hose did not match the supplied regulator (3/4") and required my finding an adapter. Had I chosen to use a standard propane tank and regulator, I would have needed yet another adapter to go from 1/4" to 3/8" there as well.
The total delivered cost of the kit and hose was "about" $200.
I found the need to come up with these little "extras" irritating for what I thought was a complete kit with the necessary adapters, fittings and parts for my particular engine.
I selected to draw my propane from a large underground tank previously installed in my backyard for two gas fireplaces in the house. It is possible to simply use refillable above ground tanks like the ones on your BBQ grill or RV. You can also use natural gas if you are lucky enough to have it piped to your home. In my case, nothing is piped to or from my home (no water, gas or sewer) and I consider myself lucky to get electricity even on a sunny day. That's the cost you pay for living in a rural area.
The beauty of my going to the in ground propane tank is a long fuel storage life, no need to store 20+ gallons of gasoline for an emergency, and no refueling danger since I am not dumping gas into a tank on a hot engine (yes, I know you are suppose to turn it off and let it cool.) I live in Virginia - about 70 air miles from the Atlantic coast. Previous ice storms, hurricanes, tropical depressions and the like have left us without power for as long as two weeks in the past. With a generator sucking up 6-7 gallons of gas a day, that adds up, especially when gas stations are closed and the roads impassable. My goal is to keep my 300 gallon propane tank at least half full at all times, which could fuel the generator for up to 3 weeks. We need the generator to pump water from the well, to keep the freezers running, and to run the oil furnace (in the winter).
While I installed my kit on an old, noisy B&S powered Gererac rather than the recently acquired ELM3000, kits and procedures for any of the Chinese generators we have been writing about appear to be similar. Needless to say, the Chinese units would be quiter and use less fuel than my old B&S engine does.
Despite the little irritations with the lack of completeness, I am pleased with my US Carb conversion kit. The generator starts easily and runs perfectly on propane.
Photos of my complete set-up are included below. I have kept them small out of consideration for those on the forum who have dial-up Internet connections. If you want larger images, they are available by clicking on the link next to the photos.
Please let me know if you have any questions. I would also be interested in knowing if anyone else follows suite with the propane conversion.
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For several years now I have wanted to convert my "contractor" series 5000 Watt Generac home back-up generator to propane. Thanks to another member on this forum, I was pointed to the US Carb website as an inexpensive source of a conversion kit. It took six weeks to get the kit once it was ordered, and several hours to install it.
The conversion is now complete. The US Carb kit worked as promised in their advertisements, but the conversion did not go as smoothly as I expected.
I selected the "tri-fuel, no drill" kit as I wanted to retain the ability to use gasoline. The customer service/order person at US Carb took my engine model number and advised me that I would need the Type "C" kit. This kit, even though it was supposedly specifically for my particular model 10 HP Briggs & Stratton engine, did not contain the parts or instructions to retain a functioning choke. It took an additional hour to design, fabricate and install a bracket/lever assembly to retain the choke function in the gas mode. It is also necessary to extend the crankcase vent tube. While the instructions address this, and the parts kit shows an extension tube, this type kit does not include the necessary extension tube. I had to come up with that myself - luckily I had a scrap piece of 1/2" copper pipe in the Junk Box that worked fine.
I also ordered a six foot flexible (rubber) propane hose with the kit. The 3/8" pipe thread fittings on the hose did not match the supplied regulator (3/4") and required my finding an adapter. Had I chosen to use a standard propane tank and regulator, I would have needed yet another adapter to go from 1/4" to 3/8" there as well.
The total delivered cost of the kit and hose was "about" $200.
I found the need to come up with these little "extras" irritating for what I thought was a complete kit with the necessary adapters, fittings and parts for my particular engine.
I selected to draw my propane from a large underground tank previously installed in my backyard for two gas fireplaces in the house. It is possible to simply use refillable above ground tanks like the ones on your BBQ grill or RV. You can also use natural gas if you are lucky enough to have it piped to your home. In my case, nothing is piped to or from my home (no water, gas or sewer) and I consider myself lucky to get electricity even on a sunny day. That's the cost you pay for living in a rural area.
The beauty of my going to the in ground propane tank is a long fuel storage life, no need to store 20+ gallons of gasoline for an emergency, and no refueling danger since I am not dumping gas into a tank on a hot engine (yes, I know you are suppose to turn it off and let it cool.) I live in Virginia - about 70 air miles from the Atlantic coast. Previous ice storms, hurricanes, tropical depressions and the like have left us without power for as long as two weeks in the past. With a generator sucking up 6-7 gallons of gas a day, that adds up, especially when gas stations are closed and the roads impassable. My goal is to keep my 300 gallon propane tank at least half full at all times, which could fuel the generator for up to 3 weeks. We need the generator to pump water from the well, to keep the freezers running, and to run the oil furnace (in the winter).
While I installed my kit on an old, noisy B&S powered Gererac rather than the recently acquired ELM3000, kits and procedures for any of the Chinese generators we have been writing about appear to be similar. Needless to say, the Chinese units would be quiter and use less fuel than my old B&S engine does.
Despite the little irritations with the lack of completeness, I am pleased with my US Carb conversion kit. The generator starts easily and runs perfectly on propane.
Photos of my complete set-up are included below. I have kept them small out of consideration for those on the forum who have dial-up Internet connections. If you want larger images, they are available by clicking on the link next to the photos.
Please let me know if you have any questions. I would also be interested in knowing if anyone else follows suite with the propane conversion.
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Due to several recent emails about how I rewired my Champion Generator, I am posting more pictures!
First, here is the original post:
This is of my new Champion 3500 (4450 watt peek) watt gen set that I bought today at Checker Auto. It is wired for 120/240 so only 1750 watts is available for me to use with my camper. It is on sale for $299 It has the large muffler and is fairly quiet compared to my Coleman but loud compared to my Honda 3000. It came with a wheel kit that I have not yet installed as well as a 12 volt charging cable to charge up automotive batteries (10 amp). It also came with a spare foam air filter. It did come dry. NO oil in the crankcase. It does have 2 ell shaped shipping brackets that need to be removed. The engine is a 6.5hp Honda clone.
I have it running outside right now with a 1500 watt load on it. At 1 am, I am going to switch over to the other plug and run it to daylight to get it broken in a bit.
I want to configure it so ALL of the 3500 watts are going to be on the same set of the 120 volts. I do not need to generate 240 volts so wiring in a switch will not be necessary.
Below is a picture of the head of the gen set with the cover removed.
I think this is going to be an easy conversion since the coils of the gen set are conveniently wired to a terminal strip as shown in the picture. The red and dark blue wire go into the gen set as a pair and ohm out to be shorted when tested (test done with them removed from the terminal strip) and the white and brown wires show the same. The light blue (left side of picture) and another brown wire (right side of picture) (not seen, it is under the visible brown wire) go to the power panel. The center terminal has 3 wires on it. Two white and one red wire. One of these white wires go to the power panel. As already mentioned, the other 2 are paired with the light blue and the brown wire.
Would I be correct if I moved the center white wire to the dark blue and the center red wire to the brown wire? One side of my new 110 would then be the dark blue and white wire and the other side of my 110 would be the brown and red wire. The wire colors are consistent with the drawing by allpraisebob.
I'll be replacing the 240 volt plug with a 30 amp camper plug and doing something creative with the circut breaker.
Now here is the new stuff!
I would like to note that you will have NO power on the panel until it is re-wired. I am enclosing pict of my re-wire job. I used some of the blue wire that was no longer needed to finish up my re-wiring.
This is a picture of the head after is has been re-wired.
Here is the OUTSIDE of the power panel after the re-wire. Note that I removed the 220 volt plug and replaced it with a 30 ampre camper plug.
Now here are the breakers. They are the original breakers but I have them wired in paralled. The brown wire comes directly from the generator head. I have tapped into it and ran one leg of the tap to one breaker and the other side to the other breaker. Coming off the breakers, I used the blue wire that was no longer needed to go to the brass colored terminal of my 30 ampre camper plug. Both circute breakers now go to the same point. This will have all the wattage to this point while going through the circute breakers.
Now for the rest of the wiring. Here, a picture is worth a thousand works. Hope the picture shows enough detail.
Mine is still working well with close to 300 hours of time on it. Be sure to change your oil ever 48 hours of run time! That may be more often that recomened but it does not take long and does not take that much oil to add life to the engine.
First, here is the original post:
This is of my new Champion 3500 (4450 watt peek) watt gen set that I bought today at Checker Auto. It is wired for 120/240 so only 1750 watts is available for me to use with my camper. It is on sale for $299 It has the large muffler and is fairly quiet compared to my Coleman but loud compared to my Honda 3000. It came with a wheel kit that I have not yet installed as well as a 12 volt charging cable to charge up automotive batteries (10 amp). It also came with a spare foam air filter. It did come dry. NO oil in the crankcase. It does have 2 ell shaped shipping brackets that need to be removed. The engine is a 6.5hp Honda clone.
I have it running outside right now with a 1500 watt load on it. At 1 am, I am going to switch over to the other plug and run it to daylight to get it broken in a bit.
I want to configure it so ALL of the 3500 watts are going to be on the same set of the 120 volts. I do not need to generate 240 volts so wiring in a switch will not be necessary.
Below is a picture of the head of the gen set with the cover removed.
I think this is going to be an easy conversion since the coils of the gen set are conveniently wired to a terminal strip as shown in the picture. The red and dark blue wire go into the gen set as a pair and ohm out to be shorted when tested (test done with them removed from the terminal strip) and the white and brown wires show the same. The light blue (left side of picture) and another brown wire (right side of picture) (not seen, it is under the visible brown wire) go to the power panel. The center terminal has 3 wires on it. Two white and one red wire. One of these white wires go to the power panel. As already mentioned, the other 2 are paired with the light blue and the brown wire.
Would I be correct if I moved the center white wire to the dark blue and the center red wire to the brown wire? One side of my new 110 would then be the dark blue and white wire and the other side of my 110 would be the brown and red wire. The wire colors are consistent with the drawing by allpraisebob.
I'll be replacing the 240 volt plug with a 30 amp camper plug and doing something creative with the circut breaker.
Now here is the new stuff!
I would like to note that you will have NO power on the panel until it is re-wired. I am enclosing pict of my re-wire job. I used some of the blue wire that was no longer needed to finish up my re-wiring.
This is a picture of the head after is has been re-wired.
Here is the OUTSIDE of the power panel after the re-wire. Note that I removed the 220 volt plug and replaced it with a 30 ampre camper plug.
Now here are the breakers. They are the original breakers but I have them wired in paralled. The brown wire comes directly from the generator head. I have tapped into it and ran one leg of the tap to one breaker and the other side to the other breaker. Coming off the breakers, I used the blue wire that was no longer needed to go to the brass colored terminal of my 30 ampre camper plug. Both circute breakers now go to the same point. This will have all the wattage to this point while going through the circute breakers.
Now for the rest of the wiring. Here, a picture is worth a thousand works. Hope the picture shows enough detail.
Mine is still working well with close to 300 hours of time on it. Be sure to change your oil ever 48 hours of run time! That may be more often that recomened but it does not take long and does not take that much oil to add life to the engine.
