Converter Causing Generator Surge

[hittingtheroada]

I have a 5th wheel with a Progressive Dynamics Inteli-Power Converter. When dry camping we use a Honda 2000 generator to recharge the batteries. Lately when I start the generator in the morning and the converter goes into the boost mode of 14.4 volts the generator will start to surge even without the RPM's increasing. I have to use the remote pendant to put in in the normal mode of 13.6 volts for about an hour then it can be placed in the boost mode and it will run normal. I have 2 generators and it happens with either and also when the 2 of them are hooked together with parallel cables. This has never happen in the past. A technician at the company said it was impossible for the converter to cause this and it has to be the generator. One generator is brand new and the other almost new. I am leaning toward a new converter but before spending the money would like advise from someone knowledgeable
on the subject. Thanks.

[enblethen]

Honda 2000 manual page 37 says to leave the ECO switch in the "off" postion. The converter will automatically and quickly change the load and cause the genset to switch off and then turn back on the ECO system.

[hittingtheroada]

Saying the generator was surging may be a misleading description. It does not rev up at all but rather dies down a bit the comes back up. The cause is not the generator as I have two, one is brand new and the other almost new. They both do the same thing individually and also when paralleled. It does this with no other load to speak of. I took the batteries out put a full charge in them and they tested good. Even though a Progressive Dynamics tech said the converter could not cause this I am having my doubts. Process of elimination does not leave much else.

[ve7prt]

64thunderbolt wrote:
put some seafoam in the fuel. Sounds to me like the gen is not liking the load. Running fine when dialed back out of boost confirms this. Carb could be getting gummed up. Seafoam is the best cleaner you can get. Auto Zone, Wally world etc carry it. I have used this stuff for years and saved lots of carbs. Good luck & let us know what it turns out to be.

I'd say this is the most likely issue. But, I would like to submit that is it possible that water got into the generator somewhere it shouldn't have?

My Honda 2K normally works fine with the PD9280 in the RV, even with the fridge on shorepower. I did have an RPM surging issue a while back where the engine RPMs kept fluctuating badly while on the ECO throttle mode. This caused the PD9280's output to fluctuate as well. Turned out that when I'd had the truck in for servicing on that trip, the generator had gotten wet when the truck was washed, and water most likely got somewhere it shouldn't have been. The unit has since dried out and everything works normally.

Just My Thoughts.
Mike

[64thunderbolt]

put some seafoam in the fuel. Sounds to me like the gen is not liking the load. Running fine when dialed back out of boost confirms this. Carb could be getting gummed up. Seafoam is the best cleaner you can get. Auto Zone, Wally world etc carry it. I have used this stuff for years and saved lots of carbs. Good luck & let us know what it turns out to be.

[NinerBikes]

Another situation is storing your Hondas with fuel in the carb. Do a search on stickies to learn how to clean your carburetors.

[MM49]

hittingtheroadagain wrote:
I have a 5th wheel with a Progressive Dynamics Inteli-Power Converter. When dry camping we use a Honda 2000 generator to recharge the batteries. Lately when I start the generator in the morning and the converter goes into the boost mode of 14.4 volts the generator will start to surge even without the RPM's increasing. I have to use the remote pendant to put in in the normal mode of 13.6 volts for about an hour then it can be placed in the boost mode and it will run normal. I have 2 generators and it happens with either and also when the 2 of them are hooked together with parallel cables. This has never happen in the past. A technician at the company said it was impossible for the converter to cause this and it has to be the generator. One generator is brand new and the other almost new. I am leaning toward a new converter but before spending the money would like advise from someone knowledgeable
on the subject. Thanks.

I would guess that your Generator is running lean. To test, warm up your generator then set it to ECO. Set the generator choke to 1/2 on and re-test. I think you will find it runs smooth. To fix your generator you need to open the fuel screw 1/2 turn. The fuel screw has an anti-tamper cap glued on. Just take a soldering iron and heat the cap and pull off with a needle nose plier. Re-test after each fuel screw adjustment. The fuel screw adjustment is very insensitive due the emulsion tube design on the main jet well. Record your adjustments.
MM49

[mrekim]

RoyB wrote:

Like others suggested here I'm thinking you have a battery going bad on you. When the batteries start going bad they will demand alot of DC CURRENT when being charged.

Would a bad battery also seem to never get enough charge, DC current does not go low or it even goes down to 4 to 6 amps and then back up to 10 during the same charge session?

For example an 80 Amp Hour battery being charged with a couple of hundred amp hours of current from the charger...

[Wayne_Dohnal]

I don't know what "surge" means in this post because I define surging as fast RPM changes. How does the generator behave with a different heavy load, like the water heater element? From the information that's listed, I also put the quality of gasoline and high altitude, if applicable, on the list of suspected causes.

[Chris_Bryant]

Not saying this is the issue, but I have seen some electronic loads put noise on the input line that affected the electronics of the genset- requiring a filter to be installed.

[BFL13]

What is the "surge" exactly? You say it is not an increase in revs but it seems to be related to the load since you can operate ok when you reduce the load by knocking the converter back to 13.6. Perhaps the revs are already max so it can't increase in revs?

It must be quite a load since it also happens when you are at 4000 with two gens.

I don't see how the batteries can make that happen, since even if one is bad or whatever, the PD is still current- limited to about 60 amps- no big deal for a pair of 2000s. It would nearly max a single 2000 but not overload it. ( Your tech with his 1000w max forgot about the 0.7 PF which will make the VA from the gen higher, but that is still not over what the gens can do.

If the other 120v loads are not on as stated then maybe there is a short costing a bunch of 120? What about your shore power cable to gen adapter or ?

[MrWizard]

moved from technology

[hittingtheroada]

Well I fired the gen up and it is still doing the same thing. I guess my next move will be to get a hydrometer tomorrow and check each cell in the batteries. I have been keeping an eye on the water levels and there is not any that were lower than the others. The batteries are just one year old.

[Matt_Colie]

Paula and Paul,

I have only heard of this one other time. It seems to be a function of how inverter generators and switching power devices interact. It isn't the PD that is doing it and and it isn't the Honda. It is the two of them not agreeing on moment by moment basis. Both systems as massively non-linear (Duh), but if their non-linearity happens in the same place, strange things can happen.

No, I don't have an immediate fix. But, I don't think that re-arranging the battery cables to be the right way will fix the surging.

Matt

[hittingtheroada]

I may have found the problem. While checking all connections I noticed that the positive and negative leads to the RV were connected to the same battery. The correct way should be Positive to one battery and negative to the second battery. Reading up on charging batteries wired this way can result in a significant difference in the batteries charging at higher amps. As the converter can put out up to 60 amps this may be the cause. I am waiting for my batteries to require charging and will see what happens. I will post and give the results. Thanks again for letting me bounce this off greater minds.

[RoyB]

I have the PD9260 Converter/Charger and use my single 2KW Honda to run the converter when camping off the power grid for three hours to recharge my 255AH battery bank. When my PD9260 first goes to 14.4VDC mode my battery bank is drawing around 52-53 AMPS DC Current. I usually run mine in ECO mode so I can hear the generator rev down as the batteries start taking charge.

Like others suggested here I'm thinking you have a battery going bad on you. When the batteries start going bad they will demand alot of DC CURRENT when being charged. Definitely check the fluid levels. The cell that is really low on fluids is most likely the cell that is going bad...

Over charging and running the batteries down below the 12.0VDC level are the two biggest bad things that can happen to your batteries.

SMART MODE on-board Converter/charger units really prevent all of this from happening..

Roy Ken