Generator

[GlennaRae]

I have had problems with my generator for the last 4 or 5 years. I always have oil changes every year and tried to maintain it. The generator would run 5 or 20 minutes and kick off. I have taken it to the top generator dealer in the country at least 3 times. Last September I was told that it was cleaned out as good as they could do it but I needed a new generator. How could that be. Right now it has 260 hours on it and got that the first years I had it when it would run. A new generator would cost 3 thousand dollars and that is not including labor. I told my son that I had decided to buy and he said let me make a call. He call a RV dealer in Tulsa and said what my generator was doing and if they had ever seen that problem. He fellow said yes he had, Doug ask how he fix it and he said we put in a different grade of oil. Last Friday got out the manuel, read instruction and got under the motorhome changed my 30 weight oil out and put in 15W-40 that Son had brought. The first two times I started it ran 15 minutes and kicked off. When I first start it up it sounds like an old fashion washing machine. Jumps around and black smokes comes out the pipe. After a few minutes it settles down. Since last Friday and I have been running it for hours probably longer than it has been run in the last 4 years. Read that smoke coming out of pipe is saying the motor is not well maintained. If anyone else has this problem think of different grade of oil. How can anything this simple not been said before. I just think there was a good opportunity to sell a new generator. Thank goodness I didn't bite.

[MandysMom]

Wow always good to get a second opinion and in this case it saved you three grand! We need to take my LT van in for the generator which was fixed under warranty when new and won't start. Found that all the RV places here who say yes we can fix generator don't, they just charge you a fortune to remove it then take it to the authorized repair place the other side of Sacramento then charge you for that work plus reinstall. When under warranty we were told by LT to take to Camping world for warranty repair. I sat all day while they supposedly needed like 8 hours to get it out ( yeah we were newbies 9 years ago). They said it weighed like 450 lbs and took 4 men to lift out of its cradle. I then left with the van minus generator while they took a couple of weeks to wait for some part that just never goes out, or so they said. Then another 8 hours sitting while they reinstalled. Later, with research, we learned the generator only weighs 180 lbs and should take under an hour to remove!! Then a nice salesman at Lazy Days Rv here told us, all generators are removed and sent to the authorized generator place across town who do only generators. I called and they said only shoud take a hour or two at most to pull, repair, and reinstall ours as he has done lots on Sprinter based generators. So when I can we are going there because it's likely that is what CW did the first time after not telling the truth ( but I was not paying then). Oh the tales RV service centers will try to pull on the unknowing and unsuspecting!!!
Glad you got yours fixed so easily on the end.
Velda

[BirdbyBird]

Thanks for sharing your experience. It might be useful to any of us in the future.

[snowball]

mine of course is a different type of genny than what is installed in the motor homes
but perhaps this will be of a help to others as well our first winter in Q boondocking the genny
was in the shop more than it was charging us..would run for a few minuets up to a long time or not at all
one never knew what it was going to do..that was in the shop or at home didn't matter...finally the shop guy
put out the question to whoever asking what could it be turns out it had a faulty sensor telling the genny it was out
of oil and so it wouldn't run. cheap part= weeks of frustration
sheila

[cnq50b]

This group pegged the problem I had with my generator last year.
I was having problems with it traveling up to WA.
Tried to find a Cummins place to look at it - every one I called was booked up - couldn't get me in for another week or so.
Decided to just 'let it go' until I got home.
Someone here said it might be that it was set for a lower altitude...
So, I continued my trip to WA & then down to CA...
My last day in CA at Fiesta Island, I decided to try it -
Voila! It started right up
Haven't had any problems since...

This is one smart group! Even the Cummins places didn't think of that!

[JudyJB]

Guess I need to have someone do some checking on mine.

CW tried to tell me last winter that it would take 6-8 weeks to get a replacement water pump so they wanted to replumb my RV. Checked with their online store and found they had tons of them and could have one to me in two days.

Needless to say, I went elsewhere!!!

FYI. I have had water pump problems camping over 9,000 feet. When I came down to 6,000 feet it worked fine. Makes sense that some of these things might. It work well at high altitudes.

[MelissaD]

Most diesels are turbo charged these days and thus not as sensitive to altitude power loss and other issues. Since the RV generator is a naturally aspirated engine it would be more sensitive to altitude. There are so many self protection systems on generators these days that it could be 1 of many things, even oil viscosity (wrong oil blend) causing a low pressure sensor to think there was a loss of lubrication condition (oil to thick when cold). Depending upon how the engine draws it's fuel to the fuel pump ie does it use a pump in the fuel tank or does the fuel pump suck from the fuel tank, altitude and a dirt fuel filter could lowered fuel pressure to the pump causing a lack of fuel issue.

I suspect the techs just don't have the experience. So many of the old timers with that experience are retiring.

FYI. I have had water pump problems camping over 9,000 feet..... is probably due to a problem call insufficient net positive suction head (lower water pressure to the pumps suction). For a pump to properly operate it needs the water (in this case) supplied at a certain pressure. The high altitude lowered this supply pressure to the pump and it cavitated, resulting in low flow and probably a noisy pump. It's why we have water towers and tanks on top of hills and buildings.

[GlennaRae]

Update on generator. Just wanted everyone to know that my generator is still working perfectly. It is hard to believe that just changing the weight of the oil made a generator that I had given up on and was ready to replace is working so well. Keep this in mind if you are having generator problems. A five dollar quart of oil could make a difference. It did for me.