Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire Home generator - Generac vs. Kohler

Electricians have told me that I’ll spend about 12k after it’s all said and done.

I’m @ $7500 now, electrical and plumbing are yet to come.

The Bakken discount…

EXACTLY!

Tikka turned me on to the small WENs. They sip gas and can me slaved if you need more power.

I keep mobile diesel units as well.

5kw is a boatload of practical juice... once you turn off the Stove, Dryer and WHOLE HOUSE A/C.

A 110v mini-split in a single zone is a practical AC/Heat solution.

The Hispanic guys that put up my metal building ran a small Craftsman gen (Honda knockoff) 10 full hours on ONE GALLON of fuel (charging 18v batteries, running a hammer drill and playing that boogee woogee Mexican mambo music.

Made me a believer.

NOT the music.

BTW... These are a brilliant solution for diesel transfer.

I am am searching for a new or used generator right now. We have never had electricity at the ranch.
Grew up on small Kohler that we only ran from sundown till bedtime and an hour or so before daylight.
Ran a witte diesel for 20 years, 24hrs a day, 500 gals a month until diesel went up in the early 2000’s.
We installed solar in 2005. It’s great BUT you need genny backup when cloudy and especially during monsoon season. I average 100hrs a year on the backup.
Just burned up my third Kohler air cooled with 159 hours on it. Collector ring went out which is 2k to replace rotor. Mechanic says it might have stressed the voltage regulator and that is another 2k to replace. New unit is $4500. Generator shop in Tucson says buy a brushless genny and an 1800 rpm engine. Hard to find either gas or diesel. Kubota makes just what I want but don’t sell in the USA due to tier 4 requirements. The units they sell in the us are 3600rpm and use a brush type generator. I don’t know whether to [bleep] or go go blind at this point.
I can use propane or diesel either but need one that has a two wire start so the invertors can start it when certain parameters are met. Ie low voltage or state of charge.

Have had a 16kW natural gas Generac on a 200A ATS for 5 years.

Flawless, so far.

You don't need a 20KW generator if all you want is needed service.
6 years ago I started looking a generators, asked a lot of question and did my research.
What I wanted was a generator that would run my well, furnace, kitchen appliances, refrigerator, freezer, my office, family room and master bedroom/bath.
My research showed a 9 KW would do this. The thing you have to remember is that you're not going to run everyone of those choices at the same time.
So we've lost power about 4 times in 6 years, longest was for two days. I had heat, I had water, I had a functioning kitchen, TV in the family room, computer service in my office and a alarm clock in the bedroom and only about ran half of those at a time. We lived our normal life.
I chose a Generac installed for about $5,500

Sounds pretty smart. A prolonged outage is a crisis. Cover the basics and do without some of the rest. Water, heat (or cooling) and refrigeration will be enough to avoid the pain. Lights take very little power and can be an afterthought. All your relatives will come knocking.