# Generator choice info/help



## JohnNY (Apr 27, 2020)

New to the forum, 
Hopefully some of the generator guru's can help me make my choice on which is a better unit for overall power and ability to run a 220 mig welder. I currently own both units now. 

The first is a B&S Pro8000 which is rated 8000/10000 . 16hp twin cylinder engine. ALL outlets are GFCI protected. On first run of my home wired directly to a 30amp double pole /interlock. I kept tripping the gfci on the unit. Until I realized that the ground had to be disconnected at the panel. (Have 10ga 3 wire with ground)

I just purchased for a GREAT deal yesterday a 
B&S (generac) Exl8000 8000/ 13500 15hp single cylinder engine. NO gfci protection on the gen.
So the obvious is the surge watts on the exl @13500 vs 10000 on the pro8000. My thought was the twin would maintain power more stable vs the single cylinder?
Also would I be able to connect the ground in the panel if i was to use the exl8000 which has no gfci on it? Are there generator (the electricity producing part) model tags that I can find on each to compare which is the better generator (I know engines) 
Rotor and stator have completely different part numbers. I want to obviously keep the better of the two for what I need which is to run my home during outages and the welder when needed. Thanks for all replies in advance


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## iowagold (Jan 22, 2020)

first things first what is the mig make and model?
is it an inverter unit?

if you are looking at welder first these are nice and do mig , tig, and stick,
or are you doing aluminum?
Lincoln Electric Eagle 10,000 Plus Multi-Process Welder/Generator with 674CC Kohler Gas Engine and Electric Start — 50–225 Amp DC Output, 9,000 Watt AC Power, Model# K2343-3





Lincoln Electric Eagle 10,000 Plus Multi-Process Welder/Generator with 674CC Kohler Gas Engine and Electric Start 50225 Amp DC Output, 9,000 Watt AC Power, Model# K2343-3 | Northern Tool


A Lincoln Electric Eagle 10,000 Plus Multi-Process Welder/Generator with Kohler Engine can help make work fly! It&#39...




www.northerntool.com





and for the welder only look at these
LINCOLN ELECTRIC TIG Welder, Invertec(R) V160-T,115/230VAC, K1845-1
they run 125volt or 240.

you are better off buying a good welder gen combo for welding..
the duty cycle is better.


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## ToolLover (Jan 13, 2020)

Well, Lincoln has been around for a long time.
Miller had a sales place near us and I had five miller welders in my shop.
One 20 amp unit, three 30 amp units and one special welder for aluminum.
Pick a welder that has a local sales avaliable.


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## drmerdp (Apr 10, 2018)

For starters, do not remove the inlets ground, ever. Its tripping the GFI because your generator is neutral bonded. That bond needs to be removed, then you'll be able to feed your house. 

Both generator will likely handle your houses power needs just fine, the question is which is quieter (im willing to bet the vtwin is smoother and quieter) , and which has the cleaner sine wave. 

You can always build an enclosure to house a loud generator, but the cleaner electricity would trump all, for me anyway. 

I would try to look up their rated THD.


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## iowagold (Jan 22, 2020)

ToolLover said:


> Well, Lincoln has been around for a long time.
> Miller had a sales place near us and I had five miller welders in my shop.
> One 20 amp unit, three 30 amp units and one special welder for aluminum.
> Pick a welder that has a local sales avaliable.


amen on the local place for the welder!!
it is important to have a place where you can take it when things are not working right!!
so much of the new stuff is board replacement now in the new welders...
but if you stick with the good versions of the name brand units it is hard to go wrong!!
I love the inverter multi welder units!!
they do sooo much more with less power..
but the classic miller 252 is a good unit as well..
just watch the duty cycle on the whips.. all of them melt easy if you are doing production work..
long day if you have to replace a couple of liners!! lol!!

I still like for a gen set the Honda eu7000is... it is inverter..
and fuel injected now.
the power management is real good!!
we run some of the inverter welders on that and they do ok! 22 amps at 240.. is what the eu7000is will stand for..
we also use the Gillette generators when running the larger welders.. they are v twin honda powered..
but they are LOUD!!


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## JohnNY (Apr 27, 2020)

Hi Iowagold, well the welder I have (first one ever and learning) is from Harbor freight this one. First I had their really cheap one and bought this one to do some Hobby welding basically. So far I repaired a trailer and made some other little repairs I wouldnt otherwise be able to do without a welder. It really opened a whole new area of tooling around lol. I probably wouldnt be on the gen too often unless I needed to run it at the 220 voltage setting. Also I have it running solid .035 with 75/25.









*TITANIUM*
*MIG 170 Professional Welder With 120/240 Volt Input*


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## JohnNY (Apr 27, 2020)

drmerdp said:


> For starters, do not remove the inlets ground, ever. Its tripping the GFI because your generator is neutral bonded. That bond needs to be removed, then you'll be able to feed your house.
> 
> Both generator will likely handle your houses power needs just fine, the question is which is quieter (im willing to bet the vtwin is smoother and quieter) , and which has the cleaner sine wave.
> 
> ...


Thanks for the info, so based on just the wattage rating do you think the exl8000 really can have 13.500 surge watts?? That's 5500 above its running watts (according to the label). I have never seen a gen with such a large jump in surge watts over its rated running. Is that even possible? Or are they just over stating its power. Excuse me if my terminology is wrong lol. As for engines I would by experience of course rather the twin vs a single and over all loudness doesn't seam that much different by ear., but the single is probably louder actually. 
Also if I was to use the exl8000 which has NO gfi protection at all, could I reconnect both my neutral and ground in the panel and function fine? It does also have the neutral bonded to the frame like the other.


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## iowagold (Jan 22, 2020)

well the numbers are
24 A @ 120V and 26.8 A @ 240V out of the owners manual


https://manuals.harborfreight.com/manuals/64000-64999/64805.pdf


I would use a good meter setup and see where it really is on current demand..
on the inverter welders it all depends on the real world settings etc...
and they put out less when on 125 volt cord...
but depending on the material you are welding..
it can be way less current if you are skip welding (tack welding 1 inch or less)..
you need a pretty good sized gen set to run these as the current demand is not steady...

I would try the eu7000is! the inverter in the honda would stand this inverter welder..


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## iowagold (Jan 22, 2020)

oh yea welders are tricky to run on any gen set!! lol!!
unless it is a welder generator combo..
they are setup to deal with the on off pulse and wild start current with welding..
ranger, or miller both are good. in the classic gen/welders...

I hear they are doing a inverter gen / welder soon!! or multi process unit.


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## iowagold (Jan 22, 2020)

yea kinda weird on the number spread on that gen set...
I would like to see a real world testing on it with a good load bank for gen sets..

the numbers could be way exaggerated from the real world numbers...
we see this in the JINA clone gensets a lot...


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## JohnNY (Apr 27, 2020)

iowagold said:


> well the numbers are
> 24 A @ 120V and 26.8 A @ 240V out of the owners manual
> 
> 
> ...


thanks Iowa I had no idea how much that welder called for and I have the manual lol. I have a lot of learning to do with welding. I have to get a bunch of stock and want to make a table and such for my log splitter eventually.


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## iowagold (Jan 22, 2020)

use good mig welding wire even on the low cost welders..
stay with the name brand spools.. watch for the sales to get the price!
same on whips and consumables.

and same on the welding gas, get the good mix.
the co2 mix with argon works well for dirty metals...

we use 5%o2 and 95% argon for new production... way hotter on the weld.. and you can turn down the voltage at least 2 volts.. 
and the current is way less...
makes a nice production weld if the metal is perfectly clean.
but you will get a welding flash burn easy as it is super bright!!

and 100% argon for aluminum.

but then again I have welded with car battery's... LOL!!
I am an old school welder in the modern times for sure.
we mig and tig almost everything now... and some spray welds.
we phased out stick back in early 2005... 
the mig setup was faster and a real good weld.


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## JohnNY (Apr 27, 2020)

Is their a way to compare or find out the actual specs on the generator part? (Stator/rotor)


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## iowagold (Jan 22, 2020)

the best is to use a load bank made for gen sets.
at least to bench mark the performance.

your honda generator service centers are required to have one.
as all of the honda generators must be checked
and the performance numbers recorded on the warranty service sheet before
returning to the customer after any replacement of parts
like the carb, inverter, spark unit, coil assy's, etc.

if you do the engineering thing to the T,
you can get the theory specs.
all the wire size, air gap, gauss, rpm, etc, etc.
one hint is to look at the wire size on the stator.
think heat soak or run time heating. and you can get close to the output power.

the bit of tricky science on the honda inverter units is on the
small 125 volt only units they use one 3 phase winding.
feeding the inverter.
and on the larger 240 volt units like the eu7000is they use 2.
kinda cool how they have them set inside the inverter to clock the 180 out on the eu7000i.


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## JohnNY (Apr 27, 2020)

I wonder if I could call a Honda dealer and they would do be able to load test the two of these? Of course I would be willing to pay them so maybe they would accept to do it. My personal problem is having to tear into the specs of everything and keep going up in quality/size/power what ever it may be lol. Im going to call around tomorrow. Thanks for that info!


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## iowagold (Jan 22, 2020)

most of the good honda service centers love to see what the other brands are doing.
I get a chance to show off what honda will really do!!
that side by side run is always a good selling point!!
a just dealer may not have a load bank.
but the service centers do.
lol who knows a gallon of hand sanitizer might get you in the door!!
LOL!!
or a box of good black service gloves!!
I never show up asking for special favors with out something special or cool!!
and glad handing a 50 always helps too!!
they tend to remember you that way!!
or call the near by pizza joint for a delivery drop.

back in the day a bag of snickers fun size was the BIG deal!!
or a 2-3 lb summer sausage!!


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## JohnNY (Apr 27, 2020)

iowagold said:


> most of the good honda service centers love to see what the other brands are doing.
> I get a chance to show off what honda will really do!!
> that side by side run is always a good selling point!!
> a just dealer may not have a load bank.
> ...


Hahaha thats how I roll LOL. Its just hard to find that kind of help/service these days. The "old school" way of customer service has been long gone especially here in NY where I live. These guys are actually inundated with work at times because NO ONE is willing to do or knows anything any more. The best example of that is when I went to a local shop for some NOS Tecumseh parts they had and there were brand new snow blowers LINED UP on the side of their building and all had service tags attached to them. When I asked aren't they all new? He said yes, I then asked "Their all broken already? His answer "NO.......they ran out of gas!!!"

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## drmerdp (Apr 10, 2018)

> "NO.......they ran out of gas!!!"


lol


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## iowagold (Jan 22, 2020)

lol on the ran out of gas!!
I needed a good laugh this am!!


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## JohnNY (Apr 27, 2020)

I think my jaw is still on their counter when he told me lol. Guess when they delivered them they left out that the part where the operator needs to add gas when it runs out lol

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## JohnNY (Apr 27, 2020)

Question: are there data sheets available for generators showing the factory testing or anything? Unfortunately with whats going on with the world today, all shops dont even answer so I assume they are closed. Trying to plug ahead on comparison so I know which one to keep 

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## iowagold (Jan 22, 2020)

one of those new age snow throwers that works on free energy! lol!!


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## JohnNY (Apr 27, 2020)

So I took the air covers off the rear of both gens today to compare the alternator workings. The attached pictures of the exl8000 (8000/135000 are the first below.























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## JohnNY (Apr 27, 2020)

Here are the pictures of the Pro8000 (8000/10000) . This gen looks a lot more heavy duty and a lot more going on inside then that of the "larger spec'd" exl8000, plus the exl8000 has a build date sticker in it of 02/20/07. I was hoping to get some part #s or model numbers to possibly compare actual specs that way but only really the AVR has a part number and I have no idea which one can make a difference but the one from the pro8000 is definitely larger by parts. The EXL8000 is definitely a rebadged Generac for sure. Don't know who made the pro8000. The pro8000 looks brand new also all around.












































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## JohnNY (Apr 27, 2020)

Now I have to figure out how and where the neutral bonding takes place. Any ideas?























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## tabora (Sep 6, 2018)

JohnNY said:


> Now I have to figure out how and where the neutral bonding takes place. Any ideas?


Find the neutral on the 240V outlet. Trace the wire(s) from that point until you encounter a ground wire or the frame.


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## iowagold (Jan 22, 2020)

the 240 outlet is right beside the breaker on the right in that pix
can you shoot a pix of the front panel back side that is looking at that for us?
I saw some thing on the right side of the green wires on the back wall
there is another wire under the green I could not see the color or where it was feeding to.
snap a good close up of that buss bar for us too


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## iowagold (Jan 22, 2020)

looks like 
gray and blue as L1 and L2
red as neutral??
I see one connection of a green /yellow tracer to one outlet as earth ground..
and no other jumpers from that point to the other green grounds.. FAIL!! lol at least in my inspection eyes.
there was a black wire under one of the green / yellow on the back wall that runs to the gen harness.. what is that?

I need better pix of the back side of the front panel wires..


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## speedy2019 (Jan 29, 2019)

Ahhh thats where the AVR is, I wondered why I couldnt see mine, its hidden away.


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## JohnNY (Apr 27, 2020)

Thanks Iowa, I will pull it out tomorrow and spread the bunch out a bit for better views of the wires. I know the ground came right off the 120v outlet. It want even tight. 

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## JohnNY (Apr 27, 2020)

tabora said:


> Find the neutral on the 240V outlet. Trace the wire(s) from that point until you encounter a ground wire or the frame.


Thanks, Im gonna try that also. What a birds nest in there.

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## JohnNY (Apr 27, 2020)

iowagold said:


> the 240 outlet is right beside the breaker on the right in that pix
> can you shoot a pix of the front panel back side that is looking at that for us?
> I saw some thing on the right side of the green wires on the back wall
> there is another wire under the green I could not see the color or where it was feeding to.
> snap a good close up of that buss bar for us too


I will get all that for you. Thanks

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## iowagold (Jan 22, 2020)

JohnNY said:


> Thanks, Im gonna try that also. What a birds nest in there.
> 
> Sent from my moto z4 using Tapatalk


lol on the birds nest!!
this one is really pretty basic!!
some of these gen sets get really tight inside on the wiring bundles..
more like a rats nest!! lol!!
hard to trace some of them unless you cut zip ties or cut sheath loom materials..
yea schematics are one thing... the real world is another!! lol
take your time on the pix... it is worth it for sure.


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## JohnNY (Apr 27, 2020)

iowagold said:


> lol on the birds nest!!
> this one is really pretty basic!!
> some of these gen sets get really tight inside on the wiring bundles..
> more like a rats nest!! lol!!
> ...


Compared to the exl8000 MUCH MORE wiring. But the exl has only 2 120/15amp and one 240 twist lock. Compared to the pro8000.


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## JohnNY (Apr 27, 2020)

I think I found the bonding of the neutral to ground. (I stress the think part) by looking at the photos of the bus bar in the rear of the panel they have a link bridging the neutral to the grounds. Could it be that easy? I still have to trace all out but maybe one of you guys may say NOPE it's needed for the gfci breaker.


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## drmerdp (Apr 10, 2018)

It can and should be that easy. Attach a picture if you'd like one of us to confirm it.


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## iowagold (Jan 22, 2020)

JohnNY said:


> I think I found the bonding of the neutral to ground. (I stress the think part) by looking at the photos of the bus bar in the rear of the panel they have a link bridging the neutral to the grounds. Could it be that easy? I still have to trace all out but maybe one of you guys may say NOPE it's needed for the gfci breaker.


did you get a chance to take the pix yet?
there will be a green/yellow to the gfci
I just cannot see the other connections..
I think I found a print for this








the yellow marked area is the neutral bond to the chassis.
they show it as white wire... but from the pictures I saw it was the reds...
are there numbers on the wires??
be care full if they are painted on the rub off easy!!
you are looking for the junction of wire 22 (neutral ) to 33..
they also show it with a plug in connector or maybe a fork lug to the chassis..
it might be the green / yellow wire I saw...
I need a better pix of the gfci wires


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## JohnNY (Apr 27, 2020)

iowagold said:


> did you get a chance to take the pix yet?
> there will be a green/yellow to the gfci
> I just cannot see the other connections..
> I think I found a print for this
> ...


Hey Guys, didnt have a chance today to pull it back out as today turned into a honeydo day lol. I zoomed in on the current photo of the terminal block and noticed the bridging thing that looks like it can be removed. Im probably wrong.


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## iowagold (Jan 22, 2020)

THAT IS IT!!
GOOD JOB!!
HARD FOR ME TO SEE THAT!!
well done!
yup remove that to remove the ground bond to the neutral at the gen set.
you can always put it back if you need to at a later date.


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## JohnNY (Apr 27, 2020)

Thats it!! Im a generator mechanic now lol. Who needs advise lol. You guys have been awesome with this. Im still going to post better photos when I open it up.


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## JohnNY (Apr 27, 2020)

Sold the exl8000 today. Haven't gotten to the pro yet to remove the bonding.


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