Homemade diesel gen help

[donnreeves]

I mated an Onan 6500MH gen to a D600 3 cyl Kabota diesel. While it does run very well and powers everything I need it to, the governor is not sensitive enough to hold 60hz. Does anyone know of an inexpensive electonic governor? the only two that I have been able to find are between $1000 and 2000. Spending that much kind of defeats the whole idea of building my own.  Thanks  Donn

[VanTare]

what did the D600 power before the generator they have different governor weights and springs for different applications it will work great for you with the right springs and weights.   


David

[Hartley]

What you are looking for is one of the belt drive governors
called a "hoof" governor. It can be driven from the fan belt
and with a little rigging can regulate the Kubota.

I looked on the e-place and didn't see any of the belt versions.
I got one a while back from there and it was about $40

The D600 is just about shy of the HP needed for a 10 kw but
should pull the 6.5 if you set the freq @62 hz it should then hover
around 58 to 61 hz loaded. If it wavers too much you might be down
on power from the engine.

[donnreeves]

the D600 was in a Grasshopper lawn mower. I called Kubota and they said that the gov was the same as the D722, which is the gen version except for the spring and throttle control. They are sending me the correct one, but didn't know if it would solve the problem. I don't have  much faith that it will .

[Tim Strommen]

If you have house batts, why not build a DC gen?

I had wrestled with a way to power my rig while parked, and eventually settled on having the main alternator do all of the work.  To allow the alt to be powered by a second source, I purchased two over-speed clutches to create kind of a mechanical "OR" system (either engine can run the alt, which ever is spinning faster has the load).  I settled on a 2-cyl Perkins diesel at ~13HP (the alt needs ~10HP peak to fully output the 24V/500Amps possible [C.E. niehoff C803D]).  I am looking at relocating the air compressor from the DD-6V92 to the alt drive shaft, so that either engine can maintain the air and batts (and the smaller engine can pre-heat the larger with a 24V heater for faster get-aways).

Later I may put in a spring-starter on the smaller engine for "black starts" if I was dumb and forgot to take the Optima D31A's out for storage, or ran both banks dead - this is similar to how the big ships start the mains (small APU builds up hydraulic pressure in accumulators and runs general electrical loads, then a large hydraulic starter on the mains does the starting labor).

[kwidd]

Have you any pics of the generator mated to the engine? I would like to see that. thanks Kent

[TomC]

Since most small Kubotas are governed for 3-3600rpm, you need to get a softer spring for the governor at 1800rpm.  The proper spring that Kubota is sending you will probably be correct.  I have a 1800rpm Kubot gen and from no power to full power, only changes about 3 hertz.  Good Luck, TomC