Generator Question

I recently purchased an 8500K Champion emergency generator. I've been running it with no load to break it in per the user manual. I have fresh gas in it with fuel stabilizer and have roughly three hours of runtime. I've run it several times and put in gas starvation mode each time to run the gas out of the carb completely. yesterday when I was running it it started right up but died twice after running for awhile. If it has fresh gas and I've been taking care of it very well why would it die out like that? It died twice but started right back up both times. What would cause it to do that?

 

How does it act when it dies?
For instance does it act like it was turned off or sputtering like it's running out of fuel.
Try loading it up for a while, get the governor to open up.

 

It has plenty of fuel in it and when it died it sounded more like someone had turned it off. it just winded down with no sputtering.

 

Choke was turned off too soon?

 

Just FYI, when you shut the fuel off and let it run until it quits, there is still a little fuel in the carb bowl, and if left long term it will turn to "yuck" and eventually get sucked into an orifice where it should not be.
For simple proof of this, after it runs out of fuel and quits, pull the choke out and start it again...they will often fire for a bit...but even then there is still a little fuel in the bowl. Best thing to do for long term storage is to drain the bowl...there is generally a screw to open, or a small bolt to loosen, or remove, to drain completely...I usually let it drip dry before closing back up.

 

Sounds like fuel might not be getting to the fuel bowl as quickly as it should. Could also be low oil. Could be some crud in the carb also.

 

I have several of the champion gensets, they've been great. They are all clones of very good honda or yamaha engines. As I recall, the break in period is to be done with a load of up to 50%. It's not normal to break in the genset with no load.

If you were running it on gasoline when it shut off then I doubt it is related to a lack of fuel. They will hunt when starved. Instead I believe that your spark was stopped which is most often from the low oil sensor. Please check the oil level.

Another problem with these modern gensets is they all have a CO detector that will shut off the spark to the genset if it senses CO (exhaust) so you really have to run it somewhere well ventilated.

If you have full oil and are running way out in the open then I'd call up Champion. I've done it and talked to real english speaking people that did a great job.

 

You need to run it under a load. Without a load the throttle does not open enough to allow it to pull fuel through the high-speed jet side of the carb.
It sounds like maybe the jet might be partly clogged, you can try revving it up and then close the choke until it almost stalls and open it again, maybe do this a couple times. Sometimes this will suck a bunch of fuel through the jet and clean it out.
Might not be it but easy enough to try.

 

Yes, their techline is excellent.

If it was an inverter model, running in eco mode...otherwise it'll be 3600RPM.

 

How's your oil level?

 

Oil level is fine and it's new clean oil.....i guess I'll try running it with a load next time. it ran for about 45 minutes before shutting off....it started right up, ran for about another ten minutes and shut off, then started right up again and i shut it off myself after about ten minutes..literally three hours with fresh gas and oil is all this things been run sinc ei bought it....hope i'm not experiencing fuel issues already. Also I'm running it outdoors with complete ventialtion so I doubt it could be the CO sensor.

 

Under no load it doesn't take much fuel to hit 3600.
I personally would load it up to capacity with a resistive load and let everything break in.
You want to work out the bugs on the electrical side too.

 

Don’t have anything to add other than I’ve seen probably 20 times more generators not functioning from lack of use than wore out. My own Yamaha 2000 wasn’t running right until I ran it hard for a couple hours! Runs perfect now!

 

My advice is stop running it out of fuel. Use stabil in your fuel, exercise it loaded for an hour once a month and forget it. My 2010 Onan Marquis 5500 in my toy hauler was exercised monthly and had zero issues when I sold it in 2020. Same thing for my Hobart Champion Elite, very few actual welding hours on it, but more exercise hours than anything else, it was my standby whole home generator. Purchased it in 2008 with 7.5 hours on it, sold it with 93 this year before I moved. Changed the oil in it twice but always ran stabil in the fuel and exercised it as close to monthly as I could.

 

Exactly.

 

I called Champion today. Got through in 5 minutes and they were great. They told me that it could be the CO shield sensor tripping even though I'm running it outside. They said the sensors are sometimes too sensitive and they would sendme a new one if I needed it. She told me that if it dies again to look at the unit and the CO shield light will be flashing red.

As far as running it with a load they did advise that. I was going to plug my shop vac in but she said that was too much of a load to run just for maintenance operation which I thought was a little odd. She suggest plugging a fan and a lamp in and varying the load while running it by unplugging and plugging back in so that is what I'm going to do.

 

I disabled the sensor on my new Generac GP9200E because of the same issue. Just another bandaid for stupidity that has made another product less reliable.

For loading during my monthly maintenance run, I use a 1500 watt radiant heater.

 

I explained to the customer service rep that while I may not always be the brightest guy in the room I know enough to never run my generator without proper, adequate ventilation. I asked if there was a way to disable the CO shield and was told there is not. She said something about the exhaust blowing back on the generator and tripping the sensor. If this is happening when the generator is being run completely unobstructed in the great outdoors (my back yard 8 feet from my shed and 30 feet from my house), that sounds like a design flaw and not user error to me. In any event I'm pretty satisfied with the level of customer service Champion has provided thus far.

Don't even get me started on the new safety nozzles for gas cans.

 

EZ-Pour.

 

I see many are doing monthly runs. I'm not totally in agreement with that being necessary. It's true that an amature can 'lose it's charge' but rare I think. If it happens to you backfeed a 110volt outlet with a 9 volt battery to re-energize. The super low rent version is to plug in a drill and spin it in reverse by hand a few times briskly. For the 9-volt you can use a paperclip to make 'leads' from by soldering them into the 9 volt's sockets. These are not my 'tricks' but those passed down to my by older and wiser shop hands. Unit needs to be running while using either method. I'm speaking of traditional generators. The new ones with all the gadgets....good luck.

For reference, my second hand Yamaha is sitting right now bone dry and has been since more than a year ago. I have no worries that it will make some lightening for me when needed.