<div>This makes it hard to decide if the problem is auto starting (it is) or lousy gear and poor support? Anyone notice a pattern of support here? </div>
<div>I avoid auto start because murphy moves in on the better designed systems and bites you in the rear sooner that later, on the lousy ones like the start of the thread he openly lives there.</div>
<div>Also never run an engine without a "Murphy" shutdown system. Sooner or later it will save your rear end. But it will not help if it will not start!</div>
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<div>With auto start most people don't pay any attention and things go wrong also.</div>
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<div>Either way we catch the flack.</div>
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<div>Have a great Christmas,</div>
<div> </div>
<div>Bob Ellison</div>
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<div> <br><br></div>
<div class="gmail_quote">On Tue, Dec 23, 2008 at 1:18 PM, Tom Elliot <span dir="ltr"><<a href="mailto:telliot@wagonmaker.com">telliot@wagonmaker.com</a>></span> wrote:<br>
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<div><font face="Arial" color="#000000" size="2">Todd,</font></div>
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<div><font face="Arial" color="#000000" size="2">Excellent points to which I'd add I've been wondering just how well-designed these off-grid homes are that need generators to be running when the home is unoccupied for long periods of time. A home that uses that much power with no one in it is simply badly designed.</font></div>
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<div><font face="Arial" color="#000000" size="2">Tom</font></div>
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<div style="FONT: 10pt arial">----- Original Message ----- </div>
<div style="BACKGROUND: #e4e4e4; FONT: 10pt arial"><b>From:</b> <a title="toddcory@finestplanet.com" href="mailto:toddcory@finestplanet.com" target="_blank">Todd Cory</a> </div>
<div style="FONT: 10pt arial"><b>To:</b> <a title="re-wrenches@lists.re-wrenches.org" href="mailto:re-wrenches@lists.re-wrenches.org" target="_blank">RE-wrenches</a> </div>
<div style="FONT: 10pt arial"><b>Sent:</b> Tuesday, December 23, 2008 7:52 AM</div>
<div style="FONT: 10pt arial"><b>Subject:</b> Re: [RE-wrenches] mate issues AND MORE ISSUES</div>
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<div></div>
<div class="Wj3C7c"><font size="+1"><font face="Arial">I know this is not the topic, but I <u>never</u> set up auto genny starts and this thread only confirms the correctness of that decision. Having a machine automatically start/stop while unattended is IMO a recipe for, at best damage to gear and, at worst a fire that could destroy the entire homestead. <br>
If people are too mindless to know how to fly their off-grid system by looking at the weather forecast and battery SOC meter, then they should move to a on-grid home. I tell my customers when they are away from their off-grid homes, to shut the inverter's DC breaker off and leave the PV charging sources on. There is no chance for failure with this setup.<br>
<br>Murphy will get you every time you try to automate what should be done manually.<br><br>Todd<br><br></font></font><br><a href="mailto:CVSOLAR@aol.com" target="_blank">CVSOLAR@aol.com</a> wrote:
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<div><font face="Arial" color="#000000" size="2">Matt & Tom,</font></div>
<div><font face="Arial" color="#000000" size="2"> Guess it's time to put in my two cents. I have also had the same random failures to start and/or stop the generator automatically from the mate in 3 installation. Managed to boil dry 8 L 16's and run through 90 gallons of propane before we went back to the unattended second home over three days after checking it out and found the generator had been running since we left. As you have noted, all tests checked out good at the time. We are looking into 3rd party auto start modules as an alternative or continue to tell all customers not to use auto start if unattended. It seems that all auto start problems occur when the customer is not home. We had one Trace SW4024 start a Kohler generator flawlessly for 3 years and when they took their first extended stay from home, it failed.... Turned out it was a bad spark plug but it shattered their faith in the system. We have also had problems with The Xantrex SW Plus with similar problems. We have also had a problem with several Outback systems shutting down the generator prematurely at about 70% charge even though we reset the mate and Inverter to factory defaults. </font></div>
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<div><font face="Arial" color="#000000" size="2">I still have trouble convincing the rich second home owners that the only reliable system is 2 generators with a person to run them. We are currently using a honda 2000i as our backup for our off grid home so our VFX3624 does just fine taking in the power. Love the low fuel consumption. My customer with the runaway Kohler used more fuel in one weekend than we have used in a year. </font></div>
<div><font face="Arial" color="#000000" size="2"></font> </div>
<div><font face="Arial" color="#000000" size="2"><font lang="0" face="Arial" size="2">John Blittersdorf<br>NABCEP Certified Solar PV Installer <font size="1">tm</font><br>Central Vermont Solar & Wind, LLC.<br>104 River Street<br>
Rutland, VT 05701<br><br>802-747-0577<br>802-773-0924 fax<br>802-770-8625 cell<br><a href="http://www.cvsolar.com/" target="_blank">www.cvsolar.com</a></font></font></div></blockquote></div></div>
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