"Van Chocstraw" wrote in message
...
Nick Danger wrote:
Looking for generator repair advice...
I have a Winco 900-watt Tri-Fuel generator with about 320 hours on it for
home standby use. It's worked well for years - it easily powers
everything in the house except the central AC. During a power outage last
night, after it had been running for about five hours, I turned on the
basement light switch, the lights flashed momentarily and then went out.
The only other load in the basement is a dehumidifier that I always keep
running when on generator power as it helps stabilize the output. I then
found that the breaker for the basement had tripped. We've been in the
house over 20 years and I've never seen that breaker trip. I reset the
breaker and then the entire house went dark. The generator kept right on
running with no noticeable change in sound (i.e. it didn't sound like it
was working harder or easing up). I tried resetting the breakers on the
generator, plugged a light into the outlets on the generator panel - but
nothing worked. I turned it off for a while to see if maybe the problem
was heat-related. Still no luck. It starts up just fine but produces no
power. It seems unlikely that the problem would be a loss of residual
magnetism. It gets exercised regularly, and it was running for five hours
when it failed. Does anyone have any suggestions for things to look for?

btw: After the main power came on, I turned on the breaker for the
basement and everything functioned normally.

tia

Sounds like the utility power came on and fried your generator. Did you
have the MAINS off?


The generator is connected through a transfer switch - installed by licensed
electricians with town permit, inspection, etc. It is physically impossible
for mains power and generator power to get into the house wiring at the same
time. The mains power didn't come back on until 1.5 hours after the
generator died.

Also - I had a typo in my original post. The generator is 9000 watts, not
900.