Generator recommendations?

We just purchased a Landmark Key Largo with the generator prep but no generator. Probably won't need a generator very often so I was wondering what is the best way to go (most economical) if we don't plan to use a generator very often??
 

danemayer

Well-known member
Hi JerryPotts,

Congratulations on your new Landmark and welcome to the Heartland Owners Forum.

We ordered the Onan 5500 LP genny from the factory. Don't use it very often, but it's there when power goes out or when I need power while in the storage lot.

Some pros: 1) nothing to carry, move around, or plug in. 2) when the genny starts and stops, power automatically switches. 3) LP is clean so I don't have to worry about the genny getting gummed up by old fuel. 4) Fuel is on board. I don't have to carry gasoline. 5) It powers everything in the Landmark, including both air conditioners running at the same time. 6) Takes zero space in the bed of the truck.

Some cons: 1) It's expensive to purchase. 2) It can be difficult to install locally. 3) It's expensive to operate. You can burn through most of a 40# tank of propane in 12 hours.

If you only use a generator occasionally, don't need more than one A/C at a time, have space in the truck and/or don't mind moving a heavy generator around, you might do ok with a gasoline powered 3000 watt Honda generator.
 

Invizatu

Senior Road Warriors
3k watt Honda generator. You can get by with a 2k if no a/c is to be used.
And if you really want to save $ get an off brand (look on Northern Tool website).
But do get an inverter generator for noise reduction and better for your electronics.
 

d_fergie

Well-known member
Buffalo tools has a LP generator pretty much identical to the Champions available thru various places, 4,000 surge 3,200 watts, will run about a lb of LP per hour at 50% load ... (weighs just under 100 lbs)
 

szewczyk_john

Well-known member
I have used a Honda 3000 inverter in my SOB trailer. Still have it in my house garage. I would purchase one Honda 2000 to have on hand in the rare instance when you need power. If you see that you are using it more and want to expand the usage then you can add a second 2000 with a cable. This is the best and lightest way to go. The 3000 is bulkier and weights alot more than even two 2000s. The only down side to this idea is the smaller fuel tank on the 2000 but they really do not use that much fuel and you can even buy larger full tanks that will siphon the fuel to your 2000.

Honda is the creator of the inverter technology and they make the best product. they are more expensive than alot of other knock offs that are available. I know that I can go to any Honda garden or cycle shop and get repairs and/or parts for my unit. You can not do that with the knock offs. You do get what you pay for.
 

jnbhobe

Well-known member
Generator prep is useless unless you get the generator at the same time, as Dan says aftermarket installation can be a real pain in the arss. 3K Honda will do almost everything for around $2K.
 

pegmikef

Well-known member
I use the Honda 2000 pair. Plenty of power to run the A/C (one A/C unit) and most of your other stuff. They are quiet running, light weight, frugal on gas and if you are not running the A/C, then you only have to run one of them. (this assumes that you run your hot water heater on propane).
 

mountainlovers76

Mississippi Chapter Leaders
I use the Honda 2000 pair. Plenty of power to run the A/C (one A/C unit) and most of your other stuff. They are quiet running, light weight, frugal on gas and if you are not running the A/C, then you only have to run one of them. (this assumes that you run your hot water heater on propane).

I also have the Honda 2000 pair and it worked fine for over 5 years with my '09 Bighorn 3600RE running one AC. However, I also just upgraded to a new 2014 Key Largo and so far I have been unable to run even one AC with the dual Honda 2000's. All works fine without AC running but try to start even one AC and the load is so great it pulls the gennies down to the point the EMS shuts down due to low voltage. This never came close to happening in the Bighorn but so far the Key Largo's AC load is just to much. My Key Largo has the Gen Prep and the gennies are hooked up properly but just will not run the AC.
 

pegmikef

Well-known member
I also have the Honda 2000 pair and it worked fine for over 5 years with my '09 Bighorn 3600RE running one AC. However, I also just upgraded to a new 2014 Key Largo and so far I have been unable to run even one AC with the dual Honda 2000's. All works fine without AC running but try to start even one AC and the load is so great it pulls the gennies down to the point the EMS shuts down due to low voltage. This never came close to happening in the Bighorn but so far the Key Largo's AC load is just to much. My Key Largo has the Gen Prep and the gennies are hooked up properly but just will not run the AC.

Hmmm, bigger A/C unit, or no high start capacitor in the A/C unit. One would think at least one A/C would start with almost 4 Kw. Maybe the converter is bigger and sucking more juice than the one in the BH did.
 

R-Bryan

Member
I went two tailgating seasons trying to power my rig off of two Champion 2,000w Inverter/Generators with a parallel kit. Although they were rated at 2,ooo w you never really got that much juice out of them and combined I think was generating only 3,600k. The two would power the rear (15k) AC unit and maybe a few lights and the TV, but if the converter kicked on or the water pump, it would trip the genset every time. The frustrating part was that the front AC was a 13.5k unit that you'd think would run fine with a little extra to handle the converter or water pump or an extra lite here or there, but with everything turned off, the two gens would never run the front AC?? Even installed the hard-start capacitor that is recommended all over the RV forums and still no luck...

I really like the portability (only 44lbs) and stackability of the Champions however, with a 50 amp service and the kind of heat we have this time of year (first tailgate is end of Aug and forecast is for 98 in Norman!) they were just not sufficient, so I bought a 5,600k inverter/generator to power whatever I needed while boondocking. It's heavy (144lbs) but a crane I ordered from Harbor Freight and installed in my truck bed makes lifting it in and out of the truck a one-man job.

Trial run this weekend and it powered both AC units, however, it struggled at first to kick over the front AC unit? Everything else ran well - with the AC running it powered the microwave, coffee maker, and hairdryer... not all at the sametime. If you need to run the AC and would like to run other appliances my experience has been that the smaller inverter/generators are great for tent camping, pop-up campers, and other smaller applications, but these rigs just have too much power demands that you'll want or need to operate and a larger generator is the way to go.
 

Grey Ghost

Well-known member
I also have two Champion 2000 inverter/generators that I run parallel and I gun my ac and almost everything else on it accept when my wife wants to run two curling irons and a blow dryer plus the tv and the coffee pot. I've had no problems with the refurbished Champions and I only paid about $300.00 a piece for them. Got them on e-bay.
 

brianharrison

Well-known member
I also have the Honda 2000 pair and it worked fine for over 5 years with my '09 Bighorn 3600RE running one AC. However, I also just upgraded to a new 2014 Key Largo and so far I have been unable to run even one AC with the dual Honda 2000's. All works fine without AC running but try to start even one AC and the load is so great it pulls the gennies down to the point the EMS shuts down due to low voltage. This never came close to happening in the Bighorn but so far the Key Largo's AC load is just to much. My Key Largo has the Gen Prep and the gennies are hooked up properly but just will not run the AC.

Converter may be larger as well, drawing additional load on the generators. But I do know the 15K draws down my 2-2000 Hondas as well. I installed the high start capacitor.

Brian
 

R-Bryan

Member
First saw the generator at our local RV dealers parts dept. They had an excellent introductory price on it, but before buying, I checked it out on the Internet. Found a better price, with free shipping and no state tax at Amazon.

The brand is Lifan - and yes it's made in China - many of the products coming out of China are improving dramatically, but you can always get a stinker too. Some of the reviews on the Lifan product would suggest such. However, I've found that buying any mechanical/electrical product, regardless where it comes from, has inherent risks and potential fail points. And without proper maintenance, anything mechanical device will fail, eventually. Didn’t mean to go down that rabbit trail, but I know some folks like to poke holes in anything made in China, kinda like we use to do with Japanese made products in the 70’s!...

I’m needing it for tailgating primarily, or the next ice storm at home, as any other time I take my 5[SUP]th[/SUP] wheel out we’re hooked up to shore power. I really wanted the Yamaha EF6300iSDE (one of our fellow tailgaters with a triple axle toy-hauler runs both his AC’s plus a bunch of other electronics off of it. They start at $3,700 new, plus another $200 for the remote, so I was looking for a used one or even a used 6500 Honda, ($5,299 new), just never found any reasonably priced considering the age and hours of use on them.

All three of them operate at similar decibel levels: 58 to 64 db @ 7 meters/23 feet for the Yamaha; Honda was 53 – 60 db and the Lifan is 59db – 64db. All well within reasonable levels for even close proximity use, unlike the contractor generators!!

As Brian stated, the converter in my rig could be drawing more amps then other units; 10-15 I believe, also, there’s mention of some kind of EMS (electronic management system??) on these newer rigs that has also been the cause of keeping the smaller inverter/gens from powering some RVs? Way over my head.

Here are the links : http://www.amazon.com/Lifan-ESI-560...8196&sr=8-6&keywords=lifan+inverter+generator

http://www.lifanpowerusa.com/

RB.
 

HornedToad

Well-known member
We just purchased a Landmark Key Largo with the generator prep but no generator. Probably won't need a generator very often so I was wondering what is the best way to go (most economical) if we don't plan to use a generator very often??

My Torque came with the generator prep package. I bought a new Onan 5500, with minor freight damage to the shell, off ebay @ 1/2 the retail cost and saw several other used low hour units in that same price range, which gets you an onboard generator for about the same cost as these portable solutions.

I installed the Onan myself with a little help from my friends. Hooking up the gas and power was easy with the prep package. The hard part was getting the unit into the generator box. We had to unbolt the side of the box and pull it back to slide the unit off a pickup tailgate into place. Once in place and hooked up we bolted the sides back down and re sealed.
 

danemayer

Well-known member
My Torque came with the generator prep package. I bought a new Onan 5500, with minor freight damage to the shell, off ebay @ 1/2 the retail cost and saw several other used low hour units in that same price range, which gets you an onboard generator for about the same cost as these portable solutions.

I installed the Onan myself with a little help from my friends. Hooking up the gas and power was easy with the prep package. The hard part was getting the unit into the generator box. We had to unbolt the side of the box and pull it back to slide the unit off a pickup tailgate into place. Once in place and hooked up we bolted the sides back down and re sealed.

May not be quite the same for an LP generator.
 

CHRIS-123

Member
I am running a champion 4000 watt/3500 for my torque 261 toyhauler, runs everything great, picked it up cheap, and have over 100 hours on it and no problems, burns a half a tank of fuel over 12 hours, does the job I need, and not very nosy as people say, but that's just my opinon.
 

pegmikef

Well-known member
I also have the Honda 2000 pair and it worked fine for over 5 years with my '09 Bighorn 3600RE running one AC. However, I also just upgraded to a new 2014 Key Largo and so far I have been unable to run even one AC with the dual Honda 2000's. All works fine without AC running but try to start even one AC and the load is so great it pulls the gennies down to the point the EMS shuts down due to low voltage. This never came close to happening in the Bighorn but so far the Key Largo's AC load is just to much. My Key Largo has the Gen Prep and the gennies are hooked up properly but just will not run the AC.

Well after reading this and making my earlier comments, it occurred to me that I had not tried running the A/C in our new BH on my Honda pair so I tried it this morning and much to my dismay my A/C also will NOT start. I tried turning the converter and all other circuit breakers off, and it still will not start. The only difference I can find between this 15k btu A/C and the 15k btu A/C iin my old TT is that the one in the BH is a Dometic and the other one was a Coleman (and this one never failed or hesitated to start and cooled better than this Dometic one). Fortunately summer is ending so I have a few months to resolve the issue. I don't want to give up my Hondas so I am probably going to install a hard start capacitor in the Dometic first to see if that works. I suspect the Coleman already had one installed (which makes sense since a lot of RV A/Cs are run off of generators and at varying elevations).
 

HornedToad

Well-known member
May not be quite the same for an LP generator.

The burn rate on a 20 lb bottle of propane is equal to about 5 gallons of gas...
so you would need to carry (and change out) 5 to 6 small or 4 large (30 lb bottles)
of propane to equal an on board gas fuel cell.

I would guess the only reason to consider LP is if the Key Largo's generator
prep is tapped into the house propane tanks?

PS the 5500 runs two AC's
 

danemayer

Well-known member
The burn rate on a 20 lb bottle of propane is equal to about 5 gallons of gas...
so you would need to carry (and change out) 5 to 6 small or 4 large (30 lb bottles)
of propane to equal an on board gas fuel cell.

I would guess the only reason to consider LP is if the Key Largo's generator
prep is tapped into the house propane tanks?

PS the 5500 runs two AC's
Landmarks don't have a fuel cell to support running a gas generator. Other owners have pursued the idea and given up because there's no easy answer. Also installation of an Onan LP generator may not be the same on a Landmark as an Onan Gas generator install on a Torque.
 
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