Generator stopped charging

[Ausfahrt]

I have a small Sportsman inverter/generator that I use as a backup for my Honda EU2000i. It's a Chinese made 1000 watt unit and I've had it for probably close to a decade and I like it because it's handy and light.

Last week I fired it up after our long winter to exercise it for an hour or so powering a 500 watt shop light. All was good until I returned to find the generator not running. I figured that the low oil level switch had cut it off as I have known them to be finicky in the past. After topping up the oil it fired right back up but was not generating power. I tried to flash it using the power drill method to no avail.

This generator was only $149 so it's not the end of the world but if you guys have any suggestions, I'm all ears.

 

[LenZee]

I had a smaller harbor freight generator break the crankshaft between the motor and generator. Ran fine but generator wasn't turning.

 

[BigCahuna]

I would check to see if the circuit breaker is doing it's thing. At least see if there's power feeding it.,,

 

[ekrampitzjr]

I would check to see if the circuit breaker is doing it's thing. At least see if there's power feeding it.,,

Some of the cheap circuit breakers used in small generators like to fail, meaning that the breaker must be replaced. This could be your problem.

 

[JTK]

That's a cool little inverter style unit.

Being a more complex inverter unit, I too would suspect an issue with the electronics external to the generator itself. There may be fuses in there that you can't see w/out doing some digging.

 

[Dave Sherman]

Flashing with a drill isn't going to do squat for an inverter generator, that only only works for conventional generators. I would suspect either the cheapie circuit breakers they put on have failed, or the inverter module itself has failed. Most of those inverter units have lights to indicate power is good or it's overloaded, are any of them on?

 

[Ausfahrt]

Flashing with a drill isn't going to do squat for an inverter generator, that only only works for conventional generators. I would suspect either the cheapie circuit breakers they put on have failed, or the inverter module itself has failed. Most of those inverter units have lights to indicate power is good or it's overloaded, are any of them on?

Thanks for chiming in here, I wasn't sure if the flashing method applied to inverters. The power light is on even though there is no power at the outlet.

 

[Ausfahrt]

Follow up:

I had some free time to dig into the generator. I started with the basics and hooked up my meter to the 120V receptical and confirmed that there was no voltage. Then I switched my meter to DC and checked the DC output and it read 13-14 volts.

This got me thinking that the inverter was functioning and to look a little more. I then traced the wires backwards from the 120V plug outlet and found a loose wire at the first connector clip.

So now my cheap generator works fine and I'm a little embarrased for having started this thread but if it helps some of you from repeating my silly mistake then it was worth it.

 

[Whimsey]

Thanks! I bought the exact same generator earlier this year for $159 as a backup so I don't need to run my 5500W generator if I'm not needing much power. It runs ok if you don't continuously run it with a load more than ~650W. I'm going to see if it runs my 36" fridge this week. I removed the Torch plug and replaced it with an NGK before I even ran it. Though it must have been tested at the factory as the Torch plug was black with soot. It runs fine with the NGK plug.

 

[meep]

Glad you fixed it! No shame - I need ideas if things I’ve missed …. err, daily.