Chinese Made Generators: Two Very Different Impressions of Quality

After yesterday's midday battery charge, my Kellen DG3600 generator shut down with an ugly, metallic rattle. I immediately assumed that to be the sound of its death, given my previous experience with the type. Luckily, this time it was only the exhaust muffler which had broken off at the weld. Thus, the set is still functional, but unbearably loud at full load. It is a good thing, then, that I never dare to run it for any length of time above 40% of its continuous rating.

The Kellen diesel generator isn't just my sole source of electricity, but also my greatest source of frustration. Ever since I picked it up from Smart Club in February (I think it was), I have been regretting my choice. Let's start with the name. Am I stupid for thinking that it would be a 3.6 kW set? Apparently, because when I took a look at the front page of the manual, it said "Diesel Generator 3.3 kW". Oh well, it wouldn't be the first time someone named a product for its peak rating, I thought. Then I looked inside the manual, where it said "Max continuous power 2.8 kW". WTF?!

After swallowing the disappointment of the blatant naming swindle, I started using the generator. It didn't even make it to its first oil change before it started developing interesting personality traits. The troubles began with starting difficulties in cold weather, which quickly developed into starting difficulties in any weather combined with black smoke at 50% load. Then the injection pump completely stopped responding to load changes, resulting in the frequency dropping past 45Hz @ 4 Amps, making the set near unusable. However, the logistics of organizing a warranty replacement were so staggering that I kept using it (only for battery charging @ 300W) until it shut down with a horrible screech and seized solid, around the 200 hour mark.

This brings us nicely around to the only positive thing I have to say about this generator: Smart Club were really nice about replacing it with a new one, no questions asked. Also, the replacement has held up much better, and is now past 100 hours without any major breakdowns. Except for the exhasut breaking off yesterday, of course. Plus the circuit breaker won't trip - if I subject it to an 8 kW load peak, the motor just loses rpm until the voltage regulator loses control. Oh, and the starter motor fell off both generators around the 30 hour mark, due to the bolts vibrating loose. And neither of them would start with the supplied batteries if it was colder than +10 centigrade, forcing me to hook up a proper car battery. And the 12V charging hasn't worked on either of them, but at this point I'm nitpicking.

In short, the Kellen DG3600 is a festering pile of poo, which can not be sweetened by any amount of niceness from the warranty department at Smart Club. I will forever regret my decision to buy it. So how could this happen? I have, after all, endured endless hours of Lisette's ranting about the all eclipsing shittiness of Chinese made scooters and ATVs. A thinking person would assume that the same applies to Chinese made generators, no? Well, once upon a time I actually did, but then the Firman SPG2500 came along and shattered my preconceptions.

It was in the spring of 2008, when I was moving out here to the buoy with Nemi, that I found myself in dire need of a source of electricity. I picked up the Firman from Jula, reasoning that it should at least give me a couple hundred hours of battery charging and coffee brewing. I didn't really expect it to last through the summer, but figured that I could just pick up a new one under warranty when it broke, and the 2k NOK price didn't seem much to pay for an immediate if temporary solution to my problem. In the end, it didn't just last through the summer, but kept running until this winter. At that point it had endured several thousand hours of horrifying abuse, with only two oil changes and a top-up when it went into low oil shutdown.

In the end I was aware that it was a lot less efficient than when it was new, but I kept beating it to death, amazed and curious how far it would go. I won't go into too much detail, as I'm planning a video autopsy to document how internally messed up one of these Honda pattern engines will get before it quits. Of course all things must end, and the honorable Firman is sitting abandoned and unloved on the aft deck of Nemi. It shall never be forgotten, though, as it forever destroyed my bombastic views of Chinese build quality. If there is a Hall of Fame for generator sets which went above and beyond the call of duty, then this little guy has earned his place, right between a 25 ton Bickerton & Day and a million hour Fairbanks Morse.

P.S: One might surmise that since I abused the Firman, I did the same with the Kellen. That is not so - I stopped taking care of the Firman when it got past the point where I expected it to quit. Its outstanding endurance led me to believe that Chinese generators can indeed last for a long time, so I fully expected the Kellen to last a couple thousand hours if I followed the maintenance steps in the manual. Thus I fed it only the best fuel and lubricants, did everything at the prescribed intervals, but to no avail. To paraphrase Lawrence Block: "I think there is a lesson in here, and it probably wouldn't be lost on a martial arts master, but I'm not quite grasping it."

P:P:S: I dropped by Smart Club. They sourced me a new muffler on the spot, without asking for a receipt. At least they take responsibility for the crap they sell, which is more than you can say for some.

P.P.P.S: The engine in the Firman is called SPE160E and is manufactured by Sumec. The engine in the Kellen is an UD178, made by the United Power Equipment Company.