Shran
Junk Collector
TRS Forum Moderator
Supporting Member
Article Contributor
V8 Engine Swap
Solid Axle Swap
Truck of Month
- Joined
- Mar 4, 2008
- Messages
- 8,897
- Reaction score
- 5,114
- Location
- Rapid City SD
- Engine Type
- V8
- Engine Size
- 5.0
I obtained an Onan Emerald 1 generator yesterday. It came out of a mid 80's motorhome that my buddy is tearing apart. I haven't heard it run yet but I imagine it'll be no problem to get up and running and it only has about 550 hours on it.
I'm tempted to set this thing in place permanently and wire it into my house - I believe it's 4000 watts so that should easily run my gas furnace and a couple other small appliances. I'm familiar with the wiring part (transfer switch and such) but I need some feedback about a couple other things:
Enclosure: thinking about building some sort of enclosure for it. Not really "weatherproof" or whatever, just something to keep it relatively dry. I am thinking about some sort of box that it can sit in. Up off the ground, probably with an angled "roof" and maybe fuel/battery storage under or next to it.
Exhaust: the exhaust port is on the bottom of this thing. I have the exhaust system and muffler from the motorhome, will need to be modified... thinking run it down, out the side of the enclosure, then angled out 90 degrees?
Fuel storage: will need some sort of container. I have a plastic 11 gallon fuel cell, I could mount that under it... exhaust concerns though? Maybe above would be safer? Mount the starting battery below? The generator has an electric fuel pump so I am flexible with mounting location.
Pardon the crude drawing but this is kinda where I would like to put it. I have very easy access to my breaker panel (red arrow) through my crawlspace. The red box thing is my enclosure, green line is the exhaust, green box is the generator itself, yellow line is the power feed from the gen to the breaker box.
Thoughts?
I'm tempted to set this thing in place permanently and wire it into my house - I believe it's 4000 watts so that should easily run my gas furnace and a couple other small appliances. I'm familiar with the wiring part (transfer switch and such) but I need some feedback about a couple other things:
Enclosure: thinking about building some sort of enclosure for it. Not really "weatherproof" or whatever, just something to keep it relatively dry. I am thinking about some sort of box that it can sit in. Up off the ground, probably with an angled "roof" and maybe fuel/battery storage under or next to it.
Exhaust: the exhaust port is on the bottom of this thing. I have the exhaust system and muffler from the motorhome, will need to be modified... thinking run it down, out the side of the enclosure, then angled out 90 degrees?
Fuel storage: will need some sort of container. I have a plastic 11 gallon fuel cell, I could mount that under it... exhaust concerns though? Maybe above would be safer? Mount the starting battery below? The generator has an electric fuel pump so I am flexible with mounting location.
Pardon the crude drawing but this is kinda where I would like to put it. I have very easy access to my breaker panel (red arrow) through my crawlspace. The red box thing is my enclosure, green line is the exhaust, green box is the generator itself, yellow line is the power feed from the gen to the breaker box.
Thoughts?