what size generator for a/c
 

my 85 hilo didnt come with a generator.....has anyone here added a generator?...what is the smallest one you could use that would still run the a/c?

Here's an earlier thread on this topic.

https://www.hilotrailerforum.com/f17/...-run-l21-3627/

Check the specs on your a/c and compare to the chart in this thread, or post the specs on your a/c here and someone will help.

100,000 watts at the least! 4 /25,000 watt generators! :) lol oh yeah and 4 guage copper wire up to 100 ft. funnin ya! lol:)

Run Mine with 5000 watts

2,300 watts will run the typical roof AC. Maybe you can get by on 2200.
I have one of those Ryobi inverter/generators from HomeDepot for about $499 that runs it great. Model# RYI2200
For something like an Onan that mounts under the camper you still need at least 2200 watts, 2300 to be safe.
If you want to run other AC appliances at the same time then you need to go bigger. Personally I have everything running off DC power (battery/solar) so I can use the 2200 gen just for AC, so the DC appliances/lights do not put any strain whatsoever on the generator (other than the 2 amp charger which is nothing.)

ryobi makes a 2000 inverter generator...would that run the a/c?

No, Ryobi does not make a 2,000. Theirs is 2,200 surge and 1,800 continuos.
https://www.homedepot.com/p/Ryobi-2-...2200/203617901
This one will run different AC units on campers that I have seen. Can't attest to everything, but the typical camper ones will run on it. I had one that was 2,300 watts start-up and it ran on this 2,200 watt surge Ryobi. Typically AC run much lower than the start-up watts needed. Say, 1,300 or less, but you need the power initially to get the compressor motor running.
I have this generator and it runs mine and my friends (he has same Ryobi) and my old one.

i only need 120vac window ac now my unit is so tiny now. so idk. yeah i only need my gen/ or shore for 120vac to run window ac and sanyo mini fridge. rest is solar on 750 watt inverter off my solar battery for lighting, computer, tv. i have all dc led's and halogens. i can run just fridge tho if needed. going to go with bigger inverter, when i can, or may use 2. it and my controller both have 2 usb's each. so does my gen and a bat charger built into it also and another 2 amp in the camper from acv to dcv variac converter.

they actually do make a 2000...its a ryi2000
https://www.ryobitools.com/products/...rter-generator

They do, stand corrected.
Don't get the 2,000. It likely will not run any A/C.
Most any Air Conditioner will need that 2,200.
Don't confuse AC Air Conditioner with ac Alternating Current.
120 is current I assume you mean, yes, all Air Cond units will run on household current like generator puts out.

If running a fridge too, a 120v household current fridge, then these little generators will not suffice. The air cond will be maxing out the generator at start-up, so if you want to add a fridge then get something in the 3,000 area. Fridge has the same type of compressor, so needs start-up power, and no way to tell them to never start up at the same time.

Good luck with solar. Do you have lots of panels? I have 200 watts solar and this is enough to keep things running, but not an inverter for long, and def not an inverter to run a lot of things like you want to. I use the inverter to charge the lap top on rare occasion, otherwise it always stays off. The more things you can make run straight off the 12 volt DC the better. The same appliance running off DC will use way less power than its household current version running off the AC (alternating current) that the inverter puts out.

I have 2 batteries and run an ARB DC powered fridge, lights, a fan, water pump, maybe the furnace fan and charge the phone, but little else - not all at the same time though - all this runs off DC. On rainy weeks I can last 2-3 days on what the battery has. Very little solar action happens in the rain. You also have the lift pump to raise the roof which will use a lot of power, so to start the camping off by draining that amount of power down is not ideal. I have separate battery for camper and for pump. You can run the vehicle engine while you raise the roof, but there just is not enough power over the trailer plug to matter much in this instance.

happy trails

lol..in arizona we have tons of sunshine and very little rain

I don't recommend running the TV to raise the top, you can blow the fuse in the TV because of the amps required to raise the top. .02 cents
Tree

It doesn't contribute that much energy to to the battery anyway. The battery has to have a good charge to lift the top or be jumped from a good battery.

Rich - while the TV can't add much current (because of the wire limitations), it's possible for the camper to try to draw that current anyway, and either blow the fuse (or worse) overload some wire and fry it.

Better to disconnect TV when raising/lowering. I don't get why HiLo's don't have a relay built in so when you press the raise/lower button it disconnects the + line to the TV connector. Seems a basic safety precaution.

what is TV?

Tow Vehicle (your pickup/suv, etc)

Are you guys just thinking this on reckon, or have some in-depth electrical knowledge?
Likely the TV wiring to power the trailer is much too insufficient to lead to blowing any fuses. I am skeptical that the lift pump would pull power through the TV like that, esp given there is a battery also right next to the pump that stabilizes current. Running TV while lifting wont give much additional power, but I cant see how it would be a problem.
It all comes down to how everything is wired up, how it's connected, through what kind of fuses or relays, and the gauge of the wiring. For instance, mine is separate plug, very heavy gauge wire, wired directly to the TV batteries through a heavy duty solenoid, it laughs at this, but if a tiny wire feeding the aux plug on the 7-way through a fuse buried somewhere in the TV, or worse, not fuse and it could melt somewhere unseen then that is another story, but still, the lift pump unlikely to do that.
More likely the wire melts closes to the lift pump, but will melt wherever the wire is the smallest. I just don't see the pump drawing that kind of current.

Agreement Here! If you can "jump" the battery directly from the TV, why would there be any problem?

Electric current don't care *where* the current comes from. If a device tries to draw a given current, that current will try to come through ANY wire connected to that circuit.

You may have been lucky and never blown a fuse or.burnt a wire. The reality is though, *some* of that current is still coming through the TV wiring. And if there's *any* hiccup in the system it will try to draw all 50 amps through the TV wire...which will.last about 1/10 of a second.

Using Jumper Cables
 

How long of Jumper Cables would you have to use to make the Distance from the TV battery in front of TV to at least the front of the Hitch or further back?:)

I've never used, or actually seen cables that long:rolleyes:

The PO of my old '76 had installed a 20 Amp outlet outside the HiLo and connected it to the Pump located inside at the front wall (also the Battery & No Manual Crank). Eliminated the hassle of crawling under the Table to reach the Pump & Battery compartment.

I’ll play along Bruce (just for fun:D ) at our shop we had a set of HUGE cables, like 000 gauge (about 1/3” of copper wire inside), and they were about 20’ long (so easy to jump any car from anywhere, important in a shop).

That’s the kind of wire/gauge needed to safely transfer large currents over long distance (upwards of 150 amp for 10 seconds).

Today I have some nice 0/1 gauge, 10’ jumper cables, and when being used to start a truly dead car you can feel them get warm in about 5 seconds.

The HiLo lift motor is nothing more than a car starter - so it’s going to draw similar currents (though on the lower end - I’d guess 20A) but for a longer cycle time. From a design perspective, wire heating is absolutely a concern because of the longer cycle time (20 seconds), hence the large cables on the motor.

Anyone want to throw an ammmeter on their motor next time they lift the top?

I blew three, countem, three, 30A fuses on the trailer battery charging line in my Tow Vehicle while trying to raise the top of my trailer after an all-day drive where I also had my trailer refrigerator running on DC. This occurred first in my Nissan Frontier, and second in my Ford F150. I finally learned on this forum that the combination of having a weaker battery from towing all day, having the refrigerator on (which further pulled the trailer battery output down) and then adding the electrical draw of the lift motor to the whole thing was just too much for the 30A fuse in the TV. Interestingly, though, the top ALWAYS went up! But, the next day, the trailer battery was no longer getting a charge from the TV.

Since learning this, I've ALWAYS electrically disconnected the TV from the trailer before raising the top and I've never blown another trailer charging fuse.

Regarding jumper cables, mine are 4 gauge and nothing stops me from disconnecting the truck from the trailer and turning the truck around so that the truck is facing the trailer and its battery is close to the trailer's battery compartment. I suppose if the trailer battery was so flat that I couldn't use the electric jack to get them disconnected, I'd have to use the manual crank on the lift jack, but I'd still be able to do it.

- Jack

Quit honestly, I've rarely had my TV connected nor even hitched to the HiLo when either raising or lowering. I always unhitch and level it before raising it. When the Battery on the '76 was too low to raise it, I always had to place the TV close to the door to run the Jumpers inside to the battery!

I use a cable about as thick as a good jumper cable. Get it at HD from electrical section. There are not pre-made wires, so having store cut it to your length is how it goes. You will need end terminals, also available at HD, or the auto parts store in battery section. *
Home Depot will have all gauges and can cut to length. I started from where the 12+ bolts up to the starter motor, not all the way to the battery. From there I went back to a clean spot under the truck bed, where no oil blows around from the diesel, and put a battery solenoid which is controlled by a switch on dash, then continued to trailer hitch. I used a 2-pole connector plug (ground and 12+). Probably did not need the ground, but did anyway to make it all even and useable if I want to attach power tools or a winch to the plug later. Ideally put a 20, 30 or 50 amp circuit breaker inline somewhere along the wire. The same gauge wire from plug back to trailer battery. Connects directly to battery, not to anything camper based. The longer the run, the heavier gauge wire you need. There are charts on internet, but they never agree with each other about what gauge for what length or run. A childs-finger size gauge wire is sufficient, and you can't really have too big a wire within reason. Measure the copper, not the rubber.

* if you are handy and have scrap handy, use 3/8ths copper pipe or whatever works for your wire. Cut to about 2.5 inch length. Hammer one half flat. Drill hole in flat side. Insert wire in round side and crimp it. Tape it shut. There is a cheap terminal.
You may need to cut or grind the flat side so it has rounded ends to fit your application.
Easier to hammer, drill, then cut, as hard to hold a 3 inch piece of copper in a vice to drill it. Drill while you still have a long piece to hold.

I have put an ampmeter on my 28' hilo and am pulling around 115 amps on the pump motor. This is why if your battery is low when raising the top the fuse in the TV blows. I have blown my TV 30 amp fuse several times and carry a couple of spares. When I pull into a campsite the first thing I do is hookup to shore power and leave the TV ideling to help give the battery a quick recharge while I unhook the RV and level it. I then unhook the elec pigtail and the top then goes up with no problem.

Circuit breakers will trip, then reset when they cool. Same idea as a fuse, but no need to replace.

On older HiLos the 30 amp circuit breakers in the pump compartment do not reset after cooling but have a reset button usually on the bottom that you have to press in to reactivate them. These older breakers can be replaced with the newer ones that automatically reset as the older ones go bad.

I was thinking to protect the whole system from trailer plug back. Auto parts store has circuit breakers cheap. I did not realize the pump has one too.
thanks

Just to throw in another data point, the hydraulic pump motor on our 2407T draws 58 amperes while raising (takes 15 seconds) and more than 140 amperes when the seal gaskets meet in the full up position.

George
WB4IPB

Astro those numbers fit the range of typical car starter motors (reduction-gear starters tend to draw a bit less). Above 150 amps would indicate a potential problem. This is why a battery is required to run the lift pumps - until recently an AC/DC converter of that capacity would’ve been prohibitively expensive. (Probably still is today).

You might want to look into a new device on the market called a "soft start". It ramps up the compressor slowly reducing the starting load by around 70%. With a "soft start" installed you can run most RV AC units with a 2000 watt generator.

i got a great deal on a honeywell 2200 inverter generator...i tried to run the a/c on my 86 hilo and it wouldnt...if i turned the a/c to vent..it would run it but if i tried to switch it to medium cool it wouldnt start...i think if i could get it to start it would run...anyone have any info that might help?...thanks in advance

Keystone- I'm assuming thats 2200w peak?

As I understand, the general rule w/even AC is you need a gen that can do 2kw run, not peak.

Your HiLo AC being both old engineering and aged is likely to want all the power it can get to start. A hard start or the soft start kit may help. (I haven't read up on the soft start yet,kinda curious how it compares to the old hard start systems)

yes...mine is 2200 peak and 2k run...i thought about the hard start kits...i'm assuming they are just a big capacitor?

Its been *decades* since I installed a hard start kit. They *used* to be just a piggyback cap. I'm sure there's all sorts of new microprocessor-controlled start systems now.

I could see having a faster cap that a controller would cycle for repeated bursts timed at the peak of AC pulses,to help reduce load on the genny during start, or something similar. So like every 10th or 20th of a second.

Or a controller that would sense current draw and engage the cap as needed during run.Or heck, if it'a just conditioning voltage could help prevent problems.

Due to the age of your A/C the starting capacitor could be dried out and no longer doing its job. I would say replacing it would with latest and greatest in capacitors would be a good place to start. Capacitors are mainly only needed for the compressor to start under load, the rest of the time the motor has much less draw.

i was trying to find the specs on my a/c unit but i dont see any sticker on it...anyone know what the specs are on it?...86 hi-lo 20 ft

Sometime you have to remove the A/C cowling, then remove the electrical cover plate on the A/C itself. The wire diagram and specs are on the inside of this cover plate. Tells you what P/N to use for a hard start and dotted line shows how to wire it in.

i've read on here some guys are running 2 small generators in parallel for double the watts....how is that done?...a cord with 2 male plugs...one on each end and plug the gennies together? ..i bought a honeywell 2200 gennie...it came with a double male plug.....anyone seen this before?

Double male plugs are dead-man makers. You see one of those walk the other way.

Dual-gennies have special adapters to balance the load/throughput. To be honest I've never read up on how they work,but they'd have to use some kind.of isolater to.prevent backfeed between gennies.

Honda seems to have popularized the idea with their small gennies (1k/2k)