“…because only cool people have portable generators worth having…”
…That wasn’t a bleg.
🙂 But I’ll take it. Guess what just showed up at the maildrop…
An extremely generous long-time reader emailed me right after the post at the link above, saying there was one that had been purchased for a particular purpose but the purpose had passed, and could I possibly find it in my heart to put aside my generatorphobic ways long enough to make a home for this?
Have I said lately that you guys rock?
They say that Louis XIV had the inscription Ultima Ratio Regum cast into all the cannon of the French Army. It means “The Ultimate Argument of Kings,” and that always struck me as one of the most honest and up-front things any ruler or would-be ruler ever said. “We can dress it up prettier than this, but when it comes down to the unvarnished truth this is what it’s about: You’ll do as I say or I’ll send my goons to kill you.”
I thought about that for a long time. If there’s an ultimate argument, it seems only logical that there must be an ultimate answer. For years I thought the ultimate answer must be the bullets in my rifle, but it never seemed quite right. I’ve got bullets – he’s got frigging Cannon Balls. I mean, if there were three hundred million rifles throwing bullets at him, then maybe. But we all know that’s not going to happen. So if there’s an ultimate answer to his ultimate argument, it sure as hell ain’t bullets.
It finally came to me – and that’s when I abandoned the city and most of my stuff, and gave all that was behind me a good stiff Randian Shrug.
The ultimate answer to kings is not a bullet, but a belly laugh.
Little Bear 2009-2018
Laddie the Amazing Torso Boy 2011-2020
"Freedom Outlaw. It’s not what you do; it’s how you do it. It’s an attitude — from which actions always follow. It’s a do-it-yourself occupation. And a lifetime vocation."
- Claire Wolfe, Backwoods Home Companion, 6-07-10
I owe my success to having listened respectfully to the very best advice, and then going away and doing the exact opposite.
- G. K. Chesterton
"If every Jewish and anti-Nazi family in Germany had owned a Mauser rifle and twenty rounds of ammunition and the will to use it, Adolf Hitler would be a little-known footnote to the history of the Weimar Republic."
- Aaron Zelman
"Authority should derive from the consent of the governed, not from the threat of force."
- Barbie
"Never underestimate the ability of shit to find a fan."
- F. Paul Wilson
"You can't make an omelet without breaking eggs." The sophistry of villains - Bah!
- Robert A. Heinlein, Double Star
“Truth is, I’m not specifically interested in an armed society. What I want is a free society.”
- George Potter
I never saw a wild thing sorry for itself
A small bird will drop frozen dead from a bough without ever having felt sorry for itself.
- D. H. Lawrence
Aristippus passed Diogenes as he was washing lentils.
He said, “If you could but learn to flatter the king, you would not have to live on lentils.”
Diogenes said, “And if you could learn to live on lentils, you would not have to flatter the king.”
Sandy Hook was a Gun Free Zone. So was the Westroads Mall. And the Aurora Theater. And Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School. Should I go on? They were all Gun Free Zones.Â
– Reality
“Political tags — such as royalist, communist, democrat, populist, fascist, liberal, conservative, and so forth — are never basic criteria. The human race divides politically into those who want people to be controlled and those who have no such desire. The former are idealists acting from highest motives for the greatest good of the greatest number. The latter are surly curmudgeons, suspicious and lacking in altruism. But they are more comfortable neighbors than the other sort.”
- Robert A. Heinlein
"Civilization is the process of setting man free from men."
- Ayn Rand
If ever a man should ask you
For your business or your name
Tell him to go and fuck himself
Tell his friends to do the same.
For a man who'd trade his liberty
For a safe and dreamless sleep
Doesn't deserve the both of them
And neither shall he keep.
- Frank Turner
Don't be afraid to try something big, just because you're an amateur. The Ark was built by amateurs. The Titanic was built by professionals.
- Anon
"Nothing scares a police officer more than the threat of being treated the way that they treat people every day."
- Anon
"Be polite, be professional, but have a plan to kill everybody you meet."
- Gen. James Mattis
"Lust for power is the most flagrant of all the passions."
- Tacitus
"The man who knows what freedom means will find a way to be free."
- F.A. "Baldy" Harper
"The greatest discovery of any generation is that a human being can alter his life by altering his attitude."
- William James
We who lived in concentration camps can remember the men who walked through the huts comforting others, giving away their last piece of bread. They may have been few in number, but they offer sufficient proof that everything can be taken from a man but one thing: the last of the human freedoms -- to choose one's attitude in any given set of circumstances, to choose one's own way.
- Viktor Frankl
The free man will ask neither what his country can do for him nor what he can do for his country.
- Milton Friedman
“We must be free not because we claim freedom, but because we practice it.”
- William Faulkner
There is nothing noble in being superior to your fellow man; true nobility is being superior to your former self.
- Ernest Hemingway
"Everything the State says is a lie, and everything it has it has stolen."
- Friedrich Nietzsche
John Moses Browning - The most badass Mormon who ever lived.
"The nine most terrifying words in the English language are 'I'm from the government, and I'm here to help.'"
- Ronald Reagan
The most dangerous creation of any society is the man who has nothing to lose.
- James A. Baldwin
"It is better to be a warrior in a garden than to be a gardener in a war."
- Anon
“I tried to live in such a way that, when dying, I would rather feel happy than scared.”
– Witold Pilecki
Few men desire liberty; most men wish only for a just master.
- Sallust
"Place your clothes and weapons where you can find them in the dark."
- Lazarus Long
Read, every day, something no one else is reading.
Think, every day, something no one else is thinking.
Do, every day, something no one else would be silly enough to do.
It is bad for the mind to continually be part of unanimity.
– Â Christopher Morley
“I have found that, to make a contented slave, it is necessary to make a thoughtless one. It is necessary to darken his moral and mental vision, and, as far as possible, to annihilate the power of reason. He must be able to detect no inconsistencies in slavery; he must be made to feel that slavery is right; and he can be brought to that only when he ceases to be a man.”
-Frederick Douglass
ESSE QUAM VIDERI –
To be, rather than to seem
– Marcus Tullius Cicero
“A Winchester rifle should have a place of honor in every black home, and it should be used for that protection which the law refuses to give.”
– Ida B. Wells
Do what thy manhood bid thee do; from none but self expect applause.
He noblest lives and noblest dies, who makes and keeps his self made laws
– Sir Richard Burton
Success is not final, failure is not fatal: it is the courage to continue that counts.
– Winston Churchill
“Happiness is a journey, not a destination. Dance as though no one is watching you. Love as though you have never been hurt before. Sing as though no one can hear you. Live as though heaven is on earth.”
― Father Alfred d’Souza
I understand the generator, but do you really need all those weights?
Awesome!
Whoever the generous long-time reader be has likely made your generatorphobic ways a thing of the past is my wager.
Show and tell, sometime?
Weights? What Kentucky said. Ballast maybe?
Oh, yeah. But as luck would have it it’ll be another three weeks at minimum before it makes its way to the Gulch.
Wow, Joel. Looks like you’re now (or soon to be) in the Cool Kids Club.
THAT is spectacular. I’m thinking that’s about the best possible generator you could get for your needs. (And exactly the same one I have.)
You and I do have spectacular blog readers, no doubt about it.
Holy Honda Batman! That’s an amazing gift, and you have some amazing friends. That generator will let you do anything that a normal 15-amp household power socket will do. So you have regained the ability to use power saws etc that you lost when your big inverter died.
You may not have thought about this yet, but if I remember correctly your present inverter has a battery charger built in. Using the EU2000 and that charger gives you the ability to invest a pint or two of gas to top off your batteries on sun-deficient days.
With the gas valve off and gas cap vent closed, it will be perfectly safe for you to store that gem in your closet. It doesn’t drip oil and gives off no fumes. That will keep it safe from rodents, and also warm for easy winter starts.
Wow! That is so cool!
Good on you, Joel (and good going, whomever sent it to you)!
Looks, and sounds from what folks are saying, like a little treasure. My Honda generator is 23 years old, a yard in each direction, & heavy as hell. I imagine you’ll use the hell out of this portable little monster.
“With the gas valve off and gas cap vent closed, it will be perfectly safe for you to store that gem in your closet. It doesn’t drip oil and gives off no fumes. That will keep it safe from rodents, and also warm for easy winter starts.”
Good point. Keeping a generator inside a house isn’t the most intuitive thing, but I’ve kept my Honda eu2000i in the pantry since I got it. No odors. No drips. No problems whatsoever. And it’s nice and safe there.
Hey, we can get you a FAR bigger AC unit in the spring now! We’ll have you wearing that winter coat indoors in the middle of summer in the middle of the day…
}:-]
Very nice. Who ever the benefactor was he (or she) is one hell of a great person for doing this.
In the winter we keep ours under the kitchen table because it starts great warm but at -40 not so much.
@Ben – no need for that; the EU2000i has a built-in 12 volt charger. All one needs is the Honda 12 volt charging cord to plug into it.
@Joel: If I may take the liberty of adding a suggestion or two.
The ON/OFF knob does two things simultaneously when moved to the OFF position: it shuts down fuel flow and turns off the ignition. This makes it impossible to “run it until it dies” to empty the fuel system between the tank and carburetor. So….
Remove the large side cover access panel over the carb system (one quarter-turn screw at top, hinges with two tabs at the bottom, panel is easily removable), and you’ll find the carb bowl has a drain screw with a plastic tube leading underneath the generator frame. With the generator in a safe location to do so, loosen the screw a few turns and give it a minute (or so) to drain the float bowl. When drained, tighten the screw (gently). Reinstall the access cover, tighten quarter turn screw at top.
Pro Tip: Develop the habit of not replacing the cover until the drain screw has been tightened.
With the control knob still in the OFF position, move the choke lever to FULL ON (to the extreme right, facing the side of the generator). Pull the starter cord several times with vigor (“vigor” means “as if trying to start the generator”).
You’re now done with storage prep.
What this does is, first, empty the carburetor float bowl of fuel, and second, the vacuum created by “attempting to start” wth the choke closed pulls out what residual fuel may remain in the internal carb passages, preventing it from hardening into varnish in the passages. (The same trick works with other gasoline-powered equipment.)
The alternative to this procedure is, first, use non-ethanol fuel, second, keep the tank filled to the bottom of the tank neck (on the EU2000 it helps to remove the filter screen in the filler neck to see fuel level) and keep the fuel tank cap in the “OFF” position to reduce evaporation as much as possible, third, run the generator monthly under load.
“Under load” is a critical part of generator testing; inverter generators are somewhat susceptible to the inverter failing (if you have an inverter generator with battery start, disconnect the battery completely from the generator before attaching any kind of battery charger – many chargers put out “dirty” eg. poor sine wave current, which damages inverters – we’ve replaced several $1000 inverters on EU3000s and 5500s due to that). So far, the 2000s have appeared pretty bullet proof in that regard, but I would extend a caution to not exceed the machine’s generating capacity.
I can’t tell you how many generator owners have pulled their baby out of the garage or shed, fired it up and discovered zero electrons. “But I run it every month” is the common refrain, which, unfortunately, does not acknowledge that the engine is but one part of a generator and the generating capacity another, and they both have to function to be useful.
Elmer, thanks for the advice. I will flag this comment for further review when I actually have the generator to tinker with.
Make sure you run it dry when you go to store it. We just spent 2 hours cleaning lines and the carb to get rid of gunk in them on the same generator.
“The ON/OFF knob does two things simultaneously when moved to the OFF position: it shuts down fuel flow and turns off the ignition. This makes it impossible to “run it until it dies” to empty the fuel system between the tank and carburetor.”
Just a question . . . is it not possible to somehow install a manually-operated shut-off valve between the tank and whatever comes next? This should allow “run it until it dies”. There are some very small such devices available, and I have installed such on a couple of small-engine devices.
Looks like a great generator, though.
Steve_in_CA, you’re preaching to the choir. As a chainsaw mechanic I am an apostle of “run it dry before you store it.”
Kentucky, I’ve installed quite a few manual fuel cutoff switches in other, cheaper generators. It could be possible to do it on a Honda if space permits, which I don’t know but kind of doubt. But a carb bowl drain would accomplish the same task with less hassle. What Elmer suggests would make me nervous on a chainsaw with a diaphragm carb but it should work perfectly well in this.
Of course I would never store a generator long-term with any gas at all in the tank. It’s just not worth it to save less than a gallon of gas. What I’m not seeing is a convenient way to drain the tank…
I’m about to purchase the Honda generator based on your information, this discussion is SO useful as I’ve never owned a generator (or a full size gas chainsaw) and wouldn’t think of doing any of the things you all have suggested. unless they are in the manual. Thanks so much for sharing what you know. I’ve been wondering how the varnish etc. buildup was avoided.
Elmer wrote: “@Ben – no need for that; the EU2000i has a built-in 12 volt charger. All one needs is the Honda 12 volt charging cord to plug into it.”
You are correct Elmer, but the devil is in the details. According to the EU2000i manual the 12 volt output is: “Only for charging 12V automotive batteries.Maximum charging output= 8A”
So that gives you a maximum of 100 watts of charging power from a generator capable of many times that much. But with a proper battery charger running on 120 volts from the generator, you would be able to charge a deep cycle battery much quicker and more efficiently.
“What I’m not seeing is a convenient way to drain the tank…”
Hey, it’s a small unit. How about “remove fill cap, invert unit”?
Actually, the Owners Manual offers a ten-step procedure, which I haven’t been able to cut’n’paste:
http://cdn.powerequipment.honda.com/pe/pdf/manuals/00x31z076300.pdf
@Zelda & Ben: First, yes, the 12 volt output on an EU2000 is only 8 amps, because it’s intended to recharge garden variety 12 volt automotive batteries, as in “my RV has one of those and I need to recharge it to get the RV started bcause I left the lights on/ran the TV too long.” The late Sochiro Honda (or whomever he hired to design generators bearing his name) figured including a limited way to recharge 12 volt batteries was enough; I doubt he was aware of, much less considered, using a 2KW gen to restore a solar system to full capacity. Yes, you can plug multiple external battery chargers into an EU2000, and if that’s your need, go for it. Otherwise, live within the limitations of the device. FYI, output to the 12 volt charging system does reduce the total output available from an EU2000, so the 8 amps at 12 volts is not “free.”
Second, if you want good EU2000 info, and info on a bunch of tricks with them, search the RV forums. RVers have adopted the EU2000 as their Generator Of Choice because the freaking things just work. 48 lbs empty, super quiet, 2 is one and 1 is none, and a pair of them double the 120 volt wattage output enough to run RV air conditioners. There’s a run-time trick for 2000s using a 6 gallon marine fuel tank, a T-connector and a second pair of modified Honda EU2000 gas caps that allows running a pair for 10-12 hours. You’ll need the electrical connector kit to tie 2 EU2000s together, either from Honda or from YouTube instructions on how to build your own, to get enough watts for air conditioning, but the RVers do it all the time. FYI, tying 2 together doubles the wattage (3200 run, 4000 surge) but is still only 120 volts.
I am awed by the amount of abuse RVers inflict on EU2000s and they keep on running. Pro Tip: break them in with good petroleum oil (10 hours on first oil change, 25 for the second – the reason is very high quality synthetic oils are so friction free that using them from the start prolongs break-in for quite some time; a certain degree of internal friction is necessary for all the parts to “wear in” with each other, and good petroleum oils serves that puirpose well.) then switch to the highest grade synthetic you can get and check the oil level before each use (I’ve never seen one run on Amsoil automotive 10w40 – and kept full of oil – worn out internally, despite years of oil change intervals well beyond 200-250 hours; Honda specifies 20 hours initially and each 100 after that, but in a power outage situation every day is 24 hours, and I’ve seen a pair of 2000s attached to an RV run non-stop all weekend. Most RVers change oil only once a year in their 2000s, and some not even that often). Change oil as close to the recommended number of hours as you can achieve, use clean non-ethanol gasoline, clean/replace the air filter every 70-100 hours (the RV usage environment is usually pretty clean, but if you have dust go for 20-30 hours) and the thing should last for years.
I downloaded a manual this morning, and my problem with the built-in battery charger isn’t that it maxes at 8 amps but that it’s unregulated. My batteries cost far too much in money and hassle to risk overcharging them. I’ve got a nice Battery Minder that has served me well for something like eight years and I won’t abandon it now. So the DC power output on the Honda may go unused for the time being.
That said, it will be nice to have the option of a non-panel charge come the next extended gloomy period.
Considering your rodent problem, you might want to make a ‘box’ cage of hardware cloth over a wooden frame to store your genny in. You don’t need the wires or the hoses chewed up by your little visitors (that you are still killing, right?).
Glad you are getting even more self-sufficient out there.
Joel wrote: “That said, it will be nice to have the option of a non-panel charge come the next extended gloomy period.”
Joel, I don’t remember the model number of your inverter so I can’t look it up, but I seem to remember that it has the unusual feature of having a built-in charger. That charger almost certainly will be properly regulated, and might be faster than your Battery Minder.
Kentucky Wrote: “. . . is it not possible to somehow install a manually-operated shut-off valve between the tank and whatever comes next? This should allow “run it until it dies”. ”
I stumbled across an after-market gadget made precisely for that:
https://hutchmountain.com/products.html#!/Bad-Gas-Ethanol-Gummed-Carb-Eliminator-Switch-Eu2000i-Honda-Generator/p/78797767/category=0
Holy cow, that’s a generous gift. Good on whoever did it!
Dang sir, you have some awesome minions ! Extremely nice of that individual to do that – kudos sir !!