What would be involved with converting a generator from 50Hz to 60Hz?
What would be involved with converting a generator from 50Hz to 60Hz?
Here in Europe all outside work must run on 110 volts by law, so contractors use step down transformers to reduce the voltage from 220/240.
.
Thanks all for the answers. Was just checking out boats and one of them was a 50hz boat.
Guess it'd be a pretty big job to convert a 50hz boat to 60hz.
Might not be valid for all European countries, I don't think that it is European law. Would be surprised if it was so on the continent...
best regards / med venlig hilsen
wadden
"Almost all motors on a boat can run at 50 Hz or 60 Hz with no problem."
Here in St. Lucia the domestic supply is 220v 50Hz. I have a US spec boat and run a LARGE transformer in the shore-power line. In my experience, 60Hz air-conditioners work OK on 50 Hz. However the motor that drives the h/p pump on my water-maker, plus the motors on my compressor and bandsaw all get really hot when run on 50Hz. The same motors run much cooler when powered by the boat's generator. YMMV.
Many, perhaps most electric motors designed for 240V/60hz will run on 230V/50hz. Lots of people do it and get away wit hit, but it doesn't mean it's a good idea. In fact, it's a bad idea, akin to running your diesel in a constant overload condition.
Given any particular electric motor, if you run it at a lower frequency, you need to correspondingly lower the voltage. Conversely, if you run at a higher frequency, you need to take up the voltage. So an air conditioner designed to run at 240V/60hz can be run be run at 50hz, but you need to cut the voltage down to 200V. Otherwise the motor will be stressed and run hot, as you observed. If you read the fine print on the name plates and spec sheets for Dometic air con systems, they tell you this.
Its all about the de-rate factor, the given 200 volts is found as follows;
240v * (50Hz/60Hz) = 200v this not mean you should run this motor on 200v, it means on 50Hz it has the performance as of running on 200v.
Example; to replace a 1 kw 240v 60Hz motor to run on 50Hz you need to replace it with a 1kW * (60Hz/50Hz) = 1.2 kW 240v 60Hz motor.
CeesH
Would it make sense to leave it 50Hz and just deal with it?
Might not be valid for all European countries, I don't think that it is European law. Would be surprised if it was so on the continent...
best regards / med venlig hilsen
wadden
I was going to reply just that yesterday but have been thinking about it.
Looked up the boat you mention on YW an could not find the name of the genny nor capacity so it isn't easy to answer your question. My suspicion is most will run at 60 or 50hz and there should be a switch or jumpers to control that. But if everything else is native 50hz and you have the Atlas system, why would you want to change? The only reasons I could think of is it all the outlets on the boat are wired to foreign standards and you want to change them out to use US appliances and the like. Seems like a much more complicated issue than simply changing the generator.
I saw one smaller Nordy on YW which was $50K below market and one of the rationale was it was 50hz native and had to be rewired. Don't recall if it had the Atlas system. It didn't sound like it was a cheap fix. Couldn't find it on YW yesterday so it might have sold or been removed from the market.
Thanks all for the answers. Was just checking out boats and one of them was a 50hz boat.
Guess it'd be a pretty big job to convert a 50hz boat to 60hz.
Thinking about it now, i don't think its a super big job. Just Switch out the receptacles. Reprogram the Atlas. New inveter chargers. Wirirng size shoudl nto be a problem because i don't thing they change the wire size between 60&50Hz boats. HVAC depends, some of Cruisairs are both 60&50Hz compatible while others aren't. Then there are things like the watermaker. Not fond of Village Marine water makers anyways. Also ER blowers might have to be changed but thats not a big job either. Im not super sure about the appliances though.
Serious warning flags here. Think again. Or better still get advice from a qualified marine electrician and a good Surveyor.
I turned a 120V / 60 Hz boat into a 230V / 50 Hz boat. Well, mostly. And with expert help. Wiring gauge is likely to be an issue going the other way around, particularly to meet relevant Standards which is likely required for insurance.
First make an inventory of AC only appliances. I know Twisted chose to run lots of AC items when he built and hence his extensive listing in his post, but most folks have DC units where feasible and the AC stuff is quite limited in number. If that's the case then it may not be too difficult to workaround.
My workaround included adding some new receptacles and changing just a couple for the 230V /50 Hz circuits, which were also on a new, additional breaker panel. In some cases that will mean ending up with 120V and 230V receptacles next to each other, such as for the washer and dryer. I'm still running those 120V units here is Oz at the moment via a step down transformer but will be replacing them with 230V units soon. The washer works OK on 50Hz but if ambient temps are hot then the dryer overheats and shuts off part way through a drying cycle. I do not want to continue running inductive loads designed for 60Hz on 50 Hz long term. I believe it is a fire risk. On the other hand and as noted above, resistive loads are not really a problem, so I'm fine with my 120V toaster.
Its an item by item assessment once you have a full inventory of AC items. But I think its easier to go the direction I did. Most 230V / 50 Hz minor electrical items I buy come with wall-warts that accept wide voltage and frequency inputs. On the other hand, buying similar stuff in Nth America I found that often the wart would accept 120v/60Hz only.
It is not uncommon for Nordhavns to have dual system capacity. Without getting into specifics, what says Nordhavn?
PS - Have you seen the pictures and video of the Polar Star fire?