1977 Kohler 7.5 kW Gen Set - Batt Charging

[Art]

Does anyone know if 1977 Kohler 7.5 kW gen set has internal means for charging its own battery?

Reason I ask: Since we purchased boat in 2008 a relatively small [16" x 36"] solar panel has always been on fly bridge face and hooked up to the gen set batt; which also powers the windless and forward toilet. Never before seemed to have lack of batt amps/volts... whenever gen set or other two items are used. That said... this Memorial Day weekend the gen set's G27 starter batt was dead [11.3 on multi meter]. I found that negative lead from solar panel had somehow been broken off at batt terminal. The dead batt is only 1 year old. We'd run the gen set a while ago... and... I had then noticed that the batt was sluggish regarding starter action.

Luckily, I always keep a G27 batt in isolated batt box and fully charged for if such a need might arise. We were back up and running in no time flat... with solar panel again well connected to battery.

Just wondering if the gen set can keep it's own batt charged or if for the last 9 years it's the solar panel only that has been maintaining batt charge level.

BTW: The batt on gen set before the 1 yr old one that was dead this past weekend was over 10 yrs old before it failed. And, yes, that 10 year old batt had always stayed correctly hooked to the solar panel.

Happy Generator-Battery Daze! - Art

 

[RT Firefly]

Greetings,
Mr. A. I can't speak to Kohler but we had a 7.5kw. Onan that had a rudimentary charging circuit from what I recall. I can't imagine any generator being dependent on any battery that was remote from the unit itself. Wouldn't make sense. How would the manufacturer know if there would or would not be a remotely charged battery available?

 

[Comodave]

Most gensets do charge their own battery, not sure about your particular one.

 

[john61ct]

That old maybe broke and PO jury-rigged current solution.

Fact is cranking is such a minor load, piggybacking off a pump/windlass etc bank is better than a dead weight dedicated Starter.

A 1/2/all switch (for load direction not charging) can add redundancy from another bank if desired.

 

[Lepke]

Find a manual, maybe available online. Almost all small generator sets have a separate charging circuit. It allows a raw water pump in place of the alternator without adding another pulley or complicated belt arrangement. Both of mine have charging circuits.

 

[Art]

Find a manual, maybe available online. Almost all small generator sets have a separate charging circuit. It allows a raw water pump in place of the alternator without adding another pulley or complicated belt arrangement. Both of mine have charging circuits.

Went deeply into manual I down loaded 9 yrs ago. Found little blurb about an off/on switch that activates a trickle charge [3 amps] if desired to be used. No drawing where the switch is located. Also mentioned that if starter batt is charged by other means then no need to activate the charge feature. Kind of seemed in the "wording" that this charge feature might not be functioning. So, I guess, similar to as I alluded to in post #1... the PO must have set up the solar panel just for this reason. Guess the fact that one of the solar leads to one of the batt terminals had unknown to me broken off was reason for starter batt eventually going dead. Now that I have solar hooked back up, the batt will likely remain charged.

In addition, I have a 2 amp trickle charger that activates whenever the boat's 110 AC switch is on. It keeps my completely isolated emergency G27 batt charged... and it is not too far from the gen set batt. Therefore as added precaution [help in keeping gen set batt charged] I plan to run lead from the emergency batt trickle charger to also include a charging feature for the gen set batt.

Thanks for the input!