The Walden Effect: Farming, simple living, permaculture, and invention.

Yamaha generator review

Off-grid cooking


Our new Yamaha generator is quiet and efficient.

It runs for twelve hours on one tank of gas at a low load --- a few fans, a light or two, and a laptop charger.

The Instant Pot and circular saw work on the generator too, but both run at a slower speed. After the first test, Anna opted to continue cooking on the propane camp stove instead. I kept using my saw.


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About us: Anna Hess and Mark Hamilton spent over a decade living self-sufficiently in the mountains of Virginia before moving north to start over from scratch in the foothills of Ohio. They've experimented with permaculture, no-till gardening, trailersteading, home-based microbusinesses and much more, writing about their adventures in both blogs and books.



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You might want to have that generator checked,I would think it should run those things fine.It may need adjusted.
Comment by Robert L Wed Oct 18 10:15:28 2017

A circular saw is not a purely resistive load. Such saws generally use so-called universal motors, which is basically a commutated series-wound motor. When running, these motors generate counter-EMF. The voltage and current are not in phase anymore and hence their power factor is reduced. Under such a load, the inverter-generator cannot deliver its full capacity. Check the manual.

For the instant-pot, the main power use is probably the heating element. When running at full blast, this is a purely resistive load. However, it is probably electronically controlled with I suspect pulse width modulation. That will probably also reduce the useful output of the generator.

Comment by Roland_Smith Fri Oct 20 17:48:20 2017





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