User Tag List

Page 12 of 14 FirstFirst ... 21011121314 LastLast
Results 111 to 120 of 137
  1. #111
    Big Traveler
    Join Date
    Dec 2019
    Location
    Gaffney, SC
    Posts
    1,134
    Mentioned
    28 Post(s)
    Tagged
    0 Thread(s)
    Great minds (or desperate people?) think alike.

    The pump I added is low PSI, but I put a regulator right in front of the factory pump on the genny to bring it down to about .5PSI. That said, I don't have the tools (ordered today) to do a live testing of the fuel supply. I need to get some barbed T fittings and some other stuff to cut into a line so I can watch it while it runs and see if something is dropping out.

    That said, I have 2 new pumps, and I've NEVER been able to show any fuel pump failures, when I test them (either of them) they work, including right after it dies. I'm beginning to think it's something else, the dreaded electronic gremlin perhaps? I'm not giving up yet; I'm going to do what I described above and also, depending on the results, also trying running it off a remote tank (to see if it's a fuel line/tank problem). If nothing shows up in either of those tests, well, that's where I'm throwing in the towel.

    The "good" news, the problem is much more repeatable now. If you run the genny for 20 mins, it will fail, moving, not moving, doesn't matter. The only thing I'm not sure, it may be heat related, I'm going to try it tomorrow early morning to see if there's any alignment between heat and runtime.

    I'm just so over it with this generator. I really want to find someone to buy it (a dealer, let them deal with it) and get an EFI model instead. I'm pretty sure (as long as it's not an electronic gremlin) that it's something in th fuel supply/carb area, fuel injection would make life a lot better here!

  2. #112
    Long Hauler offtohavasu's Avatar
    Join Date
    Dec 2014
    Location
    Fountain Valley, CA
    Posts
    2,254
    Mentioned
    4 Post(s)
    Tagged
    0 Thread(s)
    I don't recall, so still slinging here, have you seen the oil videos in YouTube?

  3. #113
    Big Traveler
    Join Date
    Dec 2019
    Location
    Gaffney, SC
    Posts
    1,134
    Mentioned
    28 Post(s)
    Tagged
    0 Thread(s)
    Quote Originally Posted by offtohavasu View Post
    I don't recall, so still slinging here, have you seen the oil videos in YouTube?
    <rant below>
    You mean the ones that say "fill it until it's spilling out or it'll stall"? Or the ones that say "don't fill it beyond 1/4 the way up the stick or it'll stall"? It would be funny if these generators weren't so expensive and SO critical in some situations, I'm sure there are dead pets and perhaps even dead people because of the stalling issues on these Onan generators. What really kills me, the Onan is by far the most expensive "small engine" I own, and it's also, FAR and away the most temperamental and downright unreliable of the probably couple of dozen small engines I own. Lawn mowers, log splitters, stuff that's far too cheap from Harbor Freight. None of those engines have given me 1/100th the hassle of this Onan. Shoot, I even have 2 Harbor Freight generators, they run fine. The only time either has stalled on me is when they were out of fuel.
    <end rant>

    Today's troubleshooting yielded some interesting results. First thing I did was rig it so I can run from a remote tank, trying to determine if it's a fuel problem or issue with the lines in the RV. Nope, same exact problem, run 20 mins or so, then shut down (error 36). Then I did a lot of carb cleaning, I don't think this is the issue, but I figured it was worth a shot, especially since I had a remote tank rigged up. No change.

    Last night I found the guy saying "too much oil will make it stall". OK, that's an easy one, drained the oil until it was about 1/3rd of the way on the stick. Nope, no change.

    I have a fuel pressure test kit coming this week, so I can see what's going on there, but, the tests today; I'm beginning to think less and less it's a fuel issue.

    So, what else could it be? Normally I'd say "spark", because with my other generators, if you have fuel/spark/air, it's going to run. But, this thing is way more complicated, and I found some post somewhere about the "control board" and they can fail. I also read that overheat, especially if there's a lot of power flowing, and finally, the control board powers the pump directly. Well, that's a dumb design, but, whatever, worth a shot.

    Over to Autozone, bought a 30A relay, and hooked the 12V line from the genny that powers the pump to relay trigger, and then wired the power for the pump directly to the battery.

    Guess what? No stall. Ran for hours today, purred, no stumbles, no nothing. Blasted 2 ACs for hours and not a hiccup. It hasn't run that long uninterrupted in months (since my last trip in May when it failed on the way home).

    Here's my guess; I had 2 pumps wired up to the control board (a lift pump and the pump right at the tank to overcome the issue when driving when there's too much distance) and it was just too much for the POS (note, Onan TOLD me to wire up a lift pump!). The control board is failing, and having to send all the power through to both pumps just exacerbates the issue.

    It's a guess, but love to hear some ideas from others. I'm just so tired of this issue, it's going to take me years before I come to see this thing as "reliable".

  4. #114
    Long Hauler offtohavasu's Avatar
    Join Date
    Dec 2014
    Location
    Fountain Valley, CA
    Posts
    2,254
    Mentioned
    4 Post(s)
    Tagged
    0 Thread(s)
    I think you're in to it. Two pumps May be drawing too many amps through the board and something is heating up, maybe an on board self resetting breaker. If you're comfortable with your temporary wire job with the relay, try running it that way. The only thing I'd suggest modifying, if this brings positive results, would be run each pump in it's own relay.

  5. #115
    Site Team Redapple63's Avatar
    Join Date
    Mar 2020
    Location
    SoCal
    Posts
    2,761
    Mentioned
    26 Post(s)
    Tagged
    0 Thread(s)
    I ran the same genny in my motor home and the tank was about 20 feet away from the genny with no issues. Are you sure you need to run two pumps? Maybe it was the board the whole time? If it is a fuel delivery issue, is the fuel line collapsing maybe?
    2019 GMC 3500 SRW Sierra Denali Duramax
    2020 Reflection 315RLTS

  6. #116
    Big Traveler
    Join Date
    Dec 2019
    Location
    Gaffney, SC
    Posts
    1,134
    Mentioned
    28 Post(s)
    Tagged
    0 Thread(s)
    Quote Originally Posted by offtohavasu View Post
    I think you're in to it. Two pumps May be drawing too many amps through the board and something is heating up, maybe an on board self resetting breaker. If you're comfortable with your temporary wire job with the relay, try running it that way. The only thing I'd suggest modifying, if this brings positive results, would be run each pump in it's own relay.
    Could be, however, I had this into Onan and when they didn't fix my problem, they said it's a GD problem because they didn't put in a lift pump, they recommended I wire it exactly as I did (just splice into the same wire that powers the pump today). Again, rant aside, I did find someone who had a similar problem.

    Why each pump on it's own relay? I got a 30A relay, that should be way more than enough to run two pumps. Just wondering what I'm not thinking through.

    I ran the same genny in my motor home and the tank was about 20 feet away from the genny with no issues. Are you sure you need to run two pumps? Maybe it was the board the whole time? If it is a fuel delivery issue, is the fuel line collapsing maybe?
    My tank is close to 30 feet away, it's all the way in the back and the genny is all the way in the front. I'm pretty sure that the lift pump was a must have, when I installed that, many of my problems went away, in fact, most of last season, it was perfect, I ran it for hours and hours of drive time.

    I was thinking fuel delivery too, but I'm pretty sure that's not it. I changed the pump on the generator (replaced it with a new one) this weekend, no change. Then I decided to go whole hog and ran a line straight from the fuel pump to a 5 gallon gas can sitting right next to the generator (using only the onboard pump, ~6 ft of brand new fuel line). No change, still stalled out. Also, I did check the carb bleed screw after a failure, there was plenty of fuel in the bowl.

    If it's what I think it is, it's not actually a fuel delivery problem, the fuel is getting there until something overheats in the control board and shuts it down. But it's a "shutdown", not a "ran out of gas" stop. Sounds just like you pressed the stop button.

  7. #117
    Big Traveler
    Join Date
    Dec 2019
    Location
    Gaffney, SC
    Posts
    1,134
    Mentioned
    28 Post(s)
    Tagged
    0 Thread(s)
    Also, for anyone following this, I'm looking at a Flight Systems board if I need to replace it. I'm NOT sure this is the one for my generator (don't have the PN of my generator) but I LOVE this:

    Exact replacement for Onan 327-1413 and 300-5046 control modules**.
    Status indications for cranking and normal running.
    Does not shut down because of minor faults, like the original.
    Keeps running on all faults except for loss of stator voltage.
    Does not generate fault codes.
    Since the engine keeps running, normal troubleshooting methods can be used.
    Over-sized heat sink for cooler operation.
    When you travel with pets, generators can literally be a life/death situation. I DO NOT want the generator to stop because the control board thinks it's a good idea. I check the oil, I do the maintenance as required. Unless your on fire DO NOT STOP RUNNING. If I can get this working again, I'm going to disable anything I can that can possibly stop this thing, oil sensors, pressure sensors. I'll take the "risk" (in quotes because the vast majority of engines I own don't have oil sensors or other fancy electronics and I've burned exactly 0 of them up). Just KEEP RUNNING!!

    https://www.flightsystems.com/p-56-1413-01.html

    Edited to add, I think this is the right board for my generator:

    https://www.flightsystems.com/p-56-A032Y912C-00
    Last edited by Overtaxed; 09-06-2021 at 06:32 PM.

  8. #118
    Long Hauler offtohavasu's Avatar
    Join Date
    Dec 2014
    Location
    Fountain Valley, CA
    Posts
    2,254
    Mentioned
    4 Post(s)
    Tagged
    0 Thread(s)
    I only recommend 2 separate relays for redundancy. If you lose one relay, then you can still be in business until the 2nd gets replaced.
    Curtis, Christine, Cole, and Charlotte

    2007 Chevrolet Silverado Duramax LBZ, CCLB
    2020 Momentum 351M

  9. #119
    Big Traveler
    Join Date
    Dec 2019
    Location
    Gaffney, SC
    Posts
    1,134
    Mentioned
    28 Post(s)
    Tagged
    0 Thread(s)
    Quote Originally Posted by offtohavasu View Post
    I only recommend 2 separate relays for redundancy. If you lose one relay, then you can still be in business until the 2nd gets replaced.
    I thought about what you said and did some testing last night. I was thinking "this isn't going to work" because I apparently don't understand how fuel pumps work.

    Anyway, you're right, either fuel pump can pump without the other pump running. I thought the one not running would block the flow of fuel, but it doesn't, if I have the back one running, it'll push right through the generator mounted pump and I get fuel up to the carb and vice versa. So there's merit to what you're suggesting, if either relay failed, in theory, the remaining pump should be able to keep fuel flowing. And, of course, same thing for the pumps themselves, if either pump failed, the remaining one should be able to keep it going.

    That said, while I'm into a different troubleshooting problem now, I'm pretty certain that the initial problem I was having was not having a lift pump. The symptoms this time are similar, but not identical, when I first had this problem it was only while driving and if I went up a big hill, it would almost always cut out. I'm 99% sure my initial problem was not having a lift pump, especially when I saw the recommendation from Onan (the manual calls this out, as did the Onan repair center) and the results of adding a 2nd pump (it worked for close a 1 year without a single stalling event, I'd be lucky to make it 10 miles without a stall before). Long way of saying, I'm not sure I'd actually be buying much/any redundancy by having 2 relays because without both pumps (certainly the rear pump), I don't think the generator will keep running.

    I do wonder if all of this is a winding road back to the control board though. Others seem to be able to drive with their genny running on a similar rig. But maybe my control board has been weak from the beginning and as it heats up, voltage starts to drop to the fuel pump until, eventually, there wasn't enough to keep it going? Or maybe it's just a cascade, the first problem was no lift pump, added the pump, but it put more load on the control board, which caused it to start to overheat and fail?

    It's a maddening problem, that's for sure, and I really need to take pictures of all this stuff for you guys in case others have this issue (the relay, the test setup, etc). I'd literally hand some a fresh stack of 100 dollar bills at least 10, perhaps 20 high if they'd come out here and troubleshoot/fix this issue for me. I hate the "throw parts at it" approach, I'd love to see a test that says "this is bad" so I can have some confidence the issue is fixed. The generator runs like a top when its working, so there is light at the end of the tunnel, I just need to get there.

  10. #120
    Big Traveler
    Join Date
    Dec 2019
    Location
    Gaffney, SC
    Posts
    1,134
    Mentioned
    28 Post(s)
    Tagged
    0 Thread(s)
    Ran the generator for about 4 hours today, no shutdowns, using the onboard fuel tank and both pumps on a relay. I think I've homed in on the problem, appears to be the control board. I had a conversation with Flight systems, very nice, confirmed the board I linked above (https://www.flightsystems.com/p-56-A032Y912C-00) is the correct replacement part for my genset. Their board is not microprocessor controlled, it does not check for (or report) faults other than oil pressure. That was music to my ears after the hassle I've had with this generator.

    Almost 500 bucks out the door, that stings. What has stung even worse is all the time/energy and wasted worry I've put into this generator so far. This is a brand new generator, less than 100 hours on it, it's been back to the RV dealer and the Cummins dealer twice. It's a 5000 dollar generator that's not a whole lot more sophisticated than a 500 dollar generator I can buy from Harbor Freight. And the Harbor Freight generator has the distinct advantage that it runs (I have 1000's of hours on HF generators without a single unexpected shutdown other than running out of fuel).

    So annoyed at the situation; yes, I could make Onan fix this, it's still under warranty. Probably take me 2-3 more trips to the dealer, probably dozens of hours towing/fighting, and then, when I win, I'll get the same board that's far too sophisticated and error prone installed. My time is worth more, and my sanity is worth a lot more. But Onan, guys, if you're going to charge a huge markup on a simple generator, please, for the love of Pete, make it RELIABLE. Yes, quiet is good, yes, it's cool to monitor it from my phone, no, I don't give a HOOT about those features if the thing doesn't run when I need it to!

Page 12 of 14 FirstFirst ... 21011121314 LastLast

Posting Permissions

  • You may not post new threads
  • You may not post replies
  • You may not post attachments
  • You may not edit your posts
  •  

DISCLAIMER:This website is not affiliated with or endorsed by Grand Design RV, LLC or any of its affiliates. This is an independent site.