Generator won't run A/C

[Herk7769]

Originally Posted by ogmonte

Ok I bought a tester to test the amps of the A/C during start up while hooked up to to the generator. When the fan kicks on the amps are at 3.4 while the fan is still running and the compressor kicks on the amps jump up to 26 amps and the generator goes into overload. Not sure if I'm right but that is roughy around 2800 watts.

So I decided to hook A/C up to shore power and run the same test with the the same meter (T5-1000) and when the fan kicks on the amps are at 3.1. When the compressor kicks on the amps go up to 39.6 for about 1 second then drop down to 12.5. Does that sound normal for the compressor to draw that many amps at startup?


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My Coleman Mach III 15K had similar numbers till I put the hard start kit and fan delay module in. The numbers for the fan is about right and my startup amps are now about 16 amps at compressor peak.

The reason you don't trip your circuit breaker is the peak amps only last a second and the breaker needs longer than that to open. The generator's response to an overload is near instant.

FYI - My Yamaha EF3000 with 500 amp boost (total of 3500 Watts for 10 minutes) would not run the generator in ECON mode because of the ramp up time needed. The draw is so heavy and so fast, the generator must be running at near peak RPM to get the amps out before the compressor stalls.