Aurora Diesel Gen WARRANTY not worth a SQUAT!!!!!

[Recoveryhill]

Tried to delete the duplicate post but perhaps it needed to be said twice.

Don't buy no name engines (low bidder asian producers) gasoline or diesel. Don't buy Gener@( for this reason, gas, propane, nat gas or diesel. Stick to Honda for gasoline or name brand diesel engines otherwise. I've paid to accumulate this advice.

 

[amigauser]

Tried to delete the duplicate post but perhaps it needed to be said twice. Don't buy no name engines (low bidder asian producers) gasoline or diesel. Don't buy Gener@( for this reason, gas, propane, nat gas or diesel. Stick to Honda for gasoline or name brand diesel engines otherwise. I've paid to accumulate this advice.

I have had excellent service from my Generac. Purchased it from Lowes for around $1300 probably seven years and 500 hours ago. They no longer sell this version at Lowes and now carry the lower end XG models.

Shop Generac Xp 8,000-Running Watts Portable Generator at Lowes.com

I do yearly Mobile1 oil changes with the Fram extra guard filter. I also store with full tank of treated (marine stabil or startron). I also start it at least every two months and have a battery tender on the starting battery. No issues only oil/filter changes and a new starting battery this year.

It ran just about continuously during two storms were power was out for 7 and 10 days along with some shorter outages since purchase.

 

[Dave M7040]

Most of these smaller gen sets have one end of the rotor supported on the engine shaft which is tapered. When either end (generator or motor) fails you have a collection of junk. The engine cannot be used to drive a pressure washer pump as they need a non tapered shaft. You cannot even put a pulley on the engine shaft. The generator rotor,if good, will not fit on a "normal" engine with a non tapered shaft.
These features even apply to Honda gen sets.
Dave M7040

 

[Boeing]

A follow up since there are a couple of folks who think I got what I deserved... The GENERATOR DID NOT COME WITH ANY OIL so the oil in it had the 14 hours. It was castrol Diesel oil, good stuff....and 14 hours on a RECOMMENDED 25 hour FIRST change cycle did not seem excessive. About the "pressure sensor".....have you never had an oil pressure gauge in your 1974 pickup (or equiv) stay at zero after you had been driving it an hour and just happened to NOTICE it? It's normally the gauge or the sensor screwed in the block and KNOWING this common issue I'll bet you drove it back home before you addressed it....right? The generator ran fine for an hour no knocks, clatters or anything to indicate that the oil pressure WAS low. I would have been replacing the sensor if the secondary issue hadn't started the NEXT day that we used it. (Dying down THEN knocking after just a minute). After getting the oil fault, the fuel fault...MY fault I took it to the John Deer dealer (Yanmar) They think that it's a fuel meter-controller-computer-measurer thing that is causing too much/too little fuel to get to the injector.
NOW, I am in a dilemma as to spend $200-500 at J.Deere on the questionable Chinese Genset or go buy a GAS unit, Rigid, Generac etc with a GOOD warranty and throw this Chinese one in the landfill.
BTW guys, IF I buy a gas unit let's forget the manual for a minute.....WHAT oil do I break in with, WHEN do I change it and can I go with SYNTHETIC after the break-in. Thanks as always.....alot of experience out there.

 

[sixdogs]

I too have been shafted by these kinds of things over the years. Not so much for a while because I am older and have the accumulated school of hard knocks experience to generally stay out of trouble.

Fact is, these Chinese units are marginal and hit or miss on whether you get a good one or not. To now pay more money to fix this seems like a bad option. It already quit once and will likely do it again. If you can fix it yourself you could keep it as a backup or sell it to recoup some of the $$. You're not out a boatload of money at this point and the situation could surely be worse. Sometimes these things just happen.

if it were me--and it's not--I would forget about the thing, write off the loss and just get something you can depend on. You aren't going to win the warranty thing and you are already out the money. That part is over. My dad taught me decades ago that "a poor man can only afford the best". It took me years to understand that while I was buying lesser quality I would often have to buy the same item multiple times because of poor quality and often spent more than what a quality piece would have cost from the get go.

Just my personal opinion here.

 

[Scooby074]

Unless you want a money pit, the chinese genset should go into the trash and write this one off to a lesson learned as Sixdogs says. There will be more issues.

 

[Boeing]

Thanks SixDogs and Scooby.......good advice, sometimes not what we want to hear but good sound thinking. I'm looking at a RIGID with the YAMAHA engine.
Any first hand info on that one? Doesn't come with oil, neither did the old one. I'm thinking plain old 10W-30 for about 5 hours THEN an oil change to......WHAT? More 10W-30 or go to SYNTHETIC? I do keep all my toys on solar chargers during the winter cause I don't get up there after Thanksgiving until March or April. Maybe I should change oil every spring upon my return regardless of hours??? Somebody mentioned topping the fuel tank with high test and staybil......? I was thinking of running the engine totally OUT/dry.......not good?
Thanks for the help

 

[whistlepig]

Why not a Honda? That's what all my neighbors and I have. I keep the gas drained out of my generator. That way I always know when fresh gas was out in.

 

[Scooby074]

I dont recommend any small engines other than Honda. Subaru is OK, I got one on my splitter, but its only 8/10ths a Honda. It was my "learning moment". I should have coughed up the extra $200 for the Honda.

Treated premium fuel (non-ethanol) should be usable for a year.

Draining is an option if you suspect ethanol.

 

[crazyal]

I'm not going to go into the whole, should you have disconnected the pressure switch or not but the JD dealer tell you what is wrong with the engine (or did you say and I missed it)? Or is it just waiting for you to tell them to look at it? Making lots of noise can mean a lot of different things. With something like a Chinese built anything, something could have just had the bolts loosen up. Did you try to turn the engine over, did it feel like it was either locked up or real hard to turn? While I like to spend other people's money (I'm a big fan of Honda small engines) you might not be that bad off.