Your last generator Maintenance Run

[Industrial Toys]

I never use it on my Stihl 036.

I never bothered to put the recoil starter back on my Yanmar. I was thinking, the other day, that an eight foot piece of rope would probably work better anyway. Get it spinning good and fast for longer, and with the help of someone operating the decompression lever.

 

[3930dave]

The compression release saved me once. My tractor that痴 30 miles for civilization had a dead battery and I desperately needed to mow. The battery wouldn稚 take any charge and I was failing at boosting it. There was too much amperage lose and it just wasn稚 going to turn fast enough to start. Then I had the idea to pull the compression release and get it spinning then close the release. With kinetic energy in my favor it turned over fast enough and fired up. They値l always kill a runaway diesel.

My first thought was along the lines of 90's comment - lower cost starter.

But you raise two other good points. Esp. when a replacement battery is a very long way off, it can make a difference between starting or not. Hadn't thought about the runaway side of things..... lots easier to just press a lever than go scrambling for CO2 extinguishers, rags to stuff in the intake, etc.....

(..... trying to recall certain old motorcycles that used compression release, but the names aren't coming up....maybe I'm dreaming, but that does make sense for large displacement gas MC engines, esp. back when kick-start ruled.....)

Rgds, D.

 

[3930dave]

I never use it on my Stihl 036.

I never bothered to put the recoil starter back on my Yanmar. I was thinking, the other day, that an eight foot piece of rope would probably work better anyway. Get it spinning good and fast for longer, and with the help of someone operating the decompression lever.

At your homestead, you'll have oodles of ways to boost that Yanmar if needed, so I can understand leaving it off.... but I've always liked the duality of having electric and pull-start on a generator.

Maybe that's just my old-school inner MC-rider talking, as I've never quite made peace with kick-starters being deleted from street-bikes

Diesel is a tough application for a pull-starter, well, your arm at least..... I'm still very impressed with the pull-starter on my 7kw Briggs. My better-half doesn't mess with such things, but if I was ever going to teach her how to pull-start something, it would be that 7kw gen - it pulls way easier and more naturally (motion-wise) than most smaller motors...

Rgds, D.

 

[ultrarunner]

Biggest engine I own with a compression release is the two cylinder rope start 35 hp Evinrude Lark outboard.

It also had electric start but taking the battery out of the truck at the lunch to put in the boat got old for high school kids so we just used the rope start.

 

[DEWFPO]

My single cylinder 1988 Honda 200cc ATV has a compression release on it to use if you have to pull start it.

DEWFPO

 

[3930dave]

My single cylinder 1988 Honda 200cc ATV has a compression release on it to use if you have to pull start it.

DEWFPO

Maybe not used much, but if you were trying to start 60 miles back of nowhere, on a freshly dead battery.... once would be enough to appreciate it.

Or on a balky outboard, while you drift somewhere you don't want to go.....

Edit - or on a generator , in an emergency.....

Rgds, D.

 

[Sawyer Rob]

Lots of small motors have a compression release built right in them... SO, even though you don't see it, it doesn't mean it doesn't have one...

Like I already said, one of my Kubota's has one... (diesel)

SR

 

[daugen]

SR, is your experience seeing compression releases on gas engines or diesels? Since diesels are higher compression, assuming
that's most common, besides big chain saws. I'm curious what I've been missing...
I've never seen one on a modern B&S, probably because it would add fifty cents in cost.

 

[3930dave]

On MCs, they're still in use recently.

There, the issue is not just cost, but weight. Recent Ducati example:

Compression release - Wikipedia

Some others:

Dan's Motorcycle Four Stroke Compression Releases

More engines probably use them than we think.....

On tractors, it may tie into world markets somewhat. Here, for most of us, if a battery dies, we grumble about it, hop in a vehicle, drive to a parts store etc and buy a new one. Other parts of the world, even today, not so simple.

3rd world countries have changed (cell phones being one good example) during my lifetime, but it's easy to forget how tough logistics still are. A company I worked for years ago had customers primarily in 3rd world markets - I remember talking with one of our field guys about working over there. The simple example he gave was getting a part from A to B - part gets put on some random privately owned truck and sets off - truck breaks down - owner sleeps in the truck till it's fixed, which was some random unknown time. Pre-cell phones, you never really knew when a part would show up, or what was going on with the shipment.

Long blather.... but I'm thinking with tractors or gens, or other high utility equipment, if one of the primary markets today is remote or sparsely developed areas, then that might make an obvious manually operated compression release a design priority. That same product, marketed in a first world country may still have the release on it, but the feature is not emphasized - it is anticipated that customers just go buy a new battery.....

Rgds, D.

 

[Sawyer Rob]

SR, is your experience seeing compression releases on gas engines or diesels? Since diesels are higher compression, assuming
that's most common, besides big chain saws. I'm curious what I've been missing...
I've never seen one on a modern B&S, probably because it would add fifty cents in cost.

Many of the small Honda gas engines lift a valve for a compression release when you crank them, other brands do the same thing...

SR