Grounding neutral at the house (non SDS) MEP _802a chassis ground question

[Zebcorod]

I have been reading all the older forum post about proper grounding. I can't find any examples of my setup. I have a picture attached with my question. I want to make sure where the MEP-802a chassis ground is. I have neutral bonded at the house main electrical panel (non separately derived system). Our system is grounded at the house.

We are off grid single phase 120 volts. I know that the Hot (black) wire goes to L3 lug, and the neutral (white) goes to N lug, and the bare copper ground goes to the GND lug. Then, do I need to ground the MEP-802a chassis only at the generator with a separate grounding rod? Our existing gas powered honda generator chassis is grounded at the generator.

Thanks

 

[Suprman]

Always good to ground the generator. Neutral and ground are two different connections.

 

[DieselAddict]

Use the big ground lug and you will be in good shape. The terminals there on right are just for bonding the ground and neutral.

 

[Daybreak]

Howdy,
OK, if the picture is from your generator, it is missing the bonding bar.

Below is a picture with a ground rod in the ground connected to a load bank.

The bonding bar is what ties the neutral and ground together.

In the field with ground rod = ground strap is in place.

Hooked to house with proper grounding system = ground strap disconnected, and all 4 wires from lugs to your house panel.

 

[Zebcorod]

Thanks for the replies and picture. I will be connecting to the house electrical panel with proper grounding. That's why the bonding bar is missing in my picture.

 

[Green Mountain Boys]

This is exactly what I was looking for. I am getting ready for the first test of a MEP-802A. It was a non-running unit with missing parts but only 25 hours. I have it running well now, at least at idle with no load. It is time to put a load on it. I was looking for the neutral ground bond but I overlooked it. After seeing the picture above, it is there. I am using an old electric stove as a load bank. I have break in oil in the engine because it is low hours. How hard would you run the unit with the break in oil and low hours?

 

[Guyfang]

This is exactly what I was looking for. I am getting ready for the first test of a MEP-802A. It was a non-running unit with missing parts but only 25 hours. I have it running well now, at least at idle. (There is no idle. It ALWAYS is supposed to run at 60 Hertz. I hope what you meant was, its running without load) It is time to put a load on it. I was looking for the neutral ground bond but I overlooked it. After seeing the picture above, it is there. I am using an old electric stove as a load bank. I have break in oil in the engine because it is low hours. How hard would you run the unit with the break in oil and low hours? (Well, I would run the set for 1-2 hours without load, then, start easy. 1-2 KW, for 1-2hours. Then step it up 1-2 KW. Run it a few hours. Then go to 5 KW.

This is just my two cents. I see no reason to load a 5 KW gen set up higher than 5 KW. My feelings are that too many folks just HAVE TO SEE, if it will carry 6-7 KW. Why. Its rated at 5 KW. Good enough. Would you do that to your car? Or a horse? A few hours of low or no load is not going to hurt your gen set. We never broke in anything, in the Army. Uncrated the gen set and hooked it to our Air Defense System and ran it till it broke. Fixed it, and ran it till it broke. But if I would have done a break in, it would not have been longer than 6-7 hours. Start easy, work up to rated load and then let er run, until you feel good. You trust it.

Later when I ran a DS Repair Shop, any generator that my shop sent back to the owning unit ran an uninterrupted 6 hours, at full load, without a hiccup. Then I felt good.)

 

[Green Mountain Boys]

@Guyfang
Hey, thanks for your reply. Yes, I should have said running without a load. I ran the generator today and put nearly 4 gallons of fuel through it. I started of with a light load and gradually increased the load to 80% to 100%. It was a cold start this morning at 30F. It fired right up without any problem. The water temp never exceeded 180F with the ambient air at 48F. The only problem I had was the linkage just above the engine oil dipstick came apart after about an hour of run time, and I had to put it back together. Overall, it was a big success. I agree with your assessment. No need to exceed 100% rated load.