I recently bought a boat with a 5kw Northern Lights diesel gen set. Diesel generator runs well but no electricity being produced. All the breakers on the gen set look good but no power on either side of them. Then we noticed the lock out bar had been removed so the generator and shore power panel source. That mod would allow both shore & gen breakers to be on at the same time. Assuming this occurred what would fail first on the gen set or is the complete elect end toast?
Not good. If you can not figure it out for safe operation, please get a proper tech in there. Pretty sure you would not like your new wire-curly hair do (at least) that may happen. We can try to help but with out lots of schematics (or drawings) and pictures, we may be not time achieving. Would you have wiring schematics for the boat and panel? N L info is on their web site (used to be). I have lots of N L stuff here if needed. Just be careful when messing with that stuff (curly)..
How is it possible to have both shore power and gen on the buss at the same time? I get your point about a lock out bar but don’t you have a source selector in addition to breakers? If you can truly have both on at the same time, holy cow that’s dangerous. Not just your generator damage but if you are running the gen and backfeed shore power you are really asking for trouble. You can seriously hurt or kill someone and in most places is actually illegal.
Some boats only have a safety slide over the breakers. No rotaries. Pretty bad that the boat is missing the slide. No idea what it could damage inside the gen... voltage regulator probably?
The lock out slider was broken off by somebody and I suspect that is what damaged the gen set. I am not a do-it yourselfer and always try to hire the best tech for the job. Unfortunately with the demand for service it will be 5 weeks before the NL dealer trouble shoots the gen set. I did buy the replacement lock out parts and installed them.
Safe bet the generator is damaged, however any good generator guy should be able to diagnose your problem, he may not be able to readily get parts, you may have to order the parts yourself,
Sounds like the shore connect would have to be disconnected first then start the gen-set. I assume the owner was not available to discuss this with you and no survey. We worked on a Meridian that had a gen-set failure like this. The transfer breakers and slide bar were intact, just the one of the breakers had an internal issue (carbon trail). While on shore power and gen-set running, the gen-set got zapped. Fancy newer Cummins/Oh-No. The voltage regulator and all else were fine. Just the armature exciter diodes fried. On another boat, smaller NL, not used for a long time and did not make juice. High moisture in the windings and lost it's self exciting magnetism. Ran the engine for a few hours and re-gauzed (flashed) the windings. Easy fixes. Hope you find an easy fix also. Oh, while you are repairing the transfer switches, don't forget to include a forth lead. Green wire open while on shore, green wire tied to white while on gen-set or inverter. During updates, installs and repairs we usually incorporated this into our check list.
Only when off the dock. On a proper transfer switch (4 pole), when in the gen-set position the green and white are tied. While in shore power position, white and green are NOT tied. Here the dock service ties green and white (per code) together. This is how we installed gen-sets and is ABYC approved (mandated). There are long and boring codes from ABYC, CFRs, and other that have these specs. If your white and green are tied on board, while on shore service, on a newer dock with GFI service breakers, they will trip. You will also offer stray currents in your bonding system to/from other boats in the hood.
N and G are bonded at the generator. I don’t think I have ever seen ground being switched on and off at the transfer switch. All grounds are tied together at the bus. Neutral though is switched on and off at the transfer switch though so when switching from gen to shore neutral is disconnected from the gen therefore the G to N bonding inside the gen is broken marine inverters also bond N to G when in inverter mode but automatically break the bond when in charging mode otherwise dockside GFI would trip. This is why you need marine inverters and not off grid or truck inverters
So, when you switch to shore power, white and green are still tied? This is the usual case when GFI service breakers are tripping. On the gen-set, only while on gen-set away from the dock are green and white tied. NOT TIED while on shore power. We used a 4 pole transfer switch to make this happen. In gen-set mode, green and white are strapped.. How do you keep green & white separate when on shore power?
If the N from the Gen is disconnected at the transfer switch or dual breaker with slide, then the neutral from shore is disconnected from the N/G bonding in the gen
But your green may still be tied to ships bonding. Also not correct. Green should be connected to bonding off of the shore power service also, only when on ships power. On shore power, green (fault current) must go to the shore service. I think we agree, separate from white. This is why we never trust 2 pole breakers, don't trust 3 pole breakers. The sure fire way to ensure all is correct, 4 pole transfer switches. Oh, rarely found. Now, those with isolation transformers with out a white wire input, most can ignore this.
I had the same experience on a poorly wired boat. Luckily it was just the fried diodes, and it was a quick and easy repair.
Thank you very much, that may be the issue I am having here in Marathon that we talked about. Hope you and family are well.