Hey Guys,
As mentioned previously, "The devil finds work for idle hands..."
I have been mulling over a few ideas and would like to put them out there, for opinions and viewpoints from "Ye learned gents..."
TM2 has both net metering and prime mover capabilities, hot water capable, but stand alone and not connected into the house hot water supply(maybe never) - TM1 is prime mover and hot water only.... To maintain perspective, a summary: TM1 is mostly waste oil fueled and the cheaper beast to run from a fuel perspective, he is also coupled to hot water generation, which he does very well with. TM1 requires a "donkey start" from 220VAC, which is either provided by utility, TM2, or orange screamer depending on what is happening and available...
My Idea so far (Also, putting things down to type gets my grey matter more organised...) ....
Couple TM1 and 2 into an auto-changeover box, similar to what I have currently put together for swopping over from utility to TM1... The current changeover unit will reside at TM1, in his enclosure, and a "newer and better" (maybe) box installed to do the auto-swop and load monitoring with generator/utility duties.
The logical layout I would like, would be pretty much operating in the following manner:
TM1 - When he is online, he will take over the full building load from utility. He would have overload monitoring and load dumping should he go over 4.5Kw.
TM2 - When utility power is in a failed condition, he can be 12v battery started (Stamford Starter/Genhead installed) to take over and get things up and running (He is not an auto start unit.) - TM1 can then be started by the 220V and take over the load on an auto switch over, TM2 will then be unloaded and coasting. When this happens, I would like the option of TM2 being able to auto switch into net-metering mode should I elect. Should I require, due to workshop power demands (welding etc), I would like to run both TM1 and 2 simultaneously using the induction generator on TM2 to assist with the loading. (In fact, there is another little 5Kw diesel auto-start screamer that I have mentioned as the "orange screamer", that could also be brought into the big picture as well, where TM2 is concerned as a net-metering unit. The orange screamer is for those nasty 2am to 6am failures we often have... If nothing else, he makes a damn good alarm clock to get up and start TM1!!)
Damn.... the more I think about the various options, the more complex it becomes....
Effectively it boils down to 3 gen units -
TM1 - needs 220v to start and makes power and hot water, cheap to run.
TM2 - manual start on 12v, makes power at 220v, can also be coupled via induction generator.
Orange screamer - This off-pissingly noisy piece of "DEK Silent Runner 6000" is anything but... But he is auto-start with mains monitoring and he does work well for the early morning hours when power fails and he is diesel....
How would you gents hook these three units, plus utility, into a nice little birds nest to play together?
Keep on scheming...
Cheers
Ed