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Subject: TWL: Re: Belt driven A.C. Alternator
From: Brent Hodges (vbhodges@XXX.XXX)
Date: Thu Jan 23 2003 - 09:45:30 EST
> > Rob Brueckner wrote:
> A BTU is equal to .2931 watts, so a single 13,500 BTU unit will require
> about 4KW a/c. (endsnip)
While I'm not familiar with the BTU / watts conversion tables, This doesn't
add up to my personal tests. I have 2 fairly new 16,000 BTU Cruisair units
in our boat. A couple of weeks ago I was changing out some breakers & put an
amp probe on the hot wire coming off my a/c breakers. Each of these units
were only drawing about 9 amps with the compressor & fan on although they
spiked to almost 20 amps for a second when the compressor kicks in. 4KW at
120 volts would translate to 33 amps & I know it never draws that. I've had
one unit on a 20 amp breaker for a season with no problems, although they
reccomend a 30 amp breaker. (one of the breakers I was changing out).
I think the original question was how big of a generator it took to run an
a/c unit. My experience is it only takes about 2KW per 13.5 to 16.5 a/c
unit. On a past boat I ran a 36,000 btu central air / heat pump on a 7.5kw
genset with decent results. It was a 20 year old genset & was marginal when
you were trying to run other appliances, but it did work for the couple of
years I had the genset before I upgraded to a larger/newer unit.
YMMV
Brent Hodges
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