[flyboy]

I'm assuming when you say it works fine, you hooked it up to a propane source and ran it for awhile? Did you load test it?

How old is this generator?

 

[emtnut]

Interesting situation. A client with a rental property brought me his 3 year old "scrapped" Kohler 14RESA propane generator, which another Kohler tech replaced with a new unit. The client showed up and took possession of the "scrapped" unit the tech was otherwise going to haul away. The other Kohler Tech claimed the generator threw error codes, had the oil level too high, and then ran low on oil, etc. I tore the "scrapped" motor down and when I took off the valve cover, I found the rocker arm pivot bolt was loose, and the rocker arm was out of position (see photo.) Everything looked clean inside, and neither the pushrod nor the valve were bent. I lined it up, tightened it down, and the "scrapped" generator now works like a charm.

Questions:

1) when a rocker arm comes loose under load, what else would typically get damaged?

2) looking at the parts, is there any way of determining whether the motor was running at the time the rocker came off the valve?

3) how would you approach the client with this information?

Thanks.

1) It could have damaged the valves
2) You'd have to rip apart and inspect
3) You got it going ... as Flyboy said, did you test under load?
I'd let the client know it seems to be working, but you have no idea what damage might have been done to the valves, or if it was run with low oil.

Are you a mechanic or an electrician ?? :wink:

 

[Paul_L]

Load test

I didn't load test it. When we first got it, we sprayed some starting fluid and it would kick over a little and backfire. Once we repositioned the rocker arm, we did the same thing and it ran.

 

[Paul_L]

We still need to get a propane line hooked up and do a load test.

 

[nrp3]

I haven’t had the valve covers off on one of these because they have hydraulic valves. Assuming there is no provision for lash adjustment. Given that, maybe a compression test would be wise. How many hours on this unit?