hbrman wrote:What is the quietest generator or best enclosure?
If you don't mind spending the money, I would say the best line of marine generators around is Northern Lights.* As John says, no generator is going to be what most people consider quiet.* But they can be made quiet if you throw enough money at the problem.
A 120' corporate yacht I was associated with back in the early 2000s had two generators, both Northern Lights.* With a famous (in the PNW) chef on board and an all-electric galley including a huge electric grill, the power demands from the boat's systems was pretty intense.* Both the generators were muffled, but one of them had a custom designed muffler and exhaust system (dry) and when the generator was running at maximum output you could go up on the boat deck and stand next to the exhaust stack and you didn't hear a thing.* You could feel the generator running--- it was heavily shock mounted, but you can't elminate all the vibration--- but you couldn't hear it at all anywere on the boat.* Given the way the boat was used during the summer months the generator was running 24/7.* They normally ran only the super-muffled one.* The other one was to take the load when the first one was down for servicing or maintenance.
But I don't think you can go wrong with a Northern Lights, large or small, but you pay for the privilege.
As to noise, there are two kinds--- generator noise and exhaust noise.* Generator noise is what you hear inside the boat.* Exhaust noise is what you hear outside.* Our boat has a 1970s-era Onan 7.5kw 2-cylinder diesel generator.* Very noisy inside the boat.* It has a sound shield which cuts down the inside noise a lot, but it's still very noisy.* Fortunately it's a deep pitch and it's a slow-turning generator, so the noise is not seriously objectionable.* That's inside.
Outside, all you hear is the water splash of the exhaust and a very faint putting sound.* Twenty, thirty feet away and you don't notice it at all.
On the other hand, we've been moored to a marine park float and have had other boats on the docks with generators that themselves seemed to make little noise but the exhaust was extremely irritating.* A loud, hollow, drone that you could hear clear the other side of the bay.
So you can buy and install a quiet generator and piss everyone off for a half mile around you because the exhaust system is noisy, or you can have--- as in our case--- a pretty noisy generator that outside the boat is barely discernible.* Or you can get as quiet a generator as is possible and then put a really effective exhaust system on it and have the best of both.
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-- Edited by Marin on Saturday 18th of September 2010 09:59:16 PM
