Pilot
Active Member
Well, my Kohler gasoline generator has just cost me another $1950 for repairs. I was getting a UU under voltage alarm, followed by a 30 second shutdown. The reason is the fuel pressure was too low and as a result the engine could not come up to speed properly, thus triggering the shutdown. Anyway,, This is the 3rd fuel pump and fuel injector I've replaced among other items. Total repairs over the last 3 years is close to $5000. (enough to give a sailboater a heart attack HA!) It wouldn't be so bad, but the generator has just a little over 200 hours on it. So, yes, its practically new. The likely cause of the problems: Ethanol.
The technician who worked on it says he is seeing a very large amount of problems and damage in the gasoline engines due to ethanol, he reiterated A LOT LOT LOT OF PROBLEMS! He said Kohler recommends using Startron versus Stabil as Stabil still allows fuel to separate and the tests they've done with Startron prove its much more effective, at least on their engines which tend to be Yamaha's etc,.. I've been using Stabil religiously, so I'm switching to Startron and upping the dose a lot more than recommended on the bottle. we'll see if that helps.
Further recommendation by Kohler is to tear the generator down and clean it at the end of each season, also maybe inject some Seafoam when doing so.
I'm told you can't repair these injector and pumps once they go bad so, do what ever is necessary to keep them clean which of course includes running them often under load. The unit ran great all last season up until I winterized and put it away. So, even with the fogging and Stabil for storage and oil change and all the necessary steps I took, it would not run in the spring.
I would hope Kohler would take responsibility for their product and realize they need to figure out a way to make these generators more resilient and reliable given the fuel environment. If nothing else, they could at least do an educational campaign and publish some much more detailed information on error codes and related problems and recommendations for preventative maintenance. Put videos on the web, maybe even offer annual maintenance plans. One thing I've experienced is that most of the Searay technicians are not well trained on these units and as a result will eat up a lot of $$$ burning hours on diagnosing the problem. So,, I now call Kohler corporate service desk and get them to recommend a service dealer that specializes in Kohler in my locale and work directly with them. They too say the Searay mechanics are very questionable on their ability to properly service these units.
Cheers
The technician who worked on it says he is seeing a very large amount of problems and damage in the gasoline engines due to ethanol, he reiterated A LOT LOT LOT OF PROBLEMS! He said Kohler recommends using Startron versus Stabil as Stabil still allows fuel to separate and the tests they've done with Startron prove its much more effective, at least on their engines which tend to be Yamaha's etc,.. I've been using Stabil religiously, so I'm switching to Startron and upping the dose a lot more than recommended on the bottle. we'll see if that helps.
Further recommendation by Kohler is to tear the generator down and clean it at the end of each season, also maybe inject some Seafoam when doing so.
I'm told you can't repair these injector and pumps once they go bad so, do what ever is necessary to keep them clean which of course includes running them often under load. The unit ran great all last season up until I winterized and put it away. So, even with the fogging and Stabil for storage and oil change and all the necessary steps I took, it would not run in the spring.
I would hope Kohler would take responsibility for their product and realize they need to figure out a way to make these generators more resilient and reliable given the fuel environment. If nothing else, they could at least do an educational campaign and publish some much more detailed information on error codes and related problems and recommendations for preventative maintenance. Put videos on the web, maybe even offer annual maintenance plans. One thing I've experienced is that most of the Searay technicians are not well trained on these units and as a result will eat up a lot of $$$ burning hours on diagnosing the problem. So,, I now call Kohler corporate service desk and get them to recommend a service dealer that specializes in Kohler in my locale and work directly with them. They too say the Searay mechanics are very questionable on their ability to properly service these units.
Cheers