If the lathe is a conquest then it should be rectifying the AC so the frequency won't be important, but poor voltage regulation may be an issue.

Does it have a 12V output? You might get a more stable output sticking that through a hefty inverter.

Neil

Sounds like you have an Inverter type generator.
Some of these do not produce a good Sine wave so some things won't play well with them, mainly Digital Electronics, TV's and Computers. They are designed for Lighting and other resistive applications.
Your Lathe has a DC Motor, so the first thing it does with the Mains to drive the motor is rectify it. At that point it's DC and the generator makes no odds.
There will be a transformer and other bits to run the Speed electronics. As it's all analogue electronics you should have no issue there.
You may find that the Power Factor of your lathe is rather poor (getting technical) but your 800W Genny should easily drive your lathe without issue.

Don't forget to make sure the genny is earthed !

Alex.

I have a very limited knowledge of electrical matters, but I do power my workshop with a petrol generator. I started off with a 3.2 KVA job, which powered a mini-lathe with speed controller, and lighting, without problems. However, an older 350-watt motor on a small mill stalled it, the starting current was so high. I now have a generator pretty well twice as powerful, which allows a small fan heater to be run in addition to the lathe. A more modern motor on the mill doesn't stall the bigger generator, either Do be aware, however, that "brewing your own" is an expensive alternative – you can easily get through five litres of petrol in a busy day.,

Mars bars are more expensive than petrol calorie for calorie!

Generating your own costs about 4 X more than the mains, on a low loading a 27.5 Kva used about 9-10 Ltr per hour but under load that doubled. On a 6 week exercise the overall consumption was 9000 Ltrs.

Clive

If it IS an inverter type generator, it's worth bearing in mind that there are 2 types of inverter output – "true sinewave" and "quasi sinewave". The latter has amplitude +/-340Vdc nominal and a 70% duty cycle (so it has the same RMS value as a 240Vac sinewave). These aren't always happy driving capacitive / rectified loads. In this instance, the risk is that the inverter may keep dropping out or more seriously, may subject the input of the motor drive to overvoltages which might let the smoke out. I don't know what devices they have specified but it's not customary to build in a massive voltage margin as this costs money.

Having developed a variety of mains powered power electronics products including chargers and inverters, I can tell you that portable generators are often a cruel test of robustness in a way that many of the standard regulatory tests are not. The voltage waveforms are often poorly regulated, sometimes unstable and often far from sinusoidal – you might be horrified if you had a look. Bottom line is whether you think it's worth the risk finding out how your lathe gets on with what sounds like a cheap and nasty generator. Let us know how you get on!

Murray

Going seriously OT, Michael, can I suggest this (rather poorly scanned) pdf: **LINK** I have the original book, and really suggest it is worth getting a paper copy. Very good for 12V generation for not a lot. BTW, the site the PDF is on is Hugh Piggott's (the author) so I don't think he's breaking his own copyright by putting the scanned version of the web – did feel the need to check.

Regards,

Richard.

In the beginning, the ' blackouts' will only occur on the very coldest winter days when the wind isn't blowing.

This should give you enough forewarning not to start on long ,fine feed facing, or longtitudinal cuts.

Electricity will go first, but the pilgrims will have realised that domestic gas supply will be maintained to the very last. Therefore, anyone seriously considering standby power should try to use gas as the primary fuel.

.

Excellent: Just the sort of thing we need to know

Thanks

MichaelG.