Now it's Aldi (UK)'s turn to offer an inverter generator

[Johnny B Good]

Hi to everyone, particularly those in the UK.

Aldi have started selling (as of last Thursday) a 1800/2000W Workzone
branded inverter generator. It's almost three times the price of Lidl's
PGI 1200B at £289.99 but it does offer almost twice the power rating.
Equivalents elsewhere can be a hundred quid or more making it not quite
the bargain of the decade but, nevertheless, a reasonably low price for
what it promises.

Unfortunately, the two examples I tried fell far short of the PGI
1200B's excellence and I gave up after returning the second unit (21.3Kg
is a bit of a strain for me to be manhandling it in and out of my car
boot (trunk)).

I won't bore you with the details since you can find my review on Aldi's
website here <https://www.aldi.co.uk/workzone-petrol-inverter-generator/
p/096344208706700>

<https://tinyurl.com/y7e8oeyf>

Just scroll down towards the bottom and expand the "Customer Reviews"
section. You can't miss it unless you're a fan of the TL:DR school of
ignorance.

TBH, I'm surprised they published it since I used my usenet nym and
invalid email address rather than a real one. :-)

--
Johnny B Good

[ads]

From the pictures, it's a twin to thw PowerHorse sold in the US by
Nothern Tool and others. Their reviews are also hit-and-miss with
some getting a unit that works as advetised and others getting a
lemon. I'd say the difference might be the quality of workmanship and
be treced to the amount of manual labor involved in assembly. (Once
upon a time, knowledgeable people checked the serial number -now VIN -
to know the date a car was assembled and they avoided any vehicle
built on a Monday or Friday because of absenteeism and people being
pulled in to do some portion of the assembly for that day. Maybe the
same applies here?)

There's also the quality of some Chinese electrical products to
consider. The common DC circuit breakers sold for use with high power
audio systems in vehicles typically only carry 70% of their rating
continuously, with a "200 amp" breaker tripping at about 140-145 amps.
(I tested using a 2000 watt pure sine wave inverter and resistive
loads up to the inverter's limit.)

I almost bought the PowerHorse during last week's sale at Northern
Tool. It was $500 instead of $600 and you also got a $100 gift card,
effectivle making it $400. IF you got a good gen the first try, it
would have been a great deal.

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[Jim K]

Johnny B Good <johnny...@invalid.ntlworld.com> Wrote in message:

Do they have Aldi in 'murica?
--
--
Jim K


----Android NewsGroup Reader----
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[Jeff Layman]

Maybe because you often criticised Lidl and one of its products in your
review? They'd probably have published it if you had signed it "M Mouse"
with an mm@disney email address!

--

Jeff

[Brian Reay]

Yes and no. They have Aldi in some areas and use another name in
others- Trader Joe's for example.




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[Johnny B Good]

I guess the AI algorithm used to vet the 'review' doesn't understand
"Reverse 'damned by faint praise'".[1]

I suspect the "AI" only flags up reviews containing derogatory
expletives. I reckoned an unemotive tone with subtle phrasing would stand
the best chance of getting past the AI's "Bad Taste" filter. :-)

[1] The damning part referred to Lidl's mismanagement of their stock (no
doubt pleasing Aldi no end) whilst the praise was for the product's
ability to survive such treatment relatively unscathed, in this case a
Parkside PGI 1200 B2 where the oil level wire could temporarily be
disconnected so it could be started up to let engine vibration 'unstick'
the float sensor and/or a simple lifting (only four retaining bolts) of
the 'lid' to access the various plug/socket connectors round the back of
the inverter module to fix any that have come adrift.

As I mentioned earlier, both of these common show stopping faults are
easily remedied using the supplied 'tool kit' if you know how. Just find
the 19m 50s youtube video on the PGI 1200 B2 and view dean handley's
comments to reveal 'The Knowledge'. :-)

<https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JTTGvjbY8_s>

Pity about the shit 'scope. The mains voltage waveform looked flat
topped when, in fact as a real 'scope would show, the 'flat tops'
actually have a slight downward slope.

--
Johnny B Good

[Johnny B Good]

Sadly, unlike the case with the Parkside units, the problems with this
Workzone unit may not be so amenable to a 'quick fix'. The symptoms are
suggesting the possibility of buggy or incorrect firmware or some similar
inverter module problems which might not be so easy to fix.

>
> There's also the quality of some Chinese electrical products to
> consider. The common DC circuit breakers sold for use with high power
> audio systems in vehicles typically only carry 70% of their rating
> continuously, with a "200 amp" breaker tripping at about 140-145 amps.
> (I tested using a 2000 watt pure sine wave inverter and resistive loads
> up to the inverter's limit.)
>
> I almost bought the PowerHorse during last week's sale at Northern Tool.
> It was $500 instead of $600 and you also got a $100 gift card,
> effectivle making it $400. IF you got a good gen the first try, it
> would have been a great deal.
>

Despite what I said about 'calling it quits', I'm about to nip back to
the Aldi store to try a third unit. Perhaps it might be a case of "Third
time lucky" (or "The third time's the charm."). Did I mention/imply I was
an optimist? :-)

--
Johnny B Good

[Johnny B Good]

Just refreshed the web page and my 'review' has disappeared. I guess
they must have reviewed it and didn't like what they saw (or maybe it was
because of my invalid email address).

Looks like I'll have to submit another review with my real email
address. I certainly need to refresh it seeing as how I decided on trying
out a third generator which, apart from the rather pronounced bogging
down to a 900W load, seems to behave like an inverter genset should.
However, it does drop quite a bit of voltage going from no load to 900W
(235 down to 225 volts with an initial dip down to 206 volts before
recovering to 225 volts - quite shit really, compared to the Parkside
1/1.2KW unit).

I'm undecided about whether it's worth keeping hold of. I noticed three
cermet multi-turn pots poking out of the inverter module's potting
compound which may allow it to be properly fine tuned if I can find the
adjustment info on the 'net.

Incidentally, I took some SPL measurements and obtained a 65dBA SPL at
23 feet (7 metres) when driving the 900W test load. It was maybe 1dB
quieter on no load. Unfortunately, I don't have anything to make up a
full 1800W test load to hand right now so couldn't run the SPL test at max
loading. I suspect it'll only increase by a dB or two on the half load
figure.

It seemed a little quieter than the Parkside unit and I was going to
fire the Parkside genset up to collect comparative figures but SWMBI
started complaining about the noise (on behalf of, but unrequested by,
the neighbours) so that test will have to wait for another day.

--
Johnny B Good

[ads]

There's one a couple miles from me but I've never seen any power
equipment there. However, we're getting a Lidl's (alsoGerman, maybe
one step up from a direct competitor to Aldi's) so they've been closed
for a few weeks to expand the the Aldi's store. The lidl's is still
under construction and I'll guess 3 to 6 months before it opens.

[Johnny B Good]

On Thu, 05 Jul 2018 17:22:14 +0000, Johnny B Good wrote:

> On Thu, 05 Jul 2018 00:24:52 +0000, Johnny B Good wrote:
>
>> Hi to everyone, particularly those in the UK.
>>

====snip====

I'm currently testing my third Workzone inverter genset...

> I'm undecided about whether it's worth keeping hold of. I noticed three
> cermet multi-turn pots poking out of the inverter module's potting
> compound which may allow it to be properly fine tuned if I can find the
> adjustment info on the 'net.

I found a "Big Clue" in the form of workshop manual, not for this
generator but for a similar one. The example inverter genset in question
being a Powerhouse PH2700PRi. The "shop manual" shows a schematic of the
wiring which represents the inverter module as a reasonable facsimile of
its physical form (topologically speaking).

Zooming into the page reveals a total of four multiturn pots (the same
number as used in the Workzone inverter module). The trimpots' functions
are handily labelled as "voltage", "balance", "current" and "overload".
Presumably the four trimpots on the Workzone inverter module apply to the
same adjustments. The only snag is that the modules are far from
identical in layout so any further progress will be a 'suck it and see'
exercise. I've already cleaned the sealing compound from the trimpots (RTV
silicone?).

My first test will be to locate the "voltage" pot followed by the
"balance" pot which I guess relates to the shoddy response to a 50% load
increase from no load eco-idle state (compared to the Parkside unit, the
response is execrable - The Parkside unit doesn't bog down to a 90% load
from zero load before increasing the revs - it just does the right thing).

>
> Incidentally, I took some SPL measurements and obtained a 65dBA SPL at
> 23 feet (7 metres) when driving the 900W test load. It was maybe 1dB
> quieter on no load. Unfortunately, I don't have anything to make up a
> full 1800W test load to hand right now so couldn't run the SPL test at
> max loading. I suspect it'll only increase by a dB or two on the half
> load figure.
>
> It seemed a little quieter than the Parkside unit and I was going to
> fire the Parkside genset up to collect comparative figures but SWMBI
> started complaining about the noise (on behalf of, but unrequested by,
> the neighbours) so that test will have to wait for another day.

Well, I finally got my chance to run the Parkside this afternoon and log
some SPL readings. At about ten foot away, I was getting 65dBA no load
and 74dBA at 865W (86%) load. The corresponding figures for the Workzone
unit were 69 and 70 dBA (zero and 860W (48%) load).

TBH, after mulling over the SPL figures, I'm more inclined to just get
my money back... Again! However, I think it might be worth experimenting
with those presets - after all, I can hardly make it much worse than it
already is!

Well, I found the "voltage" pot ok[1] but couldn't find the "balance",
which I think must be to set the eco-idling speed, so it's going back as
"Unfit for Purpose" for a full refund tomorrow. I'm not going to try a
fourth unit. "Three strikes and you're out!" seems so appropriate in this
case. :-(

I have to say that if I didn't have the Parkside inverter generator to
demonstrate how an inverter genset is supposed to behave, I might have
convinced myself that such transient load behaviour was simply a normal
feature (downside) of an inverter genset always running in eco-throttle
mode for lack of an eco-throttle option switch.

I can well imagine how anyone new to the operation of a backup generator
might not realise just what a piece of junk this Workzone inverter genset
really is. Thankfully, that little 1KW Parkside unit just about suffices
for my essential needs so I can afford to wait for Lidl to put a larger
Parkside inverter genset on 'special offer' over the next year or so. :-)

[1] For anyone interested in adjusting the AC output voltage on their
1800/2000 watt Workzone inverter generator, the pot in question is the
topmost of the four (revealed by undoing the four screws that fix the
control panel to the case). Trust me, the engine vibrations make such
adjustments rather tricky to say the least of it.

--
Johnny B Good

[seibe...@gmail.com]

Aldi and Trader Joe's are separatestores with mostly different items on the shelves. They are owned by the same parent company.

[Johnny B Good]

On Wed, 23 Jan 2019 10:43:02 -0800, seibelhouse wrote:

> Aldi and Trader Joe's are separatestores with mostly different items on
> the shelves. They are owned by the same parent company.

Thanks... I think.

I'm guessing you're referring to the US of A located stores (that post
was made so long ago that it's now expired in my newsreader).

AFAICR, I landed up recommending that the Aldi Workzone 2KW inverter
genset was best avoided as it turned out to be a stinky piece of
excrement best not touched, not even with the proverbial 10 foot barge
pole.

--
Johnny B Good