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Well, what's to say, it is what it is, so here it is.
My name is skip and I live in Northeast Oklahoma.
Started on this adventure about 40 years ago now.
What got me into this was a dream, or vision, or whatever you want to call it,
in this introduction I'll call it a vision because to me, that's what it was.
I'm not an electrician and had no electrical experience at all,,
but I did have a very vivid "dream", when I woke up I drew what I saw.
Filed the drawing away and went on with life, raised kids, held my job, etc.
In 2015 I thought the economy was gonna crash, so I quit my job and drew out my 401.
My parents were in their upper 80's at the time and I thought IF its a SHTF scenario,
then my folks are gonna need air in the summer and heat in the winter,
so even though I'm a prepper and had 3 shipping containers full of supplies,
power was something I couldn't get enough of, so I bought a solar generator.
Total waste of $3,000, then I bought solar panels and batteries and all the accessories needed
to give my folks the power I thought they would need.
Unfortunately, my 10,000 watt, top of the line system (at the time) only produced 6,000 watts.
Not enough, So I searched youtube for answers, when I found nothing suitable, I prayed about it.
The Lord answered and said "There is something better, remember that dream you had 35 years ago"?
I said No Lord, He said "sure you do", and it all came flooding back to me .He said "You still have that paper,
what I was doing all those years ago was planting seeds, now that you have been doing all this solar work,
you know enough to build it, so build it. So, I went digging through old paperwork until I found it.
These are pictures of my 2nd 220 volt generator, the first one used a abrams tank alternator.
That's how I got into making generators.
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Thanks for letting me tell that story and sharing in on my little adventure.
God Bless and y'all take care,
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skip
Looks like 2 Aims ~10kw HF inverters with a UPS in the middle...and a synchronous AC motor on top of the UPS / 1 generator each under the Aims?
Not sure what all is going on there, but hey, if it works for your needs, all the more power to you 😉.
Sid, it's 2, 5,000 watt aims inverters and yes they are high frequency not low.
That;s a VFD in the middle to convert single phase to 3 phase.
and each of those generator heads puts out 5,000 AC watts.
That's why I've been asking about custom, American made inverters
started out with this, actually, it's the third one,
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that's treadmill motors, but I couldn't get enough power out of them,
only 3,000 watts, but they were silent lol
Walking treadmill motors 😉
High speed, but gotta love 'em.
That's why I've been asking about custom, American made inverters
Ah, that all over again. Of course Aims is pure Chinese design and manufacture.
GS inverters are designed right here at my desk, in the U.S. Final assembly, programming and testing is done at Sean's place, here in the U.S.
Manufacturing of the PCBs, chassis, transformer, etc., is all done in China.
If this counts as "American made" for you, then we can certainly accomplish what you need.
I'll try to find a fairly recent picture of my 110 volt unit to post.
Actually, here's a couple more of the treadmill unit for now.
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Got a guy I go to church with that does PCB's I've sent all the info to Sean,
didn't know about you till I looked up the staff awhile ago.
We can eliminate the chinese PCB part for sure lol
Gotta head to my shop, these generators won't build themselves.
y'all take care now and God bless each and everyone of you.
skip
Found a couple of pics of the 110, not the best pics for sure,
but at least in one of them you can see WHY I had to patent them as solar generators.
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And these are the first and only pictures of them on the web
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.
Got a guy I go to church with that does PCB's I've sent all the info to Sean,
Yes it can be done......
....at TEN TIMES the cost. Issue is that most people simply don't want to pay the price for a true "Made in America" label. Which is why I say that we Americans have priced ourselves out of our own markets.
I also won't mention that the ONLY parts I've had trouble sourcing through the past year or so....are the only U.S.-designed chips in the whole inverter. Every other part hasn't been the slightest problem to procure.
I digress.
If someone truly wants a "Made in America" inverter, they'll also have to float the corresponding huge price tag. I will do what I can to make it happen...but my estimate thus far is that it will cost nearly TEN TIMES as much per unit. Maybe 8 times; I won't know for sure until I spend 2 months trying to line up suppliers for everything from the States (but most of the semiconductors will ship from China / Taiwan anyway, as they simply aren't made in the States.)
I won't know for sure until I spend 2 months trying to line up suppliers for everything from the States (but most of the semiconductors will ship from China / Taiwan anyway, as they simply aren't made in the States.
Sad the US labor has gone to China and now the semiconductor are almost all made in Asia as Samsung and LG and Taiwan Semiconductor . The PCB can be made in the US but the machine to solder the semiconductor will be maybe 8 times cheaper in China . Even the Tesla Model Y made in China is cheaper than the Model Y made in SF . Even VW GM Ford electric vehicle can not compete with Tesla parts and machine made in Germany and China . I use to work jobs in manufacturing and now that jobs been gone for a long time and then had to work for lower wage in retail and service
The PCB can be made in the US but the machine to solder the semiconductor will be maybe 8 times cheaper in China .
Even the PCBs themselves cost 8-10x more if manufactured here in the States. That's not even counting the cost (or requirements for) SMD assembly--or procuring of said parts, pretty much none of which are actually manufactured in the States. I've quoted several PCBs with domestic manufacturers, and have always been shocked at the price--and that's without any SMD assembly. (Goes without saying I've never purchased any PCBs from domestic manufacturers.)
Chinese manufacturers "eat" the cost of the SMD stencil (required for placement of solder paste for reflow soldering)--but you'd better believe that U.S. manufacturers don't. So you have the PCB cost (at least 10x the cost), SMD stencil cost (technically an infinite cost increase), procuring of said parts (you're doing good to be 10x the cost), then pick-placement assembly of said parts (at a couple pretty pennies for time/labor and equipment fees), followed by the reflow oven / IR soldering and inspection, packaging...
If customers are willing to pay all those costs, then yes, an inverter can probably be made MOSTLY in the U.S. There is no way to get 100% completely around the global supply chain all the way from the raw materials to finished product.
But what American wants to pay $10,000 for an inverter when they can buy a functionally similar (if not identical) inverter made in China for $1,000?? If a manufacturer "sticks to their guns" and produces a completely U.S.-made product--they'll go bankrupt due to the competition from Chinese-manufactured goods at considerably cheaper prices. The only way to stay in business is...ahem...to stay financially competitive by procuring materials from overseas.
That's the conundrum of the reality check. We Americans have literally priced ourselves out of our own market.