The Craftmans Shop > New from Old

Trying to Quieten the 110KVA Generator

(1/24) > >>

awemawson:
Life is a bit challenging at the moment, being lived in one hour bursts, with the wife and myself doing shifts one hour on one hour off looking after new puppy so that severely limits what I can achieve or get committed to.
 
But I decided to tackle the noise from the generator. It sits in a semi open stable that is clad in 'Yorkshire Boarding' - that is 6" wide boards mounted with 1" gaps between them. My main issue is not causing a nuisance to our guests in the holiday cottages.

Using a sound 'app' on my 'phone I'm measuring 107 dBA adjacent to it, and 65 dBA in the court yard garden surrounding the cottages.

I'm using a two prong approach. Build a 6 metre long sound deadening wall parallel to the generator, with a flanking wall at 90 degrees to partially close off the entrance, and I'm going to direct the exhaust vertically, and thanks to Pete who got me some lengths of suitable pipe the exhaust modification is underway.

Yesterday I set a length of the pipe in the lathe ready to thread it 2.5" BSP but something was very odd about the steady rest - it wasn't running right. Eventually I found that one of the bearings that form the tips of the fingers had collapsed.

Very fortunately my box of odd squirrelled away bearings provided an exact match so I was able to turn the end down to 2.960" being the major diameter of 2.5" BSP, but then my time ran out!

This morning I was able to do the actual threading, and also a 'rain cap' for the vertical exhaust was delivered so things in that area are progressing in fits and starts.

I won a pile of 15 industrial partition sheets (Facebook Marketplace) that will provide sufficient material for the walls - these were delivered Monday but I've not been able to start on them. They are a 70 mm thick sandwich of steel facing and insulating foam core. I will fix a 6 metre length of 80 x 80 x 6 mm angle iron to the frame of the stable at roof height, and to the concrete floor below, and use self drilling sheeting screws to fix them (as I have a few hundred left over from another project)

FH Brundles delivered the angle iron this morning and I managed to give them a coat of Red Oxide primer (as rain is threatened) - there should have been three but one was bent like a banana and I rejected it - replacement due in the next day of two.

Brass_Machine:
Looks like you are off to a good start.

How often does the generator run?

awemawson:
Eric, VERY rarely as I'm inhibited by the noise ! This is what powers my induction furnace.

A few pictures omitted off last post due to rushing:

The existing 'collar' that terminated the exhaust currently is going to be a b***r to remove - I know as I tried before I installed it.

Brass_Machine:
Sounds like a good plan.  <-- See what I did there?  :doh:


I need to build an enclosure for the CNC router and the shop vac. Both are very loud when running...

vintageandclassicrepairs:
Hi Andrew,
I have fitted some "flue" silencers that proved quite effective quietening noisy oil fired boiler installations
If they have stainless stacks the pipes can amplify the noise alarmingly
Of course most modern units are now condensing low level outlets
A coarse stainless steel mesh is formed into a tube shape about 3 ft long and a couple of inches smaller than the flue, this is wrapped tightly with ceramic insulation blanket and bound with stainless binding wire, then a wrap of lagger's foil tape. This is fed down the SS flue and reduces the noise noticeably, extra units can also be added to
reduce the noise even more
Same principal silencers(?) are used on competition motorcycles and cars

John

Navigation

[0] Message Index

[#] Next page