Generator Auto Start

Automatic Start Generators make life easy, especially Commodore Australia's range of Air-Cooled and Water-Cooled Diesel Generators.

The following section will show you how to use a Victron GX device such as a Colour Control GX or Cerbo GX to automatically start a generator via a two-wire start system. The only pre-requisite

to ensuring this guide will work as intended is that you have a generator which supports two-wire auto start

Stage 1: Configure The Relay Settings

By configuring the relay, you are making the Cerbo GX available for use in starting the generator. This is not the default configuration hence is important to follow the steps below. If you ordered a system with an auto start generator, the auto start will be pre configured however it will still serve you well to familiarise yourself with this section.

Stage 2: Configure The Auto Start Settings

The following steps will guide you through the Generator Auto Start settings where the start and stop parameters can be adjusted to suit your system.

Stage 3: Customising Your Generator Start/Stop 

Battery Voltage

This can be useful as a 'fail safe' to the State of Charge conditions, especially for AGM and other lead-acid type batteries. If the State of Charge reading for the batteries ever become out of sync, which can happen if the batteries haven't had a full charge for a few days in a row, the 'Battery voltage' start/stop conditions can prevent a system shut-down should the batteries be lower than the State of Charge reading suggests.

Setting a Start value of 47v and a Stop value of 55v would be appropriate for most lead-acid battery banks.

The 'Start after the condition is reached for' setting allows a delay prior to starting the generator, set this to '120s'.

Inverter Overload

This option aims to start the generator to prevent a system shut-down when there is too much power being drawn from the inverter.

Once the generator is started, there can be a delay of up to 30 seconds before the inverter changes over to generator power. Therefore a short delay of around 3 seconds is recommended in the 'Start when warning is active for' setting. A longer delay of 60 seconds or more set in 'When warning is cleared stop after' keeps the generator running briefly in case another overload happens in this time.

Periodic run

If your generator is not likely to run for extended periods of time, during the sunnier months for example, the Periodic run is a great way to keep the generator healthy by starting it once in a while. You can select how often , what time of day, how long to run, etc from the menu.

Generator Quiet Hours

In some of the generator start/stop 'Conditions' menus there are separate values for “Quiet Hours”. Turning on 'Quiet hours' enables you to select a time - normally 9PM (21:00) until 6AM (6:00) where the generator will only be started based on these separate 'Quiet hours' values. This way, if you have neighbours or children sleeping you can make the generator run for a shorter time, wait until the battery is discharged lower or not run the generator at all. If your generator is in a situation where the noise is not a problem, you can safely leave this option disabled.