{"id":629,"date":"2018-08-14T15:27:34","date_gmt":"2018-08-14T15:27:34","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/exhaustnotes.us\/blog\/?p=629"},"modified":"2018-08-14T15:27:34","modified_gmt":"2018-08-14T15:27:34","slug":"exhaust-notes-review-harbor-freight-700-watt-generator","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/exhaustnotes.us\/blog\/index.php\/2018\/08\/14\/exhaust-notes-review-harbor-freight-700-watt-generator\/","title":{"rendered":"Exhaust Notes Review: Harbor Freight 700-watt Generator"},"content":{"rendered":"
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The Harbor Freight Tailgator…<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Smell is the main reason I bought Harbor Freight\u2019s 700-watt 120-VAC Tailgator generator. Mixing oil and gas for the 63cc prime mover and then burning that gas in the Tailgator is an olfactory Garden of Eden. For motorcyclists of a certain age or anyone who has owned an early 20th century gas-powered clothes washer the Tailgator\u2019s smokey aroma triggers long dormant pleasure centers.<\/p>\n

And it\u2019s not a bad generator either. 700-watts isn\u2019t a lot of power but it will run my normal shed load of 11, 4-foot long LED light fixtures with enough power left over to charge 2 Ryobi 18-volt lithium batteries at the same time. If you\u2019re thinking of arc welding or running an air conditioner with the Tailgator disabuse yourself of that idea toot sweet.<\/p>\n

The Tailgator is supported by a lively YouTube community and naturally I did some of the modifications the gang recommended. I swapped the standard Torch brand sparkplug for an NGK and replaced the OEM spark plug cap with a much better made NGK cap. I also relocated the foam air filter within the air box to achieve a better seal. After a few weeks I added a digital hour meter to log the run time per tank.<\/p>\n

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A hot-rodded 63cc generator.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
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The runtime meter.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

With 140 hours on the Tailgator she\u2019s been stone-ax reliable. Two gentle pulls on the delicate starter rope and the beast settles into a staccato 62 hz, no load. Under the full 900-watt load the rpm\u2019s will drop to a smooth 58 hz but who\u2019s counting?<\/p>\n

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The pull starter.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The gas tank holds one gallon the first time you fill it but only around \u00be gallon from then on. Some you tubers modify the fuel pickup to access that last \u00bc gallon. Unmodified, a tank will run 4 hours at 400-watt load so I leave it alone.<\/p>\n

The YouTube consensus is that the Tailgator part number ending in #24 is slightly better built than the one ending in #25. I bought a #24 and ran it 5 hours a day for a week to expose any weaknesses while the thing was still under warranty. Nothing went wrong.<\/p>\n

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Reasonably quiet and very dependable power, and inexpensive. Harbor Freight rules!<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The Tailgator is not quiet but it\u2019s not all that loud. From 13 feet away I got 60 decibels on my Cateater App. The sound of a two-stroke engine is energetic and endearing so I don\u2019t mind the racket; it\u2019s a plus in my book. The Tailgator responds poorly to ham-fisted treatment. You\u2019ve got to treat the thing like the finely crafted musical instrument it is. For only 89 dollars with a HF coupon the Tailgator is a fantastic bargain.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Smell is the main reason I bought Harbor Freight\u2019s 700-watt 120-VAC Tailgator generator. Mixing oil and gas for the 63cc prime mover and then burning that gas in the Tailgator is an olfactory Garden of Eden. For motorcyclists of a certain age or anyone who has owned an early 20th century gas-powered clothes washer the … Continue reading “Exhaust Notes Review: Harbor Freight 700-watt Generator”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-629","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"post_mailing_queue_ids":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/exhaustnotes.us\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/629","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/exhaustnotes.us\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/exhaustnotes.us\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/exhaustnotes.us\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/exhaustnotes.us\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=629"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/exhaustnotes.us\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/629\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":637,"href":"https:\/\/exhaustnotes.us\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/629\/revisions\/637"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/exhaustnotes.us\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=629"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/exhaustnotes.us\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=629"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/exhaustnotes.us\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=629"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}