Subaru - Robin Industrial Small Engines

[HOrnbrod]

Good old Mom and Pop power company in my area, the only game in town, dropped the ball again as usual. Their policy is to never clear dead trees along the power lines until they fall on the lines, kill power, and create O/T pay for the local Bubbas. About seven hours ago, a huge dead oak tree way too close to a substation fell, blowing it up, and killing power to a seven square mile grid. I am on that grid. After six hours, after being told that "maybe by morning" the power will be up, I rolled out my old 7Kw generator, powered by a pull-start 7HP Subaru - Robin industrial engine. I had not started this engine for over two years (wrong, I know) since the tornadoes came through here in April 2011 and killed power for two weeks. 

 

I'm not going to say it started on the first pull, but on the second pull with the old stale gas and all, it farted, coughed, barfed, fired up, then smoothed out in about two minutes. Freaking amazing. Been on it now for over four hours and all is well. I've been through lots of generators overseas powered by Briggs & Stratton, Honda, and other engines, but never had a more reliable or forgiving power plant than this Subaru generator. If you're shopping for a home backup generator, consider one that's Subaru - Robin powered. 

[Sir Sam]

Subaru makes really nice small engines in the lawnmower weedeater size range too, I'm not sure why you don't see more of them.

[terrawombat]

Bought a pressure washer with a Subaru engine on it a few years back.  Seems to rattle and make more noise than any Briggs or Honda I've used, but you're right, it starts right up every time and I've never winterized the thing and I've been pretty lazy about maintenance.