It started right up, and when we had plugged into the RV and running A/C it was still pretty noisy. But without the A/C running, it's pretty quiet. It is a little heavy for one person to lift in and out of a pick-up truck bed.
I did extensive research on generators/inverters for my camper, and the Westinghouse iGen4500 had the best balance of price, weight, capacity, and noise level. There were two items from shipping that were less than perfect: 1) One of the battery cable plug female ends was bent out of shape, so the plug wouldn't go together, and I had to pry it open to get it to go together. 2) Initially, the generator wouldn't start, or would kill seconds after it did. After doing some snooping on the Westinghouse Portable Power website, I found a Technical Service Bulletin under Service & Support that gave the simple, but tedious, fix to reconnect a cable to the starting module that tends to come unplugged during shipping.
This is my initial review as I just received the inverter generator and haven't had a chance to really try it out. First impression is that it is a decently made unit but can definitely see why it sells for so much less than comparable Honda or Yamaha units. The plastic side panels showed signed of having been flexed during assembly or shipping and some were scratched. This isn't a big deal as I intend to use the unit to power my travel trailer and it is going to take some wear and tear over time. After adding oil and gas, the engine started up right away using the manual start. Upon starting, it was obvious something wasn't quite right as the engine was running rough and very rich. Upon investigation I discovered that the auto choke control wires had come unplugged in transit. I plugged in the wires but have not had a chance to retest as it's 2am and I don't think my neighbors would appreciate a running generator, no matter how quiet. I will update this review as I put more time and testing into the unit. Overall, I would say Westinghouse could have a great product for the price point if they would improve the quality control at assembly.
Good - Has all the good features (and more) of the Japanese competitors at 1/2 the price. Filled it up and it ran my 30' trailer's 15,000 btu A/C (at 50% load - 1.8 KW) on a 87 degree day and all night, 18 hours to ran out of gas. While the A/C was running turned on a 1500 watt heater, ran both fine for 5 mins, 3.3 KW total load. Bad - failed to start 1st time. Called support, talked to a American service person who directed me to a web page how to fix two electrical connectors that come loose. About a 1 hour job. I sure new ones will have it fixed.
got it today, oiled it, gassed it, plugged battery cables in and no start......battery is on the charger now as the pull rope is stronger than I. I have the i2250 and it started right up, I'm hoping this is just an idle and discharged battery.