Hey Rob camping up at Lefroy bay at Ningaloo we run a 2kW Honda inverter that easily copes. Labours a bit when the compressor kicks in for the first time but then hit the eco thropttle the revs drop and it runs nice and quiet. You can even run two chest freeezers off the 2kW, just switch them on seperately. We run for a couple of hours in the morming and then a few at night while we use the lights for cooking dinner etc. If everything is well frozen before you leave the bottom stuff stays fozen solid while the top is usable as a fridge.

Last time I went to False Entrance I ran a 100L chest freezer, a 35L Waeco fridge and a 40L Engel plus a few lights all off a 1.5 kVa generator. It was a cheap chinese inverter model.

We had it running about 30 meters away tucked behind a sand dune, and you could barely hear it. (Although it's so windy at False Entrance that you can't hear much of anything).

It ran 24/7 for a week and used about 60 liters of petrol. The eco mode makes a huge difference, it lets the generator slow down in order to match the load your using and saves heaps of fuel.

I have a 1kva mishto (ebay 4 stroke sine wave) genny as back up on my 2 month trip this year. What a ripper! Used it randomly for boost charging the batteries, and for the last week of the trip when a solar regulator failed on a solar panel. 

It comfortably ran the 60l engel, as well as charge 2 x 100 amp hour batts, the 32L engel, plus charge dvd players/phones/ipads, often all at once!!

On economy mode, i would get nearly 8 hours on 2 litres fuel!! A little weapon, especially for $450. Probably clocked up over 100 hours on it during the trip, and it didnt miss a beat. Starts first pull, every time. Oil change and service when i got home, and the oil still looked very clean. Father in law has similar model, but 2.5kva. Over 6 years old, probably 1500+ hours (he caravans for 4-5 months a year), and still starts first pop. 

interesting, that's the kind of info Im looking for.
I know the Hondas are top of the wazza, and that the Ebay specials invertors are a bit hit and miss but reality dictates getting closer to the minimum required than the maximum.

While I know a 1-1.5kw should run a small chest freezer easily, that assumes that the Ebay special actually can supply rating the sticker says!

Mishto, I'll keep that in mind, what was yours Dtrain?

There are a few other brands available on there also.
Appreciate the info guys and anyone elses!

 id spend the money and buy a Honda. U get what you pay for

when the cyclone hit us this year I fired up my 2kva Honda and I was running 2x250L chest freezers, 2 house fridges, 2 flood lights, 2 iPhone chargers and also my tv and it was still going hard 

I couldn't recommend it enough mate

 I have a 1kW Kipor that was cheap (can get at Bunnings I think) and its always started first time and never let me down. A bit louder than the Honda though.... 

 I run an 80 litre engel as a freezer and a 80litre Autofridge as a fridge up at Ningaloo over Christmas & into New Year on a 1 kva Honda. On the Eco setting. I get around the 8 hour mark per tank. Only time it stops for an extended time is between about 4am and 9am. Works a treat. I change the oil fairly regularly in those temps though. 

Chris. 

Took a 2.4Kva Yamaha to Steep in April, ran like a dream, quiet as a mouse good on fuel & handled all the power needs. 4-45Lt Engels, 1-60Lt Engel freezer, lights & an ice machine.
Good luck with your choice....

Ya don't put salt with Jack Daniels haha.
Put in water & 20 mins later enough ice for a few drinks, it was for a boat.

 On a trip up the Gibb river road with 2 families we had a catastrophic battery management failure resulting in 1 battery being drained to death and 1 months worth of pre-frozen food put in jeopardy.

A 400km round trip to Derby with a new battery, 1Kw yamaha inverter genny and 2 jerrys full of fuel later saved our once in a life time holiday.

When stopped for a day or 2 we set it up to 2 25w chargers on the camper trailer batteries. they in turn ran a 60 and 45l engel on freeze and a 60 and 45 engle on fridge, camp lights and recharge for gadgets. Also an Etec charger doing top up work on vechicle batteries. The genny would be started late morning and left to run during the heat of the day and during dinner then batteries coped for the cool (30+deg) nights. 

I have also used it on a recent trip to Shark Bay where it ran a 145L cheap chinese freezer and gadget recharge no problem at all.

If the budget stretches far enough i would highly reccomend a quality genny. Quieter, more fuel efficent and more likley to supply clean power so you dont blow up your sensitive gadgets or your freezer. 

 I fell for a cheapy of ebay $400 let me down on third trip away and f*cked the trip up because of it. Couldn't wait to buy a Honda on return home now no more shit like that.

 The tickler plastic bubble shit itself Rod and when cold it needed to be primed..could not get a replacement for it. Damd thing had the lot electric start remote control 2.7 kva 

 Don't risk stuffing up a good trip buying cheap shit get on midland honda web site they often have deals on generators got my 1kva for $1100 runs the chests freezer two Engels and the lights near on non stop for two weeks with a couple oil changes in between, 8- 10 hours out of a tank can't fault it 

 We have set ourselves up with two 120w projector folding solar panels that I can join together running through a 20amp regulator. Also use a 100amp Baintech power top battery pack. This lets us run two fridges (ARB38 and Engel 40L, engel as a freezer ARB fridge) Our process is cyrovac red meat pre trip and freeze down....we put this in the Engel and some 600ml water bottles as well. The bottles freeze overnight and these become the ice blocks for the day esky and then drinking water as they unfreeze. As the red meat is eaten if we are on a fishing holiday we replace with fish. For lighting just got some LED flood lights and have put leads and switches on them to run of the battery pack. This set up we can run all our electrical requirement (even charge phones, ipads, go pro) indefinitly. We have a 2kva honda and been to Ningaloo, Steep point and places like that but decided to go solar as dont need as much space. No fuel to carry or generator. This system can run without needing to keep moving panels just leave flat on ground on some shade cloth and let it look after itself. Honestly works a treat.

Have a second batery in the car but wanted the extra battery pack for use when we camp more than one night, if it is an overnighter everything just stays in the back of the Prado, can plug into the battery pack from their and have put anderson plugs on all wires so can plug the panels into the car batteries, run one panel or two...what ever fits our need.

Just sharing for a thought.

 We have set ourselves up with two 120w projector folding solar panels that I can join together running through a 20amp regulator. Also use a 100amp Baintech power top battery pack. This lets us run two fridges (ARB38 and Engel 40L, engel as a freezer ARB fridge) Our process is cyrovac red meat pre trip and freeze down....we put this in the Engel and some 600ml water bottles as well. The bottles freeze overnight and these become the ice blocks for the day esky and then drinking water as they unfreeze. As the red meat is eaten if we are on a fishing holiday we replace with fish. For lighting just got some LED flood lights and have put leads and switches on them to run of the battery pack. This set up we can run all our electrical requirement (even charge phones, ipads, go pro) indefinitly. We have a 2kva honda and been to Ningaloo, Steep point and places like that but decided to go solar as dont need as much space. No fuel to carry or generator. This system can run without needing to keep moving panels just leave flat on ground on some shade cloth and let it look after itself. Honestly works a treat.

Have a second batery in the car but wanted the extra battery pack for use when we camp more than one night, if it is an overnighter everything just stays in the back of the Prado, can plug into the battery pack from their and have put anderson plugs on all wires so can plug the panels into the car batteries, run one panel or two...what ever fits our need.

Just sharing for a thought.

HOW DO YOU GET RID OF DOUBLE POST?

 How will your set up go if it becomes overcast Tank

 We can top the battery up off the car if need be via a anderson plug or plug in inbuilt charger on battery into the invertor. Have extension cables with anderson plugs so can run lead from car into tent to battery or move battery to car....

 We try to be full solar when we go to Ningaloo, and don't have a problem if the sun shines at least half the day. I made a 130 litre 12/24/240v chest freezer, fibreglass body with a Danfoss motor compressor unit on the end. Uses a fan blower unit inside, which obviously robs some space, but far more efficient than a plate type and will freeze down really quickly. We fill with frozen gar, and some mulies filling up the rest. it runs off the 2x85w solar panels and its own 105a/hr deep cycle and regulator. A 120 w panel with 105a/h and regulator runs the 80 l Waeco ,all the led lighting and anything else they want to. I have an inverter, but strongly advise against them they are all horribly inefficient and drain batteries very quickly. We can run for weeks with all mod cons without having to start a generator if the weather is mostly sunny.

But don't fool yourself into thinking you don't need generator backup if you are on solar in a stationary camp for more than a day or two. It will get cloudy at some stage, and you will be screwed, been there, done that. Can't rely on the car, it will have to be run for half a day at a time to keep up.  At sunny Ningaloo this year, we had almost solid overcast for over a week this year, and I was running the genny and charger twice a day to keep them both going, most time being spent on the freezer battery as it obviously had the greater amp/hour draw. No more amps when running than the Waeco, just running for more hours, obviously. And you need a BIG charger,  your 8 amps supercheap auto jobbie is not worth having. I invested in a 50 amp smart charger from Bushpower Australia, and it is brilliant. Modded the h/duty battery clamp lead to take a 120A Andersen plug, and fitted the same plug to the battery boxes, so it is very simple to plug in. It runs from a cheapie chinese generator, also from Bushpower, nominally 1kva, continous rating 850w. It just handles the initial start up current when the flat battery drags near 50 amps on initial connection, then runs happily forever. Will bring those 105a/hr batteries up from 10.5 v to fully charged while still running the freezer off the battery in about 2 1/2hrs. Waeco fridge battery takes less as the fridge is not pulling it down as much. TIP-if your little generator of any type has a smart throttle switch, turn it off for heavy use. It will cause gennie to trip on big startup loads.TIP- if using any type of smart charger, DO NOT DISCONNECT before fully charged. Cos if you reconnect immediately , it will see 12.4v, say "you're done" and not charge, where it would have gone right up to 14.2 volts or so if you had left it on.

Back in the old days, we ran a 2.4kw powered by a Robin Ey20, running a tucker box freezer and paraflood lighting ,noisy old clatterer, horrible way to do things and everyone else will hate you as camp areas are so quiet now. Glad those days are over. Generator, cheapie or yamonda? Really depends on what you want from it. In a caravan running AC, microwave, kettle, etc? get a 2/2,4kw Yam or Honda, you are running those things continuously. In our case, I saw the need as backup only, so went for a package from the aforementioned Bushpower, the generator and charger for $750. Try buying a big battery charger (at least 45amps) and see how much they cost. The generator, in use for 5 years now, has been faultless apart from once. It just would not start after being serviced prior to the annual trip after being good for three years. No spark. Looking at it, all the earths, including the one for the coil, went to a painted chassis. Cleaned the paint off it,problem solved.  

One thing to be mindful of, if you are running these little gennies a lot--they have very small oil capacity. This thing, copy of a 1kw Honda, holds about a cupful. Which means an oil change every 25 hours unless you want oil like tar and premature failure. 

I've bult up a bit of experience now running these kinds of setups, so would be glad to help if anyone has questions.

 Good read ranmar850...run solar and have a generator for a back up. Cover all fronts.

 original question--"can I run a household freezer off a small petrol generator" Short answer " yes"   You will easily run a household freezer up to 200 litres from a 1 kva generator.

We had an extended power outage in Kalbarri a while back. A full day planned outage turned into 2 1/2 days when a cocky further south decided it was a good time to light up some scrub and took 9 poles out.   That little chinese 850w  generator ran the whole house, including the biggest door-in-door fridge freezer you can get and the 150 litre tuckerbox in the shed, plus the camping freezer when the battery died. Tripped twice, when I suspect a couple of things tried to start at the same time. I ended up alternating the two freezers when they were down to temp and it never happened again. Having nearly all LED lighting in the house certainly helped.

Bushpower Australia seem to have dropped the 1kva from their website for some time now, just flog the 2kva model.