Wow.....what a strange thread. A motor rated to run on 120 VAC will draw double the amperage it does when run on 240 VAC. On that issue, I agree. The real issue here is the extension cord and the resulting voltage drop at 100 feet from the power source. The higher the amperage of the device at the end of that cord, the greater the problem. Fourteen guage wire is adequate at 100 feet if you are pulling about ten amps. Yes, I know that 14 ga. is rated for 15 amps but in this instance we are talking about a motor that has fluctuating loads while splitting logs. I have a portable 120 VAC hotdog tanked air compressor with a 1.5 hp cap start motor. That unit hates being on an extension cord unless it's at least 12 ga. or even better, 10 guage wire. So, if the OP intends to use his existing cord, he has to think about a few things here. What is the guage of wire in this cord? If it's 16 gauge, it's useless for this application at any voltage. If it's 14 guage, it's likely too light to run that motor efficiently on 120 VAC. If it's 12 guage or 10 guage, it's likely fine for the application at 120 VAC. HOWEVER, it will have the WRONG plug and receptacle on it for 240 VAC. The OP will have to buy the correct plugs and receptacles to wire everything properly (safely) or someone is going to be in for a big surprise. Items that are designed to run on 240VAC use plugs and receptacles that are RATED for the amperage of the application and each one has a different blade configuration to prevent accidental damage/overload/fires/etc. 240 VAC plugs and receptacles come in ratings of 15, 20, 25, 30, 40 and 50 amps. The plug on the 240 VAC log splitter will set the standard for the blade configuration. I agree that buying a 240 VAC unit is the way to go but not for some of the reasons stated so far. My reason has to do with the extension cord needed. A 14 guage extension cord will easily deliver 20 amps at the end of 100 feet. That motor will snap to life a tad quicker and it will recover from heavy loading a tad quicker too. Induction motors run coolest when they are spinning at their rated RPM. If you slow them down, the current rises quickly and so does the internal temps of that motor. Overload that motor too long and it will begin to smoke. From there, it's all downhill for that motor. The simplest solution is to buy the 120vac unit along with a 100 foot ten guage extension cord. You will have good power at the end of that cord and you may find other uses for it. If you go with the 240 vac unit, you will need to either convert your existing cord or another one, plus putting in the correct outlet in your garage. You will also have to make sure that the circuit breaker for that 240vac outlet is sized correctly to protect the extension cord and motor.

I have or installed a bunch of volt meters on my various stuff.Mowers,motor cycles,cars,trucks.etc.I find they will show me the state of battery charge in volts,rather than the system charging rate. For that ,I install ampmeters as well.to monitor charging rate.tbk

Thank you everyone for information. We run a 6 bedroom house off solar, invertors and batteries in Baja 4 months a year but my husband doesn't mind investing into it and so far has not taken much interest in helping me with my log cabin. He is a wealth of information - and reads Power Mag, Home Power, Mother Earth, etc. Maybe when he has our home in Baja completed (our first one burned to the ground with 9 others), he will be more willing to invest some time and money into our log cabin retreat. In the meantime, it is MY project and I DO need to educate myself and read up on these things. LazyPup, we are taking your suggestion. We are leaving for the cabin in a couple hours and taking a battery charger that we will plug into the generator whenever someone wants to shower and it is SUPPOSE to send the 110 from the generator and convert it to 12V (the pump for the shower) without even a battery inbetween. I will see how this application works for a temporary solution. (family reuion this week) By next year maybe I can have a more permanent solution so that the other family members using the cabin can operate it easily. PoohBear - we do use JC Whitney for a number of supplies and they might be a good information source for me as well. I did call Mayberry where we bought the generator for information and a remote turn on switch which I hope to install next year. Thank you everyone.

Good advice, Ron. With traditional plastic package LEDs, a safe nominal current value is usually 20 milliamps. Many of the high brightness type will take more, but 20 ma is unlikely to damage any LED you find. I don't have enough experience with SMD types to even guess, let alone COB. The safest method is to measure the current they use in the original application, and either calculate an appropriate series resistance to maintain that current, or determine it by experimenting with different series resistance values while watching with your meter. Don't forget that if you change the device's heat sinking, you may not be able to maintain the same current. I add, however, that the typical $3 dollar store solar garden light has no current regulation at all. It doesn't need any, because it uses a single 1.25 volt cell (usually nickel cadmium of about 300-400 mah) driving an LED with a nominal forward voltage of a bit over 3 volts. Hey, what did you think you were going to get for $3? You can also use a regulator IC as a constant current LED source, but that's more effort than something like this is probably worth. A sidebar. I've read that the reason you see so many cheap Chinese made products assembled with lots of screws - and even with hand-soldered circuits inside - is that labor is cheaper than machinery in China. Tesla electric vehicles are built largely by robots. Geely and BYD EVs from China are probably mostly, if not entirely, hand-made.