OT - Storm Generator - OT

[Captain Neon]

Bob's thread about the mass of P15 doors that morphed into a discussion about storage buildings has got me thinking. With winter weather approaching, and the possibility of being without power during a storm, does any one have experience and recommendations on gasoline powered emergency generators. In particular, how much output for a typical family home and then any thing to watch out for? Local utilities are not very reliable here, and even the factory where I work close-by has periods where they lose power.

[Plymouthy Adams]

one must first decide what is critical in running your home...I use a 5000 with 4500 substained watts...powers my house and garage as far as lights go...I will shut down the AC, air compressor, dryer..I will run my lights both house and shop as needed, both refrig and freezer, computer and TV...I kill the main breaker..back feed 220 though the welder outlet in the garage to power both side of the breaker box..I have gas so cooking, hot water, heat is taken care of off the top..

[Captain Neon]

I want power to run sump pump, refrigerator, deep freeze, electric range, natural gas forced air furnace, microwave, washer & dryer, computer, TV, and DVD player. A few lights would be nice too, but unless its Armageddon, I don't expect to be out more than a week. I do still live in town and am less than one block from the HS and five blocks from the factory.

[greg g]

Its not necessary to power an unopened freezer for at least a day or so. I have a 2600 watt that will probably power the sump if needed, the Fridge, a light or two and the pellet stove. If we need to go more the 48 hours it motel time.

[BobT-47P15]

We just purchased a Steele brand generator from Atwoods farm supply in Webb City.

It was on sale for 15% off the listed price.

That made it about $600 rather than the $799 we saw the same item for at Sutherlands.

It's rated at 5,000 watts with a peak of 6,000. Has wheels and a handle to pull it

around with. A friend will be coming over to wire it into the breaker box. He sold me

37 feet of cable and attendant plugs that he had extra.....so it will sit outside the

garage door to run if and when needed. It should run the fridge, microwave, furnace

blower (gas furnace), several lights, probably the computer. Probably run the

washing machine which is 110, but not the dryer or electric stove.

On the box, it calls it a 6,000 watt generator, but when you read the smaller

print, it's really a 5,000 with 6,000 peak. Hope this helps.

[TodFitch]

one must first decide what is critical in running your home...I use a 5000 with 4500 substained watts...powers my house and garage as far as lights go...I will shut down the AC, air compressor, dryer..I will run my lights both house and shop as needed, both refrig and freezer, computer and TV...I kill the main breaker..back feed 220 though the welder outlet in the garage to power both side of the breaker box..I have gas so cooking, hot water, heat is taken care of off the top..

Code in most places require a proper transfer switch if you are feeding into the house wiring.

We too have gas heat and hot water. Except they are both derived off of a new high efficiency boiler that requires electricity to operate. To cap it off, our phone service is Internet based so it goes out when the Internet goes down. Basically without electricity all we have is cold water...

[Oldguy48]

I bought a 5 KW unit from Home Depot. Installed a receptacle outside the garage to connect the generator, and separate circuits to the freezer, refrigerator, furnace, and a couple more outlets. I'll just unplug from normal power, and plug into generator power if needed, so there's no possibility of backfeeding into my breaker panel. The generator circuits are totally isolated from the house wiring. Not as convenient as a transfer switch, but it works, and it's safe.

[Don Coatney]

I kill the main breaker..back feed 220 though the welder outlet ..

I tried to back feed through my welder but it would not work. Either my oxy/acet tanks were too full to hold any electricity or I connected the wires in series not parrellel:rolleyes:

When I bought my house in Buffalo the prior owner had wired in the correct and up to code either/or switch gear. He labeled the swich "falls" and "genny". Easy to understand for one living in Buffalo.

[Plymouthy Adams]

you are looking at quite a big unit that will either be best fed by diesel motor or propane fired. Even at that the juggling of applicances may be be necessary. your typical AC FLA may be in the nighborhood of 23 amps at 220 volts (5060 watts) and if you have a split system you have the inside blower motor to add to that..that alone will overtax a 5000 watt generator...the dryer will be quite high as most definitely the stove..remember the stove with one eye will almost eat 1 ton of Ac capacity if not exhasuted outside...and the refrig and freezer are the lesser power draw of your applicances probably in the nieghborhood of 5-7 amps each. Microwave will be quite another medium weight current eater...toaster and coffe maker will run less in that order.. a unit of this size will need be set in place and wired professionally as Tod said units of this nature operate on a transfer switch...most are programmed to start after a X period of no juice automatically and normally are programmed to run a few minutes each week just to maintain the self enclosed battery without a transfer. Transferred is regualted by the power outage. I have seen some of these wired in..trust me..in a few cases I was not impressed..so be sure the installers are well experienced.

so go through your house and add up your amperage consumed by the items you wish to feed..multiply that by the power requirement for each device (110 or 220) and add these together..this will be your total wattage requirement..for items listed in watage just add that in watt form to the above list, (lights, tv, computer etc are listed by wattage most the time) do the math..and let this equal about 60-70 percent capability of the unit you buy...remember..that most heavy applicance will have a surge current draw on start up...so keeping it at 60% is my recommendation..you can find that a smaller unit can be fully adequate if you manage you own power load per say..

Actually places like Home Depot and possibily Lowes will come to your home and do the estimate of power need, make the appropriate call for size of unit and quote an install...

and should be totally up on your local area's electrical codes and gas if so fired...and if a contractor ever asks "is this unit gonna be inspected" get another contractor quick...!

[Don Coatney]

Or look at your power bill. On my bill there is a 13 month bar graph indicating power usage in KWh. I am trying to figure out why this past September I had the higest bill of the year when Lisa and I were both gone for half of the month. When we leave we shut off the air conditioner and all other large power users. We were both gone in August and we had about the lowest power bill of the year for the hottest month.

[Plymouthy Adams]

I tried to back feed through my welder but it would not work. Either my oxy/acet tanks were too full to hold any electricity or I connected the wires in series not parrellel:rolleyes:

Don..try opening the valves fully and up the pressure on the regulator..I feel you are really starving the downstream mounted devices..

[Don Coatney]

I tried to back feed through my welder but it would not work. Either my oxy/acet tanks were too full to hold any electricity or I connected the wires in series not parrellel:rolleyes:

Don..try opening the valves fully and up the pressure on the regulator..I feel you are really starving the downstream mounted devices..

I think I figured it out. All power from the power company will not work until it is returned to the power company through the earth ground for re-cycling. I still have not figured out why we pay so much for electricity and then return it to the power company so they can send it back to us over and over.

[Plymouthy Adams]

Don..they run it through a filtering process....wisen up a bit, if they did not do this..all you would see on TV is reruns..or Lisa may burn you toast like the lady next door did to her husband the week before..this is why you have to pay over and over and over..that is why is is billed as clean efficient power...

[greg g]

Does that mean if you connected jumper cables to one of the pole ( north or south) and ground you cold get free power???? If not where does the excess power go??? We know for the most part they make electricity, it goes into the "GRID" and we use it. But We don't use it all so where does the extra go? Is there a big ware house some where full of ready to use electricity? If as you speculate it goes back into the ground and then back to the source we should be able to tap ito this unmetered flow and live "Off the Grid" in a whole other way. Or is there a big battery some where? And If we keep freeing these electrons and putting them in the grid, are we going to run out of electrons some day? Oh wait never mind, I forgot about the smoke rule, thats where it goes. It leaks out of broken electrical stuff and blows away.................

You guys are nutzzzzzz.

[Norm's Coupe]

You really don't need to run everything in the house when the power goes out. Just the basics. Like sump pump, a couple of lights, a hot plate works just as well as your stove top for temporary use, and a radio. For heat, you can use a small electric heater to heat one room only. Of course, if you have a fireplace heating is a little better. Really don't need to heat the whole house, so don't need to connect the generator to the furnace. All of these can be run off an extension cord or two from the generator into the house.

We don't have a generator at all. I've thought about picking one up from time to time, but.........our power rarely goes out. We did have a power outage the other day after all the high winds. But........they had it fixed within about 45 minutes after the power went out. That was our first outage since the late 90's around here. So.....because of this, I just decided we really don't need a generator. If it goes out and stays out, then we'll do as Greg mentioned if it's during cold weather. If it's warm out, we have a grill we can cook on. Our water heater doesn't need electricity to work, it's all gas with a pilot light burning 24/7. If out too long, it's time for a little get away to a motel. Or.........we could have our fireplace converted to gas to help heat the house a little.

As some of the others mentioned. If you want the generator to operate the furnace and most of the rest of the house, you need a large one. Then it must be hooked into the house electrical system according to code. That cost can get up there. Also, if you use just a portable for emergency's, you do have to run it every now and then to keep it operating properly. You can't just stick it in the garage or a storage building and not run it a few times a year. If you do, more than likely it won't work when you really need it.

[BobT-47P15]

In the past couple years, our power was out for about a week due to a biiig ice storm.

Then another week due to a big wind storm.

We stayed elsewhere each time, but it would have been more handy to remain at

home. The whole neighborhood, as well as the house, was dark. And it got pretty

cool inside.

A few neighbors got generators, so we decided to join the crowd. May not need

it, but will be available if necessary.

Many offending trees have now been trimmed and there are not near as many big

branches hanging over the power lines.

[Jim Yergin]

Many offending trees have now been trimmed and there are not near as many big

branches hanging over the power lines.

Bob,

I hear that is also because they are now laying on top of old Plymouths.

Jim Yergin

[Plymouthy Adams]

ouch...was that served with a tad of salt included...

[Norm's Coupe]

I went one better than trimming trees a few years ago. Had the one tree that was hanging over the driveway cut down completely. Now I wish my neighbor would cut the two he has in his yard down that hang over my driveway. Because of his two trees (large maples), I only have one spot in the driveway big enough that I can park and still not get tree sap all over the car.

FYI, trimming doesn't stop the limbs, branches and twigs from falling off the tree. Have two other large maples in my backyard. Had both trimmed good the same time they cut the other one down. But...........we still get some pretty good branches falling off in a good storm, some over 1" diameter. That's large enough to do damage to a car if they were over the driveway. I think the reason those large ones fall is due to the squirrels chewing on them. Then when the wind whips up, it breaks them off.

[Frank Elder]

Find your property line, hang a plumb bob, lop em off. They are on your land....Hatfields and McCoys:eek:Just kiddin Norm.

[Norm's Coupe]

Find your property line, hang a plumb bob, lop em off. They are on your land....Hatfields and McCoys:eek:Just kiddin Norm.

You may be kidding, but I'm not. I did just that when I had my trees trimmed a few years ago. Paid the contractor a little extra for his trees. I did tell my neighbor I was having it done prior to doing it though, and he even offered to pay for it. But.........was only $25 extra for each tree so told him to forget it. As mentioned though..........that was several years ago, and now they are again hanging over my driveway. Trees have a habit of growing back.

[BobT-47P15]

Jim, even that dastardly tree has now been cut up and hauled off.

[Captain Neon]

Bob,

I hope that you gathered a little firewood from that tree. Even without a fireplace or wood stove, wome of that wood would make nice accents for the interior or even to make a box to carry treasures in. I know that the coupe wasn't stored at your place at the time, nor was the tree from your property, but I think I would have gotten a few good pieces of that tree just the same.

[Frank Elder]

I wood carry a chunk in the trunk:DCause I know you want to remember...

[BobT-47P15]

Never thought of that. Was just glad to see it go.

Maybe I could find a small remaining chip and whittle it into a toothpick.