On 2/22/13 8:02 AM, Eisboch wrote:


"F.O.A.D." wrote in message
...


Unfortunately, "life as we know it" ceases with a power outage, since
we're on a well. We have bottled water for drinking, but without water
to wash up, flush toilets, et cetera, you might as well mosey on over to
a motel if you are facing an outage that might run more than two days.

Several of our neighbors got a "deal" on 10,000 watt generators on
wheels and jury-rigged hookups to their circuit breaker boxes, and these
work ok but the hookups look scary to me. Also, apparently they cannot
run their heat pumps off these units because of the start-up power
requirements. This is way over my non-electrician pay grade.

-----------------------------------------------

During Hurricane Wilma (while we still had a house in Florida) I had
purchased a 12,500 watt "portable" contractor type generator and
installed a transfer switch to the power panel. We also had well water
there with a 220 volt pump and electric hot water heater. Since the
little Honda doesn't generate 220 volts, I figured we'd be all set.
When the power was lost, I fired up the big generator and quickly
learned how much fuel it went through during the first day and how noisy
the damn thing was. Not knowing how long the power would be out
(turned out to be over a week), I hooked up the little Honda, just for
a refrig, couple of lights, a TV and the Direct TV box.

In the mornings, I'd fire up the big generator for about an hour or so
to take a hot shower. We had an accumulator on the well water system,
so it was good for several toilet flushes without power. I'd run it
again for a half hour in the evening to recharge the accumulator.
Running the big generator this way was sufficient for the water issue.
I also fired up one of two A/C units, just to see how the big generator
handled it. It was fine, but really not worth the fuel burn since it
was November and not all that hot or humid.

The Honda ran 24 hours a day for the 7 or 8 days until commercial power
was restored. The next summer is when we had a pool installed at the
house in MA. The contractors used the Honda every day that summer and
part of the next to power the stone saw they were using for cutting the
bluestone. By that time, I figured the dusty Honda was probably pretty
much worn out and I put it away and forgot about it. It sat unused,
with stale gas in it for the next 6 years until we had a storm and lost
power for several hours. I dug it out and much to my surprise, it
fired up after a few pulls and ran fine. As mentioned before, I used
it again two weeks ago and it ran non-stop (other than refueling twice a
day) for the three day outage. I am really impressed with these
little generators. When this one finally dies, I'll probably replace
it with the EU3000i model and get the adaptor for an external gas tank.
I've calculated all the current draw we'd require to heat the house, run
a couple of refrigerators and some lights. The EU3000i will handle it
fine.





According to Generac, a 17KW unit burns 2.57 gallons of propane an hour
at full load and 1.30 gallons at half load. Half load or less is the
most common running speed.

24 hours of operation at 1.3 gallons an hour...that's about 31 gallons a
day times, let's say, $3.00 a gallon...that's about $100 a day, which,
even in these parts, will barely get you a hotel room if you can find a
vacancy. The reality is, most of the time a household generator will
running at far less than half speed.

We seriously considered a wheeled generator, but the power comes into
the house on the far side away from the garage, and that means stumbling
around in the dark or in the rain or in the dark and rain or snow or
whatever, pushing the unit across the yard and plugging it in in similar
circumstances, et cetera. A couple of feet of snow in the yard and the
unit would stay in the garage. Had the power come into the house outside
the garage, with the panels in the garage, a wheeled generator would
have been just fine.





--
I'm a *Liberal* because I knew the militant christian fundamentalist
racist militaristic xenophobic corporate oligarchy wasn't going to work
for me.