6 days without electricity here so far..

[5030]

We got slammed with an ice storm last Wednesday and the power is out (and still is). Glad we have the diesel powered standby genset to run the farm but lots of folks aren't that lucky. I've burned through about 100 gallons of di9esel so far, it's the longest single run I've had on this genset since I bought it 15 years ago.

No utility power and interestingly, none up town either and north of us, Ann Arbor is still basically in the4 dark.

My wife said looking at Farcebook (I don't) that a number of people with electric cars (ev's) are dead (literally) in the water, just another reason I'd never have one.

Hopefully, power is restored soon. Running on diesel is pretty expensive

On top of all that we just got an inch of rain, everything is flooded here.

I have 3 large trees that succumbed to the ice. A large maple and 2 oaks. Bee doing some serious chainsawing in the upcoming days.

Heating the house with biomass presently.

 

[JasperFrank]

I never thought all the boy scout stuff would be meaningful, till we were out for over 8 days. Canned goods are the pinnacle of human invention.

 

[5030]

My wife calls it camping... My neighbors with no power call it something else.

 

[sd455dan]

My wife calls it camping... My neighbors with no power call it something else.

At least you are prepared for mother nature acting up.

 

[orezok]

Not a lot different for ICE. Very few stations have generators so no gas available either.

 

[zzvyb6]

We got slammed with an ice storm last Wednesday and the power is out (and still is). Glad we have the diesel powered standby genset to run the farm but lots of folks aren't that lucky. I've burned through about 100 gallons of di9esel so far, it's the longest single run I've had on this genset since I bought it 15 years ago.

No utility power and interestingly, none up town either and north of us, Ann Arbor is still basically in the4 dark.

My wife said looking at Farcebook (I don't) that a number of people with electric cars (ev's) are dead (literally) in the water, just another reason I'd never have one.

Hopefully, power is restored soon. Running on diesel is pretty expensive

On top of all that we just got an inch of rain, everything is flooded here.

I have 3 large trees that succumbed to the ice. A large maple and 2 oaks. Bee doing some serious chainsawing in the upcoming days.

Heating the house with biomass presently.

Are you out by Stockbridge ? My friend out that way just texted that she just heard the greatest sound: The shop air compressor just started up !

 

[5030]

Are you out by Stockbridge ? My friend out that way just texted that she just heard the greatest sound: The shop air compressor just started up !

North of Toledo about 15 miles or so. No power here. In fact DTE just messaged my wife and told her they not only are having substation issues but need to set a new pole down the road from us and they have no poles available (used them all up), plus they need to get a tree crew out to cut the offending tree before anything else can be done.

DTE quit trimming right of ways about 2 years ago as a 'cost cutting' measure. How stupid on their part. Now they get to pay for it.

No restoration estimate. Guess we will be going way past the 7 days we have been on standby. That Generac is working it's butt off.

 

[5030]

Just went out and checked the fluid levels in the standby and it was a quart low on oil. Working very hard with no end in sight. It has low oil shutdown as well as low coolant shutdown, don't want to get to that point if I can avoid it.

 

[dodge man]

Are you shutting it down and running it just part of the day?

 

[LouNY]

Been there and done that 12 days was my longest run, used up almost all of a 275 gallon tank of fuel.

 

[masseyrider]

Lucky us.
Bought a generator about 15 years ago.
Twice a year I put a quart of fuel in, run it dry and change the oil.
Only thing it's powered is a radio I listen to while I wait for it to run dry.
Once every couple years we lose power for a few minutes.

 

[5030]

Are you shutting it down and running it just part of the day?

24-7. It's not portable, it's a diesel fired unit. We now have 4 trucks out front and 2 down the road, all from Port Huron (Amanda, Michigan) and they told me we would be back online within an hour. Good thing as the standby could use a rest. I'll be servicing it in the coming days.

If DTE had just trimmed the rights of way, none of this would have happened. Kind of save a buck thing that is biting them in the butt now.

 

[5030]

Crews from all over out here, we have 5 trucks out front, they have the line deenergized down the road to mitigate any danger. The crew leader is from Galveston, Texas and the rest are from Armada Michigan and I hope they are socking it to DTE (which I'm sure they are). We are hooked back up but no juice yet. Crew leader told me within an hour or less which is nothing compared to the time we have been without.

All this just enforces my belief that EV's aren't the way to go. No way can the present grid can handle them.

 

[5030]

Back online about 20 minutes ago. They swung by to make sure everything was ok and it is. Probably have to wait a couple hours for hot water as the HWH is electric. According to the bulk tank gage, I went through just under 200 gallons of diesel

 

[LouNY]

Ouch, expensive power at this years diesel prices. The last I heard was $3.89 with a 1000 gallon purchase.
Still $5 at the pumps around here.

 

[dodge man]

We went on vacation to Arizona about three weeks ago from Illinois. We saw a lot of $5 a gallon diesel but here in Western Illinois is just over $4 a gallon. Even though it’s a diesel backup unit is there a reason you couldn’t turn it off and on?

 

[5030]

Ouch, expensive power at this years diesel prices. The last I heard was $3.89 with a 1000 gallon purchase.
Still $5 at the pumps around here.

Not a cheap date Lou but necessary. Last time I filled the tank it was $3.55 ORD. I suspect this coming grow season will be a bugger. Have not price any truck stop fuel lately but I assume it's high.

We went on vacation to Arizona about three weeks ago from Illinois. We saw a lot of $5 a gallon diesel but here in Western Illinois is just over $4 a gallon. Even though it’s a diesel backup unit is there a reason you couldn’t turn it off and on?

Actually there is as in no heat in the house and it's cold here and has been. I assume it uses less as the demand drops off but again, I don't know. Back on utility power now. Basically 7 days on standby.

 

[LouNY]

I don't know about 5030, but for me it's convenience. With the generator I have water to drink and flush,
my heat stays comfortable. I don't worry about my refrigerators or freezers, depending on times I could
have most of a beef in the freezer. We can cook and enjoy everything as normal. So I normally leave my
generator running till power is back, in the spring or fall I have been known to leave it off for a few hours at a time.
But summer or winter it usually goes continuously.

 

[Captain Dirty]

DTE quit trimming right of ways about 2 years ago as a 'cost cutting' measure. How stupid on their part. Now they get to pay for it.

My town is one of the few municipalities in the state that has its own electric utility company. It hires a contractor by the year on straight time to trim branches that might impinge on the lines. We seldom have outages of more than an hour and pay less per KWH than the regional companies that wait until "an event". My son lives in a neighboing town and counts on at least a week without power. I have seen bucket trucks with Indiana and Alabama license plates in front of his house. Those guys are being paid overtime, per diem (for meals and lodging), etc. Then the regional utility goes to the state rate-setting-commission and says "These are our costs; we need a rate increase to cover them." I'll wager you will get to pay for it.

 

[Jstpssng]

I'm thinking about a PTO generator, and the OPs experience reinforces that. Assuming I ran it 24 hours it would only burn 72 gallons in that same time period. I wouldn't run it all of the time, that's just for comparison purposes.