Back-up Generators

[General Lee]

I can't imagine the water heater at 50W? Maybe 5000W?

I have a three bedroom, 2.5 bath 2300sq/ft colonial. I have oil furnace heat and hot water and a well. I have electric stove and washer and dryer.

I power my house on a 5500 watt gas generator, i mounted it on wheels and store it in my garage. I roll into driveway and plug in when needed.

I easily power my house for 12-14 hours per 6.5 gallon tank.

I run my heat, hotwater, well, TV's, appliances etc, with no problems at all.

If running the oven or stove tops I'd not be able to run anything else at the same time. I've not tried the electric dryer, no need during an outage.

I've been out for up to 5 days straight with no issues. I fill at night and then fill in the morning.

I paid $399 for the generator during a day after thanksgiving day sale.

What I like about my set up is, my generator is totally portable so I can use for many purposes, it was cheap but very reliable, I've had for a few years now.

What I don't like is that it runs on gas. Gas is just plain junk today and I'm sure to treat every tankful.

Search on the site, there are many posts on this subject.

This reminds me to run the gas through my machine as it's been sitting for some time.

Joel

Joel, I'm curious and you may know this..... I too have a 5500 watt gen set, 8250 starting watts. My water tank has dual 4500 watt heating elements. I didn't think my Gen set would run it but my neighbor was convinced it would and if it didn't, the breaker would trip. So, I made sure all other breakers were off and tried the water heater during my last outage (Irene). Hit the breaker for the water heater and it appeared to run fine. I let it run for an hour to heat the water and was able to take a hot shower.

My thinking is dual 4500 watt heating elements= 9,000 watts which exceeds my gen set. Maybe the elements don't require 9,000 watts to start??

 

[sandman2234]

Typically, you might actually WANT to hear it running. It will remind you that it is doing it's maintance cycle each week (schedule that so it doesn't affect your sleep) and if your needing it running, hearing it running in the background isn't a bad deal. Around here people have had them running in their garages (door open) or next to the house and all of a sudden the power goes off. So you mosey out to see if the durn thing is out of fuel AGAIN and you find out that it isn't there anymore. A little generator isn't that hard for a couple of guys to load up in a hurry and drive off with, whereas a tractor takes a few minutes more...
David from jax

 

[grsthegreat]

It was standard practice to run all emergency back-up Hospital Generators for one hour a week... including a cool down cycle... so 52 hours a year just in readiness testing.

About 5 years ago, we were required to register all stationary Diesel Powered Equipment and the license only permits 20 hours per year of non-emergency use...

So now it is 45 minutes every two weeks...

Local Hospital Administrators tried to get exemptions and it was a no-go...

We do use less fuel, but it stays in the tank longer...

I think the annual permit fee for a typical 125 kw unit is about $400 for the air district and another $250 for the integral above ground double containment fuel tank.

hmmm, some more left coast garbage.......between calif and seattle....the US is going down the tubes. By all means lets not have the hospitals back up generator tested...geesh

 

[grsthegreat]

Thanks for all the very helpful advise. At this point my question is, where do you locate the generator in relation to the house/panel/electrical service? Why? I do not want to put it to close to the house for noise reasons. Can these be effectively muffled?

Easy to muffle the noise. mine is very quiet

 

[sandman2234]

Joel, I'm curious and you may know this..... I too have a 5500 watt gen set, 8250 starting watts. My water tank has dual 4500 watt heating elements. I didn't think my Gen set would run it but my neighbor was convinced it would and if it didn't, the breaker would trip. So, I made sure all other breakers were off and tried the water heater during my last outage (Irene). Hit the breaker for the water heater and it appeared to run fine. I let it run for an hour to heat the water and was able to take a hot shower.

My thinking is dual 4500 watt heating elements= 9,000 watts which exceeds my gen set. Maybe the elements don't require 9,000 watts to start??

Resistance heat doesn't require startup power like a motor. I think I would have dropped the wires off one of those heating elements to keep from accidently frying a winding in the generator. So it takes 15 extra minutes to heat the water to get you clean, lol. Spend that 15 minutes doing something to get dirtier!
David from jax

 

[grsthegreat]

Joel, I'm curious and you may know this..... I too have a 5500 watt gen set, 8250 starting watts. My water tank has dual 4500 watt heating elements. I didn't think my Gen set would run it but my neighbor was convinced it would and if it didn't, the breaker would trip. So, I made sure all other breakers were off and tried the water heater during my last outage (Irene). Hit the breaker for the water heater and it appeared to run fine. I let it run for an hour to heat the water and was able to take a hot shower.

My thinking is dual 4500 watt heating elements= 9,000 watts which exceeds my gen set. Maybe the elements don't require 9,000 watts to start??

Ive been told, but nevr have tried to verify, that the 2 heater units in elect water heaters cycle . first one then the other. Not sure if that is true. Would be east to test, but i never have

 

[General Lee]

Resistance heat doesn't require startup power like a motor. I think I would have dropped the wires off one of those heating elements to keep from accidently frying a winding in the generator. So it takes 15 extra minutes to heat the water to get you clean, lol. Spend that 15 minutes doing something to get dirtier!
David from jax

That is not a bad idea

 

[sandman2234]

Ive been told, but nevr have tried to verify, that the 2 heater units in elect water heaters cycle . first one then the other. Not sure if that is true. Would be east to test, but i never have

Probably not, but I am not the one to ask. The switching device would have been a nice thing to have around, on one of the hotwater heaters I have scrapped out after they died.
Another thing to consider if your trying to run a dual element heater is maybe adjust the temperature settings on each so they don't pull power at the same time. Might not be possible, but an option worth considering. Maybe turning up up to not come on would be possible.
David from jax

 

[grsthegreat]

Probably not, but I am not the one to ask. The switching device would have been a nice thing to have around, on one of the hotwater heaters I have scrapped out after they died.
Another thing to consider if your trying to run a dual element heater is maybe adjust the temperature settings on each so they don't pull power at the same time. Might not be possible, but an option worth considering. Maybe turning up up to not come on would be possible.
David from jax

I just googled this up......

1. Dual-Element Water Heaters

Dual-element electric water heaters have two thermostats, one for the top element and one for the bottom element. The top thermostat controls both the upper element and the lower thermostat. The two elements do not operate at the same time.
Water heaters are filled from the bottom. A fill tube goes from the intake at the top of the tank to the bottom of the tank, so that cold water enters at the bottom, leaving hot water at the top, where it exits the tank at the outlet as needed.
The upper element is the primary element. It operates first to heat water at the top of the tank and make it available for use. Starting with a tank of cold water, the primary thermostat at the top turns on the upper element and keeps it on until the water temperature reaches the setting on the thermostat.
The primary thermostat turns off the upper element and sends power to the lower, secondary thermostat which turns on the lower element. The lower element heats the water at the bottom of the tank until it reaches the control setting temperature. All the water in the tank is now hot and both elements are off.
Water is used from the top of the tank, which brings cold water into the bottom of the tank and pushes hot water at the bottom towards the top. Since the upper thermostat is still off, the lower thermostat turns on the lower element again to heat the additional cold water until it reaches the temperature setting.
If enough hot water is used so that the tank is once again filled with cool water, the upper thermostat will turn on the upper element and turn off the lower thermostat, starting the process over again.

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ALSO.....quick calculations If the water heater has 2 x 4500 watt heaters, total = 9,000 watts / 240 volts = 37.5 AMPS....but they DO NOT use that much amperage, they test out at just under 20. So i guess they do cycle

 

[tornadowatchranch]

I got my generac portable 15k from norwall power systems. They are actually running a special I got in email where refer a friend and we both get $50 gift card. Generac also has a current program going that I was having trouble finding on generac website but is on norwall's with a similar $50 refer a friend for a total of 100. Norwall also gives you and additional 2% off if you pay in certain methods. Not much help with the transfer switch discussion but thought I would offer the tip I went with and manual transfer since it is a portable generator for me. Mine was delivered via motor freight so make sure you have forks or something. They just put mine directly on a trailer from the semi and I dealt with it from there.

http://www.norwall.com/product_pdfs...dium=email&utm_campaign=Early+September+Email