Portable generator powering most of house in power outages.

[drssg]

I never thought about cell phone service going out due to a power outage. Our last major outage knocked out the land line, electric, and cable (includes internet) for over a week.

Cell phone service remained fine for voice and data.

 

[RoyKing]

As you move to rural areas every cell tower needs a fiber feed to back haul. My Verizon tower fiber is back haul on our local ATT fiber loop that needs local power to keep the repeaters running. A big storm only leaves satellite and ham radio, who all seem to have gens.

 

[PILOON]

Update.
As I drove home radio warned us of T-storms and heavy rain in my area.
Hope I don't need the genny tonight.

 

[check]

Update.
As I drove home radio warned us of T-storms and heavy rain in my area.
Hope I don't need the genny tonight.

Well, at least we aren’t getting what they are forecasting out West - up to 60 cm of snow – that’s over 2 feet!

 

[check]

Well, at least we aren’t getting what they are forecasting out West - up to 60 cm of snow – that’s over 2 feet!

Update - 4 feet of snow in Waterton Park Alberta (just North of Montana)!

And yet tomorrow in Toronto it is going to be 86° nominal, and 100° with the humidex.

Wow.

 

[grsthegreat]

I have a lot of customers that use portable generator to power most of house. They have to physically shut off larger 2 pole circuits, and may have to manually flip thru well and or water heater circuits as needed, but is doable. I had that same thing for about 19 years before I installed fully auto 22kw unit a few years back. I do like the fact that I do nothing and lights come back on. I install 22 kw units all the time. They typically cost between 8-10k fully installed... depending on complexity. Mind you I live in area where power can be out for 5 days at a time. Cheep insurance if you ask me. But to each there own as far as I’m concerned. I can tell you I’ve never had a customer tell me that they wished they never installed it...but I have gotten calls of thanks during power outages for the generator. Especially a few years back when power was out over thanksgiving....had lots of calls and text thanking me for installing gens.

 

[MossRoad]

We came home from vacation at midnight Friday to a power outage. Large outage, maybe 16,000 people in our county alone. Neighbor said it was out for about 2 hours already. So we went to bed during a thunderstorm. Got up at 8am and power was still out, so got out the old Coleman 4000w generator with 2-3 year old 87octane 10% ethanol and Stabil, gave it a shot of carb cleaner, and it started 3rd pull. Ran the freezer and 2 fridges and well pump, took showers, flushed toilet, etc... let generator run for 2 hours until it ran out of gas. Went about our day. Fired it up again with fresh gas around 2:30 and watched the ND football game. Fell asleep. Woke up around 4:30pm and shut down the generator. Power had returned.

We bought that generator back around 1995 when we bought this house, because we have well water, and I wanted to be able to flush the toilet and take a shower. I've only had to use it maybe half a dozen times, but run it for 1/2 hour about twice a year with a load. It was under $400 back then. Good thing to have around.

I'll top it off with fresh gas and more Stabil for the next time.

 

[shooterdon]

I have a lot of customers that use portable generator to power most of house. They have to physically shut off larger 2 pole circuits, and may have to manually flip thru well and or water heater circuits as needed, but is doable. I had that same thing for about 19 years before I installed fully auto 22kw unit a few years back. I do like the fact that I do nothing and lights come back on. I install 22 kw units all the time. They typically cost between 8-10k fully installed... depending on complexity. Mind you I live in area where power can be out for 5 days at a time. Cheep insurance if you ask me. But to each there own as far as I知 concerned. I can tell you I致e never had a customer tell me that they wished they never installed it...but I have gotten calls of thanks during power outages for the generator. Especially a few years back when power was out over thanksgiving....had lots of calls and text thanking me for installing gens.

I looked at not only the installed cost ($10k) but the operating cost as well. I believe it was $75/day IIRC ($375for a 5 day outage). It was more than I wanted to spend and I do not need power 24/7. What is necessary is electric start so we can start the generator easily.

With my large 10 kw Honda gas generator ($1500 used) I power up for an hour every 5-6 hour and we are OK for water (fill the tubs for flushing with a bucket) and keeping the fridge and freezer food safe. It uses just over 1 gallon/hr. which works out to less than $15/day For charging batteries and cell phones, I have a small 900W HF generator that runs for about five hours on a gallon of 50:1 mix. I paid $90 for the little thing and it not bad for the price. Total cost to operate the gas generators is under $100 for a 5 day outage.

I am looking at adding this for the cell booster, Jetpack, and computers:

https://www.amazon.com/Portable-300...show_all_btm?ie=UTF8&reviewerType=all_reviews

I have a second 5kw Generac gas generator that backs up the Honda...might be overkill as the Honda is a commercial unit and should last a long time. Under $3000 for everything.

The downside is that it takes about 15-20 minutes to move the generator out, fill it with gas, run the cord, and throw the safety interlock on the main panel. Not fun if it is below freezing, or pouring rain. I keep enough treated fuel for two days and a can of starting fluid just in case.

Long term, I may convert the Honda to use propane. Less costly to operate and no fuel issues. Cost for the propane conversion is about $300.

 

[Sawyer Rob]

Long term, I may convert the Honda to use propane. Less costly to operate and no fuel issues. Cost for the propane conversion is about $300.

I doubt it will be less costly to operate... I'm wondering how you came up with that?

SR

 

[shooterdon]

I doubt it will be less costly to operate... I'm wondering how you came up with that?

SR

Looking at dual fuel generators it is apparent that propane is less costly to operate. Propane is $1.39/ gal...gas $2.59. I would be using my 500 gal tank to supply.