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Home Generators (or How DTE Energy Ruined My Holidays)
We are among the thousands without power in the northeast. Day four actually, and we've decided to look into generators so that next year's New Year's doesn't involve fears of frozen pipes bursting and hypothermic babies and cats. At the very least we just need enough juice to run the furnace blower, but if we're going to lay down the cash I'd like to know what it would take to get a little more power ... like enough to run a fridge, router, laptop and lightbulb. I know nothing about this sort of thing, but figure there are more than a few experts out there so I call out to the wisdom of the mob. What am I looking for? How difficult is the wiring? What will it cost me? On the extreme edge, what would it take to get off the grid entirely? (And on a side note, thanks to DTE Energy for telling us we had power when we didn't, for losing the ticket for our neighborhood, for telling us it would be back every single day when it wasn't, and for the helpful DTE representative who warned us that our pipes might burst. Thanks.)
This is CmdrTaco -- he's saving electricity by turning off the spellchecker to conserve power, while running off of battery backup. Obviously.
You see? You see? Your stupid minds! Stupid! Stupid!
Might be best to turn off the water entirely and drain the pipes rather than risk a burst.
The most rabid believers in American Exceptionalism are the exact same people whose policies are destroying it.
... I object to your derrogatory and inflamatory efforts to drive my net asset value down.
I just built a new house, and had a 20kW Generac air-cooled generator installed along with a 200A automatic transfer switch and buried 1,000 gallon propane tank. It can run on propane or natural gas, and is manly enough to run my whole house. I have heat pumps with backup propane furnaces. The outside units are small enough so that I do not have to sequence the startup of the compressors, but I could do that if necessary (and may anyway). It self-tests once a week. All told, minus the tank (since many/most of you will have NG service), about $8,000 installed and tested. Well worth it for totally automatic, no-worries switchover even if we're away.
Tiller's Rule: Never use a word in written form that you've only heard and never read. You will end up looking foolish.
Bottom line: Permanent home backup generators can be purchased for $3000 - $6000 + installation labor.
If you have natural gas available then I highly recommend using it for your backup generator, since outages are very rare and you won't ever need to worry about storing fuel.
If you house is like most, then your incoming service is 100 amp/220 split-phase. This means that a ~22 KW generator would give you 100% backup, but really most people don't use more than 80% of their service, so this setup should provide full capacity backup for almost anyone. If that's not enough, then move up to the 30 KW model. Kohler makes generators big enough to power your entire neighborhood if you are willing to buy it.
Wiring is not difficult, but depending on your experience level and your desire to obey the local electrical code, you should consider hiring a licensed electrician.
There's a dirty, and illegal way to do it.
First, if you follow these instructions, remember this KEY STEP
TURN OFF THE MAIN SWITCH. Also, NEVER turn that main switch on if the generator is running.
Finally, the main switch MUST be double throw.
Forget to follow these instructions, and you can very easily kill a lineman or blow up your generator.
Anyways, you just need a three pronged dryer plug, 2 of them, and sufficient length of heavy gauge wire. You create an illegal male - male 3 pronged plug, and connect your generator socket into the 3 pronged plug in your house used for the clothes dryer.
The reason it is illegal is because this form of installation does not prevent you from connecting your generator to the wiring outside your house. If you left the main switch on, you can energize the dead lines outside with 12,000 volts and kill a lineman.
The advantage? As long as the main switch is double throw, and you don't turn it on when the generator is connected, it is pretty safe. And cheap : a double throw switch and circuit box is $200-$500, while this method can be done for $10.
The first thing you want is a natural gas powered generator, not gasoline. Nothing like having to take a trip to the local gas station (presuming THEY have power) to fill up the generator every 8 hours or so. This, by definition, will make the generator a stationary unit (not on wheels, designed to be bolted down to a concrete pad).
Next, you want a generator with auto-start, auto-transfer with manual return. You want the thing to automatically kick in if the power dies, but YOU should be in control of when it decides to return to the grid. Nothing like finding out that the power died 10 minutes after you and the family left the house for a couple of days and coming back to a cold house with no power and potentially burst pipes.
Wattage - you will want at least a 5000 watt unit for whole-house use. Forget this idea of running power cords everywhere - unless you like the idea of tripping over power cords everywhere. With the transfer switch mentioned above, the generator takes the place of the grid so your internal house wiring will continue to serve it's duty.
There are several manufacturers of house generator systems. You can find low-end units at places like Home Depot or Lowes. Better units are best obtained from an electrical wholesale house.
Do yourself a huge favor here and hire a licensed electrician to do the work. It'll get done right the first time, the electrical inspector won't get excited (in a negative way) when he sees the work, and the odds of "something going wrong" go way down.
From another guy in Michigan (Westland)...
Ron Gage - Westland, MI
No way man - you don't need anything nearly that complicated. Since you're just covering an occasional power outage, you don't need anything permanent. Just put the generator outdoors, and run a long extension cord (or a few) inside.
Make sure the generator is in a locked location, or at least chained down. They have a tendency to sprout legs during emergencies.
If you want something permanently in place, you need an electrician, and no less. Because you need a huge On-Off-On lever switch to ensure you never attempt to power the house from both the generator and grid simultaneously.
I just ran heavy (15amp rated) extension cords this year when our power went out. I'm wiring up my shed this spring, so I'll already have a back ho out digging the ditch to run the underground wire, so I'm going to run a spare three pole 10-gauge direct burial (will cost some bucks) along with the main run out to the shed. I'll wire up a few outlets around my house that connect specifically to the generator (which is an el-cheapo Walmart 3500 watt gas unit), because a) the generator ain't big enough to power my panel and b) to do so in my neck of the woods requires a cut off so you're not rendering your incoming power line hot.
A bit of advice I got when I bought the generator was that you don't need to run your fridge and freezer all the time, providing you open them infrequently. Every few hours just plug them in, let the compressors bring the temperature down, and then unplug them. At the very least, don't keep the fridge door open while you ponder whether to use hot mustard or not. As you say, many electrical devices that don't draw a lot of power while in use can draw a lot of power at startup (cranking is I think the technical name). Even TVs can draw considerable juice when you first turn them on, so you probably will not want to put all your devices and appliances on a power bar and then flip the switch, but rather turn on each device one at a time.
Another thing my manual makes very clear is that the generator should be properly grounded. I didn't do that this year, but as I said, when I wire up my shed, I'm going to have to use a grounding rod anyways (since I'm putting in a subpanel) so I'll just bond the generator to that. 20 amps and 120 volts is enough to cook you good in the right circumstances.
The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
If you get the chance to move out, consider getting a Passive House, where it has super-thick insulation and is hermetically sealed. You wouldn't have to worry about frozen pipes in that kind of setup.
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/12/27/world/europe/27house.html
/.'s 10 Millionth
Make sure the generator is in a locked location, or at least chained down. They have a tendency to sprout legs during emergencies."
I 100% agree! That's how most everyone along the coast does it durning hurricane season when they hit and take power out here. I was at a friends house during Gustav near Baton Rouge...and he had one generator we did fine on. I'm not sure the size, but, will try to ask and come back with an answer.
But, with this one generator...we kept a window unit AC going (hot and muggy is our problem during that time of year)...we could run his 50" LCD flatpanel tv...along with DVD and stereo for entertainment...we'd also plug in cell phones, charge computers...etc. I know we had to unplug something occasionally to plug the fridge(s) and chest freezer in, to keep food good, but, over all it worked well.
The things get pretty darned LOUD tho....but, I've heard that the Honda ones...at a premium price, and very, very quiet. Just make sure to have plenty of gasoline stocked up, and oil. We actually ran through our gas supply...and built a little dc pump out of a fuel pump, hooked to a hose and run off a car battery...to siphon gas out of their large Surburban SUV. Now..I am not a fan of SUV's....but, the thing did serve well as a tanker truck for quite a number of days. After the gas stations got back online, and actually got gas delivered to them...we filled up all our tanks...and the SUV tanks to brimming....and had plenty to last us till the electricity came back on.
Thank goodness for gas to cook on, as well as for the water heater....and we also used the propane gas grill outside s few times too....kinda turned into a fun camping trip with them!
Light travels faster than sound. This is why some people appear bright until you hear them speak.........
CAUTION: YOU MAY KILL SOMEONE IF YOU DO NOT TURN YOUR HOUSE'S MAIN BREAKERS TO OFF!
* If you leave the Main Breakers ON you will backfeed power to the entire neighborhood, and the power workers think the lines are dead. Very bad.
* Technically, you need an electrician to wire a breaker/cut-off switch to the generator. In this manner when you switch the generator connection to ON you also switch the Main Breakers to OFF. Expensive, but safe and complies with NEC.
* Most people just use a male to male plug, plug one end into the generator, and the other into some house outlet. If you turn the Main Breakers OFF ~BEFORE~ you do this, it is possible to get power to everything in your house, limited by the breaker capacity and the power generation capacity, and not feed the neighborhood. The relative safety of this is up to others to argue.
* IF THIS MAKES NO SENSE TO YOU, SEEK PROFESSIONAL HELP. Or at least a neighbor with a subscription to Popular Electronics. Your local linemen will thank you!
This shouldn't even be suggested. Buy a bloody ATS. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transfer_switch