Generators

[Mighty HD]

After my 9 hour drive Thursday night to Ft. Lauderdale from Lakeland (BAD BAD traffic) to get a Generator I have decided that plywood, tarps, and generators are an investment in Florida now. I am sick of them.

 

Which generator is everyone running down here. I almost had to gun someone down to get a Troy Bilt 5550w

 

It should be enough to run the whole house except the central heat/air.

 

I know I can backfeed it through the dryer plug, but my sisters husbend said he could hook up a switch panel/breaker dedicated to the generator so if something happens/surges it will pop the fuse before it messes up the generator.

 

 

Start your opinions!

 

BTW--3/4" plywood is the BEST for your windows..it'll make a hell of a man out of ya putting it up, and it works well.

[GF7PE]

dont forget, if you do back feed it, you must shut off the main breaker or pull the main fuse. Not all generators are created equally, look at the quality of power. Some of the home center gens will harm your electroincs (like computers or tv's etc.) As far as the automatic transfer switch, that is only worth the money if the generator has the ability to start automaticly too. Meaining, electric start-remote start, self primed if gasoline.

 

One of the best gens out now is made by gillette and has a honda motor. just about $1600 for a 5kw

[ToeJam]

My folks have a Honda generator that they use 2-3 times per year when the trees in their area knock out the power. It will sit all summer (my Dad probably fires it once every two to three months max) and then runs it for 24-48 hrs when the power goes out. I'm not sure what model it is however.

 

You definitely want to bring the power in through a separate fuse box. Take the time and do it right. Isolating it from your main breaker will allow you to turn off your main breaker and not accidentally run power up the line to the power crews working to repair the lines down the street. It will also allow you to keep power from running back to your generator during when your street power is working.

 

I'm not sure if I'd spend the money on a unit large enough to power almost everything in the house. Then again, if I had one for around here (Seattle area), I would only need it for 2-3 days max. GF7PE is right, the power you get out of it might not be clean enough to run sensative electronics (unless you can put something inline from the fuse box to clean it up). I would maybe just put my money into the best generator needed to power my fridges every hour or so and any other critical items. One thing I have learned however, is most of the generators have a pretty small fuel tank. If I was to set one up right, I'd bring in a larger tank so I wasn't having to fill it up every 90 minutes.

 

Good luck

[Worktruck]

To bad your not on the northern end of Rt 1(Maine). I have a 5500 watt deisel generator that is electric start and on wheels. Runs eithr 230 or 115 volts at 60 cycles, great for the whole house, yes I've even run the puter off it. I would definately install atleast a transfer switch if not a genset panel. That will keep you from accidently frying the power crews when they are working to turn the power back on. BTW the deisel generator ids for sale, $1400.. only has 1.5 hrs on it.

[Mighty HD]

The troybilt that I got claims to have 10 hrs of runtime @ 50% load. I'm sure ti will be either better or worse than that. I mainly got it for the fridge. This last hurricane I lost a ton of meat, and other frozen items. The other 2 hurricanes didnt knock out power, this was the first time in the 4 years that we have lived here that it has gone out. With that in mind, and the cost of the meat, I just assume buy a decent generator. The 5550 got a consumer reports "best buy" and I've read other places it's safe to run a tv, etc. I do believe it will even run the hot water heater. I have to check the element sizes first though. I will also run a small el-cheapo window unit so we can sleep @ night if the power is off. A nagging wifey isnt a good thing...lol

 

Hopefully in the next week or so I will get a manual transfer switch, fuses, etc to safely wire it into the house. I will run it in the utility room or lock it in the back of the truck against my bedroom window in the backyard. The utility room is detached from the house and you have to walk through the carport about 10ft to get to it. I think I can open the windows (about 7ft off the ground)_ and not worry about someone stealing it.

[MCourson]

We bought a used Coleman 4000 watt ebay special for $400 shipped. Bought this one because it has the old style flathead Briggs 8hp on it and I know the small Briggs L-heads inside and out. Back fed through the dry plug it fed a big freezer, a fridge, tv, 2 small fans, and a small window unit AC for ~105 hours. It burns a little oil but thats nothing a good freshening wont fix.

 

The only reason we bought it was for power in the pits at Daytona, didnt expect to use it for this. Well worth the money.