suggestions for a home primary/standby generator

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Hi,

Two winters ago a big snow storm that only happened once every ten years hit with more than 5 feet of snow. Our neighborhood was fortunate enough to loose power for only 24 hours; the others suffered the loss for more than a week. I can never forget the coldness of the night when the room temperature dropped to 40F.

I am seriously considering installing a automatic/manual transfer switch with a standby/primary generator to power the entire small townhouse of mine before the first winter storm hits. I have an electric furnace and there is no gas pipe line in my neighborhood. I have contacted a local standby generator contractor for the installation of a natural gas standby generator. He believed my HOA/county government would not approve a large enough gas tank for an extended running time in my backyard. He suggested a portable gas generator with a manual transfer switch. According to him, there was not a portable gas generator that was powerful enough to power the whole townhouse even a small one. Honda's most powerful portable gas generator produces only 10 kW and costs more than 5 grands.

I did some looking on eBay and found many diesel generator of various specs. Some of them can produce more than 45 kW which seem to be powerful enough for my need. Some made in China come with standby switch option, but I concern the quality and after sale service. Honestly I have no experience with a diesel engine. My neighbor, who maintains a standby diesel generator for a rich family that powers their whole big house during power outage, once told me that the diesel generator was a nasty thing. I need your input on owning a diesel generator like choosing the right one, maintenance issues, fuel storage, cold weather start up, quietness, etc. The generator will see action only during power outage in summer and winter, so, a used one but in good condition will be considered. I know they are not cheap, but I am willing to invest one in this unpredictable global warming weather.

Should I contact another standby generator contractor for a second opinion? Or go for a standby/primary diesel generator? Or other alternatives?

Thanks,

Simon
 
Really, you could probably get away with 25kw even with heat if you are careful with your other loads, but a 45kw unit will run the whole house as that is about 200 amps with 120/240 1 phase output.
Ive done some looking around. Ive looked into propane generators before, and like they were saying you need a large tank to run them. The colder it gets, the more capacity you have to have because the vaporization rate of the propane goes down the colder it gets. Because its in liquid form in the tank and you use gaseous propane, the liquid has to boil off. That takes heat. If you pull more propane than you can boil your pressure falls and the unit stalls. A larger tank has more capacity to boil off before this occurs so often you are not buying for runtime, but for actually keeping enough gas boiled.
A possible solution would be a propane vaporizer. It does exactly what it sounds like; takes liquid propane and boils it using a heat source.
I do like propane because it keeps better than gas or diesel.
Used, you have to find out if it is setup properly for residential output. They come in all kinds of configs for voltage and phase. Often times they are reconnectable too, though.
 
In an emergency like that you would just need the essentials. Heat,fridge and a few lights. A fridge uses about 1000w, I have no idea what your heater uses but I don't think you need a 25 or 40k generator. A 7k would be more than enough to keep the fridge on and a few electric blankets. That's my thoughts anyway. I have a 4k genny and two 800w ones.
 
Agreed. The concept of having a generator to run luxury items is just silly. I have a 1500w generator and it is perfect forgetting g us through anything with minimal noise, fuel use, or logistics requirements.
 
Have the electrician put a transfer switch in,
and an outside plug for a generator.

This way, almost any decent sized portable generator can be used.

Don't use the furnace, use a De' Longhi oil filled portable heater, pulls 600 / 900 / 1500 watts.
Add another 1500-1850, so 3 to 4K load max...

Looks like a 5K transfer switch...

There was a "This Old House" episode where they did just this...
 
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With that setup how do you keep the water pipes from bursting anywhere inside the house if everyone cuddles in the same room with one heater?
 
This is Maryland, not Michigan...

A space heater can keep a small townhouse reasonably warm with an outside temp of 40 F....
 
During the snow storm the outside temp was way below freezing. Inside the house the room temp dropped to 40F overnight without power. If the power were not restored in 24 hours, the room temp would be eventually as low as outside which was freezing.
 
I live in Virginia, and don't have the transfer switch, but I do have a 4K generator.

I have survived both Isabelle (19 days no power) and Floyd (16 days)

A small De'Longhi heater on each floor,
set to 900 watts.
Refrigerator, (1000 or so)
and either a 600 watt George Foreman grill or a slow cooker..

Two layers of R19 in the attic helped..

We survived...
 
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Get some sort of kersosene heater, a "monitor" style that vents to the outside through a dryer vent. Kerosene has pretty good energy density so you can store enough for a week in a few jerry cans.

Then you can run a much much smaller standby generator, like a 6 kW. 45 is absurd.
 
We have a 7000 watt generator for our house and use a manual transfer switch. Our auxilliary panel feeds the furnace, kitchen, well pump, master bedroom/bath, alarm system, and basement. Through proper load management, we barely notice any inconvenience when the power is out. Ours is gasoline but we keep a fair amount for OPE anyway....in the event of a large power outage, we have access to 100 gallons or so which should last us around seven days.....longer with strickter power management.
 
Maybe 10 KW capacity is more than you need. Consider also the storage life of the fuel. Propane keeps longest, I believe. If you've fully stocked up on diesel or gas, and you didn't get to use it, it will turn stale on you in a few weeks. Now if your vehicles use gas, get a gas powered generator. If your vehicle uses diesel, get a diesel generator. That way, you can always transfer the unused fuel to your vehicle.
 
ive got a 16kw unit that is powered by a detroit diesel 2-71 2 stroke diesel. if its warm out it will run on straight waste motor oil, or obviously diesel in the winter when its cold. it runs at 1200rpm, and is meant to run for weeks at a time. it cost half the price of a larger honda, will run indefinitly with a fuel supply, and is seriously heavy duty and worry free. After hurricane irene we lost power for 18 days, it it ran nonstop for 8 of those days because of some medical equipment that had to stay running. i would not put that faith in anything "consumer grade", nor a cheap 3600 rpm chinese ebay diesel generator
 
A generator large enough to run your electric heat would be big, heavy and would need to be permanently installed. Would your townhouse even let you? They are diesel and typically run at 1800 RPM and many need to have power to their block heater all winter when they are not running.

I would go for a 7500 watt generator and figure to use a few electric heaters. A Kerosun portable heater is not a bad idea to have (the ones with a wick). They need no electricity.

Propane lasts forever and you could keep a few 100 lb tanks filled and use them.

Gas is probably the cheapest, but you do have to deal with a bunch of 5 gal. cans of gas.

Remember there are storm related outages that you can prepare for and power grid failure that just happen with no warning.

You really need to use a clamp on amp-meter and determine the load (including starting load) that each mandatory item takes.
Then get a transfer switch installed.
 
Contact a few local electrical contractors. I can remember back in '03 after the blackout my step-dad bought a big Detroit Diesel generator used from a local electrical contractor, to power the entire house. It was large and permanently installed with a 100 gallon tank and runs for 20 minutes every two weeks in order to stay in shape.
 
I bought a Generac 16kw unit in 08. Took me til Sept. 09 to lay out the gas lines and have a friend install the aux panet it came with. It's a lot of work from beginning to end but once I had it all in it has worked perfectly. I have 3 100gal tanks feeding it with LP. I'm in Dutchess County NY and we've had a few good storms where I relied on it for multiple days. Always fired up when needed and cut out when the juice came back on.

Only drawback I can say is it does make a good amount of noise.

One oil change a year with PYB is all it takes. I'm planning on changing the plugs this Spring. Checked them in Oct. and they still looked good.
 
So your whole house went down to 40F in less than 24 hours? Was it -10F and windy outside? Otherwise you probably could save some money every year by figuring out where your heat is going.

We have a couple oil filled 1500W radiators. Basically they are 5000 btu each. If you house isn't super drafty, 2 of those running constantly should help you maintain reasonable temperatures. Not 70F but if you start at 70, it might take a few days to drop below 60F. We have kept our place at 60F over a weekend with just one of them going when it was around 20F outside.
Also invest in some warm clothes, or a sleeping bag, 40F shouldn't be a hardship. We've camped on the lake when ice fishing and it got to around -20F, and with the right clothes and sleeping bag, we slept pretty well.

So in summary, a 6000w generator and a few extension cords should run two heaters and a fridge, or your microwave at once, plus some lights and some electronics.
 
Are folks forgetting too that a normal generator is obnoxious and a bad neighbor thing in a townhouse when others are freezing in the dark and you in your warm home, watching TV with xmas lights on.

I live close to my neighbors and I try to minimize my generator(8000 Watt non invertor/12HP) use at night so they can simply sleep or do other bedroom stuff in piece. Thankfully a $100 UPS gives me about 9 hrs of internet, phone so I can work my 100% telecommute job without out futzing with a generator set.
 
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