Portable generator for home use

[JVM225]

I bought a big (200 lb.) portable generator after going without power for 8 days following Sandy. It’s something like 7200 watts.
Fortunately I haven’t had to use it yet, but I do start it twice a year, run it for about 30 minutes with a load on it, drain the gas, and put it away again.

 

[bajturner]

I have a Honda 3000i. Very quiet and pretty light to transport. Starts when you pull it. Tried it this winter when it was about -25C outside and it hadn't run in a couple of months- 4 pulls.

After a recent renovation, I had a manual transfer switch installed that moves the entire house power over to the generator. The wiring and natural gas lines are in place for a whole-house automatic unit that I will install if someday I realize the goal of spending my winters down south on a boat!

The power inlet is 240V, but I made a Y "shore power" cord that takes the hot from the 30A plug at the generator and Ys it to both hots on the house inlet, since the 3000i is a 120V unit. As such, only 120V loads work. If I ever want to enable the 240V loads (but not go the whole home route), I just need to buy a bigger generator and use a standard extension.

I installed a pretty neat gadget called Sense that monitors the mains in your house and figures out individual loads using AI. It is still figuring devices out a couple months later. Smart devices, like Philips Hue, it communicates with directly. There is a hardware device and an app on your phone. www.sense.com

Here's a few of screen shots:

This gives me an idea of what the total draw is and which loads would overwhelm the generator. It also has a separate power line monitor that is meant for a solar feed, but I use it on the generator feed. When the generator is in use, you can see your real-time load on your phone. This was the main reason I got it. More for the neat factor than necessity, I admit! My record is just over 16kW! That's without A/C (not on yet), hot water, and furnace (both gas). Hot tub was over 6kW of that.

The "always on" component is pretty useful, actually. I'm on a quest to get the steady state power consumption of our house down to 500W!

 

[BillK2632]

Wow, you guys have some serious stuff going on. I thought I was doing pretty good with my new little generator and a bin with dedicated extension cords etc. - everything right there ready to go. The transfer switch panel does look pretty good - thought they were more expensive. Would be nice to be able to just plug the generator in and flip a few breakers. We are probably looking at downsizing in the next 5yrs - I think that would be the time to get a whole house system. Weather is predicting another round of severe storms this week - might end up using this thing twice in one week.

 

[Timeflys]

For country dwellers...... we also have our standby Gen able to power the well pump ..... nice to be able to flush when the main supply goes down.

 

[Iprof]

I have a Firman generator I bought the 2200 got it and delivered through Walmart they had a great deal on it last summer. I wanted one I could lift into the back of the pickup and take with us for the travel trailer when we travel to see the grandsons. I would have bought the 3000 but at 98lbs and my bad back would cause a problem. I went with the 2200, 48lbs and easy to start. I do have a transfer box setup at home to power the fridges and the gas furnace during our not to often power outs but we had one today.

 

[BillK2632]

So, the little generator I bought is paying for itself already. For the 2nd time in 6 weeks our power has gone out literally the day we did our grocery shopping. Yesterday a fiesty thunderstorm rolled through about the time my wife got back from the grocery story - out goes the power. I had put a bin full of the necessary extension cords etc together, so I had the generator running in no time. Kept everything humming for about 4hrs. Just knowing I don't have to worry about the fridge etc. during a power outage is worth every penny. This thing is the best money I have spend in years.

On another note, we have had an a very active spring storm season - heard on the weather we have had over 50 tornado warnings in NC this spring - and we had a confirmed EF2 tornado touch down in our neighborhood in March - we only had minor damage, but some neighbors were not so lucky.