Portable generators to stay away from?

[grsthegreat]

The generac whole house units i service only are set to run 5 minutes every week. No load switching. I service units that are 15-20 years old doing this and they still run fine. Mind you, the older units ran for 15 minutes weekly, but the EPA did away with that allowing only 5 minute exercises.

Mine, we have power outages at least 6 times a year lasting many hours each time, so i dont bother with loaded test runs.

 

[jyoutz]

My well pump alone is 2hp...

Whole house is electric to boot

Yeah I have a 2hp well pump also. My small generator will run refrigerators and freezers, but not the well pump. Fortunately I have gas heat. The furnace won’t run without power to run fan and electric ignition, but a also have a freestanding gas stove/fireplace that is ignited by a pilot light.

 

[grsthegreat]

Small generators can, and do burn up well pumps. I have an acquaintance that owns a local well drilling company. He told me that every time theres an extended power outage they get swamped with calls to replace deep well pumps. The homeowner tries to power the poor thing on their undersized generators and burn up the pumps. These pumps can easily draw 3x the rated power to start, especially if it has a large head of water to overcome.

 

[nancyk]

Update on generator ordering: went into Lowes to order the Duromax duel fuel 13000. They could not even order it for me, the system would not let them do it, something about no stock available. The very helpful rep looked in the system and saw a Pulsar generator with pretty much the same specs as the Duromax, and could be ordered. I just checked and could find no reviews on this brand. Believe I will just wait for the Duromax.