Your last generator Maintenance Run

[daugen]

Nothing guaranteed no more outages than spending $$$ on a new generator!

since it was 111 degrees when i took my motorhome through Desert Center CA last Fall, I can't imagine you being out of power and a/c
in that heat. Truly life threatening heat for old folks. Glad you upgraded.

i can tell you after having two automatic generacs, and now a manual Westinghouse (different houses) that
automatic generators are the best thing since sliced bread.
There's nothing quite like going out side at 3am in pitch black howling wind and rain or snow to start a generator versus just counting
to about 10 and ta da the lights come back on.

I live on 30 amps in my rv. I live on 45amps in my house on gen. 900 sf cottage, if I turn off electric hot water,
runs everything fine. Though when sump pump, well pump and a/c all kick on,
gen sounds unhappy briefly and then powers on.
just have to get those breakers flipped off and manage your load

I put a good softstart kit on my rv a/c and that helped a lot. I wonder why they aren't standard.

funny that when I lived aboard my boat in Florida for three years, I had 50 amps usable.
but four a/c units in boat really hogged that up.
Plus I had a 100 amp wife.

so plenty of practice knowing you just can't run it all at once...
well, only exception was my older brother who installed a 70kw generac on his farm in VA.
I asked him why. He said he didn't want to worry about turning things off. Plus he had a 1000 gallon propane tank.
that will surely do it.
he felt reassured and safe and that's the whole goal for all of us.
and what a marvelous assortment of generators we all have to do that.

personally I think you need at least two...
I was always lending out my portable one.
I like a little "belt and suspenders" with my "insurance".

am pretty sure none of us think public power is going to get more reliable in the future.

 

[JRH02]

July 4th was a really strange day this year. Very heavy overcast and unusually chilly. Several times through the day it sprinkled with drops 6" apart but nothing measurable. That night the batteries were down to 60%. The generator didn't have enough gas for a charging run and the only fuel I had was 2 cycle mix and only 1.5 gallon of that. Good enough. Got the batteries up to 85%.

As predictable, July 5th was a clear, cloudless sky so the batteries got recharged by solar and didn't need the genset after all. So chalked it up to a maintenance run. If I rolled the dice and didn't run the generator the next day would be cloudy and the system would have a vow voltage shut down.

 

[3930dave]

Back-up Eaton branded Generac 20KW generator ran for ~6 hours last night/ early morning due to power outage; hence inherent exercise. However, about 3 hours into the run, we got a note from our Utility company that power had been restored. The generator kept on running and the transfer switch did not switch to utility power.

The Utility company is excellent and when I reported that we still had an outage they send a crew truck to investigate our new smart meter that had been installed ~3 weeks ago. No issues were noted. They did indicate that there could be an issue with the transfer switch instead and to seek professional help from an electrical contractor.

I started browsing the web for automatic transfer switch issues. I pulled the transfer switch panel cover off and found a wire with a spade terminal totally disconnected from the utility coil. We have had 4 or 5 outages since we moved into our present home a couple of years ago and there have been no issues. The connector must have been barely secured to the coil terminal and had come loose. I shut the utility power switch off and reconnected the wire to the spade terminal securely. Turned the switch back on and after a few seconds, the solenoid activated and transferred power to Utility. In less than a minute therafter, the generator shut down and all was well. This was @0330 this morning.

I am learning new stuff everyday.

Good catch. Often, Elec issues.... really just Mech issues !

Rgds, D.

 

[3930dave]

I installed a 8kW Generac 10 or so years ago and it served us well for all that time. But 8kW has it’s limits as it would not power the AC, oven, shop or other large draws.

We are getting older and decided to up grade to a 22kW which will power everything.

Well, in the 8 months since I installed it we have a total of 3 hours of actual run time including start up, testing, exercise and a couple of short outages.

Nothing guaranteed no more outages than spending $$$ on a new generator!

Murph.... Pay Now, and I'll defer you to Later !

Summer temps, your way..... that 22..... Priceless.

Rgds, D.

 

[3930dave]

personally I think you need at least two...
I was always lending out my portable one.
I like a little "belt and suspenders" with my "insurance".

am pretty sure none of us think public power is going to get more reliable in the future.

2 is One, One, none !

Rgds, D.

 

[3930dave]

July 4th was a really strange day this year. Very heavy overcast and unusually chilly. Several times through the day it sprinkled with drops 6" apart but nothing measurable. That night the batteries were down to 60%. The generator didn't have enough gas for a charging run and the only fuel I had was 2 cycle mix and only 1.5 gallon of that. Good enough. Got the batteries up to 85%.

As predictable, July 5th was a clear, cloudless sky so the batteries got recharged by solar and didn't need the genset after all. So chalked it up to a maintenance run. If I rolled the dice and didn't run the generator the next day would be cloudy and the system would have a vow voltage shut down.

Murph, again.

I understand preferring PV, off-grid. That said, do you usually not stock gasoline ?

Rgds, D.

 

[JRH02]

Murph, again.

I understand preferring PV, off-grid. That said, do you usually not stock gasoline ?

Rgds, D.

I sure do because after genset season there is still the JD Buck, log splitter, woodmill, Bobcat, chainsaws.... Everything else is diesel. There were 8 full 5g jugs that I moved to the tall barn 1/4 mile away this spring until needed late fall. I've been meaning to shag a jug but haven't been over there for a while or forget when I am close.

 

[3930dave]

I sure do because after genset season there is still the JD Buck, log splitter, woodmill, Bobcat, chainsaws.... Everything else is diesel. There were 8 full 5g jugs that I moved to the tall barn 1/4 mile away this spring until needed late fall. I've been meaning to shag a jug but haven't been over there for a while or forget when I am close.

Just curious about your Alt NRG setup.... (wondering if you used wind, water, etc, in addition to PV).

1/4 mile is close for a cache..... living remote has it's benefits, but distant fuel stations is not one !

Rgds, D.

 

[JRH02]

We've lived off grid for 15+ years. We enjoy most modern luxuries: satellite TV an internet, phone via Starlink, hot water on demand (the well water is free and yummy from a well powered by a AC/DC pump), power hog tools in the shop and on and on. We don't do resistance loads if at all possible. We have the kitchen fridge/freezer, two chest deep freezers, the outside large fridge, the water well, all the electronics we never shut down, and on and on. Then the weather station and the solar monitoring system.

We heat with wood from one stove in the winter. We have no AC but we open the windows at night and close them in the morning. A few times per year it has gotten to upper 80's in the house but if you think its hot go out in the shade for a few minutes then come back inside and you think you walked into a cooler.

This is how we live. Year after year after year...

But it's not all glory. This year the ground squirrels moved in.... Not chipmunks, gray diggers. The dogs have killed a bunch but they are destroying the garden. No boring day here.

 

[MAX-24-Dean]

But it's not all glory. This year the ground squirrels moved in.... Not chipmunks, gray diggers. The dogs have killed a bunch but they are destroying the garden. No boring day here.

We were having the same problem with gray diggers this year as well as voles putting a damper on the garden. Took four weeks to get them under control before the garden destruction ended.
Didn't know gray diggers were a problem for others this year.
Had to run the generator on the 4th of July this year as I could measure my solar harvest by how fast the rain guage was filling, it rained all day.
Put 5.5kw in the batteries.
First generator run in a year.