Generac generators for the home?

[CorbLand]

Interesting. Its not common here, although it could happen. I have always wondered why people will put in large generators to run an entire house. Makes sense.

The only people that I know that have large generators are either wealthy (can pay to not be inconvenienced by an outage) or farmers that use them to run cellars.

 

[SuperDUECE22]

I'd recommend Briggs & Stratton over Generac for standby generator for your entire house. Size accordingly so all you have to install is the transfer switch out at power pole. If you size your generator so it can run your entire house it is a very easy installation but if you size it a little smaller, you'll have to install the load shedding modules in your home which will be more complicated and would probably need an electrician.
Briggs has the best warranty at full 6 year for parts & labor and their commercial grade vanguard engines will last you a lifetime in your generator unless your power grid is very unreliable. We have installed a pile of these units (100+) in the last 5-6 years, and they have been great, unfortunately can't say the same for the generacs on our system.

 

[TripleJ]

I don't have the knowledge to do it myself, but we just paid to have a propane tank and 24k generac installed and it's saving our bacon right now. I did all the trenching to save some money, but that was the extent of what I could do. Last Saturday, about 1 week after the install was finished, we had a massive freezing rain storm come through the county, and we have been on generator power since 11AM Saturday morning. We are looking at around another week before we get power back. It's super convenient to not have to keep refilling the little portable generator with gas like I have the last few years. We live out of town, and we lose power on a fairly regular basis, so it made sense to get the whole system set up. I can be out of town and not have to worry if the power goes out, everything will automatically kick on and we will be good. We have lost several freezers full of food over the years, I don't want to have to go through that again.

 

[SuperDUECE22]

Do folks ever install a horn or something for when the regular power comes back?

For the standby systems that the OP is talking about, once your utility has come back on for 30 seconds or 1 minutes depending how it's programmed the transfer switch will switch back to utility power automatically and then your generator will continue to run for cool down period of a few minutes before it shuts down by itself.

If you're just running a portable generator on a manual transfer switch you can either just keep an eye on your meter display, or if it's dark out and if you have a rented yard light from your utility, they are usually wired on the utility side so if they are on you have utility power.

 

[SuperDUECE22]

For other guys that don't want to spend the money on fully automatic standby generator system you could look into the generlink system but just make sure your utility will allow it before purchasing.

Transfer Switch | Global Power Products

 

[mntnguide]

For the standby systems that the OP is talking about, once your utility has come back on for 30 seconds or 1 minutes depending how it's programmed the transfer switch will switch back to utility power automatically and then your generator will continue to run for cool down period of a few minutes before it shuts down by itself.

If you're just running a portable generator on a manual transfer switch you can either just keep an eye on your meter display, or if it's dark out and if you have a rented yard light from your utility, they are usually wired on the utility side so if they are on you have utility power.

Meter displays aren't reliable. Lots of older styles get burned out. So don't base power on/off just cause you can't see numbers on a digital display. I responded to plenty of power out calls cause someone looked at their meter and said power was off, but in reality power was on and they had an issue on their homeowner side.

Also per the subject at hand, coming from a lineman, please have a generator installed professionally or inspected by professionals. An incorrect installation in the transfer switch can be life or death for a lineman during a storm outage. Backfeed is one of the most dangerous things there is during outages, the 120/240 volts your generator produces will turn back into 7200 volts or more depending on your utility and what the line voltage is, if that generator backfeeds to a transformer accidently

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[displacedtexan]

Interesting. Its not common here, although it could happen. I have always wondered why people will put in large generators to run an entire house. Makes sense.

The only people that I know that have large generators are either wealthy (can pay to not be inconvenienced by an outage) or farmers that use them to run cellars.

And as a part 2 of why I (and many more average income people in my area) have generators for power outages...

The storms tend to come when its hot or cold.

So lack of power is more of a problem.

 

[SWOHTR]

I see a lot of these that are either propane or hooked into natural gas. My question is, why would they not be diesel on their own tank? Maintenance requirements? Are these even an option or available? I would think it would be better than hard plumbed into a utility, especially for those in more rural areas.

 

[SWOHTR]

Also per the subject at hand, coming from a lineman, please have a generator installed professionally or inspected by professionals. An incorrect installation in the transfer switch can be life or death for a lineman during a storm outage. Backfeed is one of the most dangerous things there is during outages, the 120/240 volts your generator produces will turn back into 7200 volts or more depending on your utility and what the line voltage is, if that generator backfeeds to a transformer accidently

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Are voltage verifications not standard practice?

 

[*zap*]

most people have natural gas already so it is easier to plumb the genny for natural gas...and people think nothing bad will ever happen to the natural gas supply...since it is underground.

 

[mntnguide]

Are voltage verifications not standard practice?

Not sure what you mean.. im not an electrician, so i have no clue what goes into installing a generator and the process.

All I'm saying is, many lineman have died due to people turning a generator on during outages and not having it properly installed

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[SWOHTR]

Not sure what you mean.. im not an electrician, so i have no clue what goes into installing a generator and the process

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Ah, I took your comment of "coming from a lineman" to mean you were a lineman. Sorry! The comment simply means that, upon power disconnect, the servicing individual then tests to ensure there is no power going to the equipment.

 

[SuperDUECE22]

Meter displays aren't reliable. Lots of older styles get burned out. So don't base power on/off just cause you can't see numbers on a digital display. I responded to plenty of power out calls cause someone looked at their meter and said power was off, but in reality power was on and they had an issue on their homeowner side.

Weird, you guys must have a trash meter system, we have around 10,000 meters on our system and in my career we have changed from and old PLC meter system to a new RF mesh IP and between both systems we had next to zero issues with meter display failure outside of a few lightning strikes. When one of our member calls into our call center with a possible outage the first question the member is asked to do is check meter display & breakers to verify outage, because if that display is blank 99% of time we are experiencing an outage.

Also agree that back feeding a transformer can be dangerous for us. Our member service department does good job of educating our members on the dangers of back feeding a line with a generator during storms. But there will be always hazards on the job and that's why we have rubber gloves, tic tracers & grounds.

 

[displacedtexan]

Not sure what you mean.. im not an electrician, so i have no clue what goes into installing a generator and the process.

All I'm saying is, many lineman have died due to people turning a generator on during outages and not having it properly installed

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It's an operator issue, not an installation issue.

People who understand what they're doing have used deadman cords to backfeed for years without issue.

There's also people who could screw up using a properly installed interlock.

 

[Mighty Mouse]

I see a lot of these that are either propane or hooked into natural gas. My question is, why would they not be diesel on their own tank? Maintenance requirements? Are these even an option or available? I would think it would be better than hard plumbed into a utility, especially for those in more rural areas.

Diesel can gel up and make it difficult-to-impossible to start the generator in cold weather. Propane and natural gas don’t have that problem. Also, if you're connected to a NG pipeline, your fuel supply is essentially endless (barring any catastrophes upstream). Keeping enough propane/diesel/gasoline onhand to run a generator for an extended time can be a challenge.

 

[Moultrie]

My dad owns a small HVAC company. He gifted me a portable Champion tri fuel 10,000W generator and installed the exterior plug and interlock kit. He also stubbed out a NG tap.

I'm not an electrician, but looking at the work, if you're electrically inclined, it probably wouldn't be too difficult.

We don't lose power here often, but it's nice to know that if we do, I'm covered.

 

[KurtR]

I see a lot of these that are either propane or hooked into natural gas. My question is, why would they not be diesel on their own tank? Maintenance requirements? Are these even an option or available? I would think it would be better than hard plumbed into a utility, especially for those in more rural areas.

We have a 500 gallon propane tank and diesel is an ass ache to deal with when its -20 out is why mine will be on propane

 

[SWOHTR]

Interesting. I'd assumed that's what anti-icing/gelling additives were for. Aircraft use them at altitudes. Anyways, thanks for the info.

 

[Mighty Mouse]

Are voltage verifications not standard practice?

@mntnguide was just pointing out that a generator putting out "only" 120/240V (which is itself plenty dangerous) will produce a much higher and more dangerous voltage in the incoming power line if the generator is not isolated from grid power. A properly installed transfer switch prevents this from happening, but when the power goes out, homeowners have been known to hastily connect their generators in unsafe ways (i.e., without using a transfer switch). If they do so and forget to flip the main disconnect at their meter and/or breaker panel, power from the generator will energize the incoming power line as well as the house. On the upstream side of the service transformer, voltage of the power from the generator will get stepped up (probably to 7200V) and will energize a line that should/would otherwise be dead, which is a very dangerous situation for the linemen working to restore grid power.

Edit: Sorry, I re-read your post and I think you already understand this. I'm going to leave my post intact anyway as a caveat for anyone else reading this thread.

 

[mntnguide]

Weird, you guys must have a trash meter system, we have around 10,000 meters on our system and in my career we have changed from and old PLC meter system to a new RF mesh IP and between both systems we had next to zero issues with meter display failure outside of a few lightning strikes. When one of our member calls into our call center with a possible outage the first question the member is asked to do is check meter display & breakers to verify outage, because if that display is blank 99% of time we are experiencing an outage.

Also agree that back feeding a transformer can be dangerous for us. Our member service department does good job of educating our members on the dangers of back feeding a line with a generator during storms. But there will be always hazards on the job and that's why we have rubber gloves, tic tracers & grounds.

The rural co-op i worked for had about 30,000 meters i believe. And though the meter department was constantly replacing them with newer Twacs models that can be controlled remotely, there was still plenty of older digital ones in the system, which seeing a burned out display was not out of the ordinary.

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