Generators, hot topic now. Here any way.

[propane1]

Thinking about buying a generator. What are your views, ideas, what’s needed, how do you sorta figure out what is needed and do you buy a gasoline powered one. Or a gasoline and propane fuel one.

What do you fellas have ?

Noel

[DavidBarkey]

I personly have a 5900 (max) 5500 continual use . in our garage with the exhaust piped outside . I set it up with 12v electric start so anyone can start it . It is plugged into a pony panel in the garage that is wired into the basement where I can plug in the essentials . It is gas only and will go through about 30 litres in 12hrs. so can get expensive to run.
Essentials = 2 fridges , 2 freezers , well pump , Natural gas furnace , and the hall lights,receptacle,and smoke/CO detectors for the whole house line .

At some point I want to change to a Natuaral gas generator as we are on a main so supply is NOT an issue . I did a little write up before about the exhaust .

[Spike188]

I was given a Coleman 5000 watt generator with a 10 hp briggs and a thrown rod. On the plus side it has 2 120 volt 15 amp outlets and 1 220 volt 20 amp outlet. In the last month the same model has been listed on Kijiji for a low $50.00 to as high as asking $275 and average is $150. I am tempted to jb weld the block and throw a new rod into it just because I hate to throw it away. But that is another project.

In the meantime I am thinking a 3 phase unit that will do a minim of 30 or 50 amps is what would suite our needs best. 3 phase equipment is cheap, welders, laths and mills. With a large enough generator, heat recover for the winter shop would be an added bonus. With a larger unit and proper switch gear we could feed the complete house when power is off. My guess is fuel consumption for a larger unit would not be much more than that of a briggs. Even a Welder/Genset on a trailer may be the best option.

[thebuildist]

I have a cheap 3800 continuous gasoline model that I can run a few lights and the fridge and the furnace. (Not cooling, just natural gas heater.)

I have a dual fuel(propane) carb I could put on it, but with propane the rating drops by around I think 15%. So it gives me an option if fuel is scarce, but slightly less useful output.

Around here cooling is as important as heat. So I've tried to figure out what I would need to support that. 14000 watts of 240V would do it for sure. 12000 maybe.

There's a 12000 on sale at Amazon right now for $627.

Tempting.

Bob

[MattA]

I have a Westinghouse igen4500 inverter generator. Very quiet and fuel efficient. An inverter generator is basically an alternator that feeds into an inverter. The engine speed is varied depending on the load. My generator is 120V only but larger inverter generators on the market can now do 120V and 240V. Run time on my generator is around 18 hours at 1/4 load on about 3 gallons of gas. Check the specs on the website and in the manual. Also youtube has a lot of great reviews. Throttling the engine back at low loads can be turned off if you need to start a high in rush load. You can also parallel the generator with another compatible inverter generator. Also has remote start. Ask whatever questions you want about it.

[Jancoe]

I have a generac 4000xl. It's rated 22 amps at 240v. It is currently on as I type this. Power went out at 3:30. I run 2 fridges, chest freezer, well pump, lights, TV etc... I replaced the carb this spring and it's been running much better. We seem to lose power more often at this place than any other house I've had. Been here 3 years and it's been out several times every year. I bought this generator 18 years? ago. As for new ones today it seems most are now built as an inverter generator. Most inverter generators have a little bit smaller engine and they also have more efficient cleaner power. Better on fuel. We sell portable gensets. Champions are cheap and if taken care of you get your money's worth. Honda's are great but expensive. Westinghouse are good too. Like any generator the more you use it, the more likely it will last. Gensets that sit are always problematic. One more thing total harmonic distortion, or THD on a generator determines the potential for problems with high-end electronics or sensitive items. The higher the THD, the higher the potential for damage. Keep it under 5%. This would be a way to rate the genset power quality between them all. Utility power and generator power are not the same.

Sent from my SM-S906U using Tapatalk

[propane1]

I personly have a 5900 (max) 5500 continual use . in our garage with the exhaust piped outside . I set it up with 12v electric start so anyone can start it . It is plugged into a pony panel in the garage that is wired into the basement where I can plug in the essentials . It is gas only and will go through about 30 litres in 12hrs. so can get expensive to run.
Essentials = 2 fridges , 2 freezers , well pump , Natural gas furnace , and the hall lights,receptacle,and smoke/CO detectors for the whole house line .

At some point I want to change to a Natuaral gas generator as we are on a main so supply is NOT an issue . I did a little write up before about the exhaust .

Where would I find your exhaust write up Dave.


Noel

[propane1]

I have a cheap 3800 continuous gasoline model that I can run a few lights and the fridge and the furnace. (Not cooling, just natural gas heater.)

I have a dual fuel(propane) carb I could put on it, but with propane the rating drops by around I think 15%. So it gives me an option if fuel is scarce, but slightly less useful output.

Around here cooling is as important as heat. So I've tried to figure out what I would need to support that. 14000 watts of 240V would do it for sure. 12000 maybe.

There's a 12000 on sale at Amazon right now for $627.

Tempting.

Bob

Here in my area, price of gasoline is quite a bit higher than propane, at the moment.


Noel

[Timj]

My take on the subject is to figure out what you need and want to run. How many amps do you need to meet this demand. The more amps you want to run the bigger the generator you need. The bigger the generator the more fuel used.

I have three generators for my business, one is a 11,000w 18 HP Briggs, a Miller Bobcat with a 16hp Onan 8000w, and a Bobcat with 23hp Koehler 10,000w. They are all very thirsty, but I have run our central air with the 11000w. 6 gallons in 4 hours.

A few years ago we picked up a new in the box Predator 6700w with a 13hp at an estate sale. Used it the first time this June. Ran 20hrs on 7.5 gallons.

I personally like keeping fuel consumption low, versus powering everything. When you are in for a long outage you can burn a lot of gas. If we had outages more often I would be looking at a stand by hooked to the natural gas. I also like the inverter generators that only run enough rpms to meet demand. There is a lot of time you are not using many amps but you generator still has to run full speed.

[propane1]

This is the one I’ve been sorta looking at.

Noel