Why is your fuel in drums? No wonder you find it tedious to refill your
generators tank. You can use the generators tank as a "day tank" and
install a five hundred fifty gallon underground tank for the extended
supply. That is not as expensive as you might have thought. The tanks
are available pre-encased in concrete to just drop into a hole in the
earth. Pre-encasement avoids the need for lined excavations and
monitoring wells up to a certain size which I believe is over a thousand
gallons. If you are going to keep your fuel in drums please take pity
on the firefighters who may someday respond to your home. Buy and
install drum vents; they screw into the large threaded bung; and vent
the overpressure if the drum is ever exposed to a burning fuel spill or
other fire. Also mark the building that you are storing them in with the
standard fixed location marking system from National Fire Protection
Association standard 704M. This gives the responding firefighters
warning of the presence of the large quantity of combustible liquid
before a boiling liquid expanding vapor explosion can take out the
entire response team. In suburban and rural areas those folks are often
just your neighbors who give their time to train and respond to your
emergencies. The least you can do is not maintain hidden death traps.
--
Tom Horne

Well we aren't no thin blue heroes and yet we aren't no blackguards to.
We're just working men and woman most remarkable like you.

Neon John wrote:
On Sun, 25 Feb 2007 20:44:10 +0000 (UTC), Jonathan Grobe
wrote:

We just had a ice storm and I had no electricity for 22 hours. I
was mostly unprepared and didn't like the experience at all.

What are you doing to prepare for this?

Thanks.

Generator and 2 week's worth of fuel in drums. Probably another week's
worth in the diesel truck. Plenty of firewood for the fireplace
stove. I always have enough food on hand to eat for a month so that's
not an issue. The generator runs the well pump so no issue with
water.

If all else fails there is my motorhome sitting in the driveway,
always fueled and watered and ready to go. I can "dry camp" for a
couple of weeks with the on-board stores if I'm careful.

I rather enjoy power outages of up to perhaps a week. Then feedin'
the generator gets a bit tedious. I don't believe in curtailing my
lifestyle during an outage so I have a 10kw homemade diesel generator
and an 8kw commercially made gas unit as backup. Never had to use the
backup except during tests.

John
---
John De Armond
See my website for my current email address
http://www.neon-john.com
Cleveland, Occupied TN
Don't let your schooling interfere with your education-Mark Twain