On Jul 13, 10:35*pm, Pavel314 wrote:
On Jul 13, 9:34*pm, "Bob F" wrote:



D.A. Tsenuf wrote:
Our cabin recently was subjected to multiple days of no electricity
during to a bad storm taking out trees and power lines
I would like to set up a generator to run the following
1) * *well water pump 3/4 hp (120v)
2) * *refrigerator (120v)
3) * *freezer (120v)
4) * *hot water heater (240v)
5) * *stove (240v)

I would like to set it up so that is one appliance is drawing power,
everything else waits.
It would also be nice to set up the chain in the order listed above

It should also be noted that:
a) the stove is optional since there is a great fire pit where food
can be cooked and hot water heated in large enough quantities for
hand and dishwashing and sponge baths.
b) * *the hot water heater is big enough to hold enough water from one
heating cycle for all daily hand and dishwashing needs + couple of
showers. Which means that unless there are more than 2 people using
the cabin, it would only need to run once - possibly in the morning
to start the day c) * *the freezer only needs to run once every 2 days
d) * *the refrigerator only needs to run once a day if access is
controlled, otherwise twice a day will keep it cold enough
e) * *the well water pump only needs to run if water pressure has
dropped low enough to trigger it.

I already have an electric start generator to run everything at the
same time.
But I would prefer not to load it to the gills at the same time,

So I'm looking at
1) * *a box that will make sure that when the generator is going, it
will sequentially feed the 5 devices and then shut off by itself when
there is no demand...
2) * *If the generator is going, then IF a higher priority device
wants power it can bump of a lower priority one. After which the
bumped device gets serviced.

Any help and suggestions are appreciated

I'd be really tempted to somehow add an exhaust heat to water heat exchanger for
the water heater. That, and a small pump would provide lots of hot water for
almost no load on the generator. If the generator is water cooled, you could get
even more.- Hide quoted text -

- Show quoted text -

Some years back we were having a problem with oil flow when both the
oil-fired water heater and oil-fired boiler were on at the same time.
We put a relay on the water heater circuit so that if the furnace was
on, the water heater would not run. I suppose that with five
appliances you could hook up a series of five relays in a way to give
a sequence of priorities. There's probably a micro-chip device that
can be programmed to do the same thing, although I've never heard of
one.

Paul

Microprocessor controllers are available for everything from elevators
to traffic signals to industrial washing machines...

Rigging one up to do what the OP wants would cost a lot of money,
require that every load is controlled via a relay panel and would have
to have sensors which could interface the generator to the controller
so it can know when to shed load to wind down when it is about to
fail...

As another reply said here, this is orders of magnitude more complex
than a few relays being interlocked via auxiliary control contacts...

~~ Evan