On Fri, 3 Aug 2012 07:39:22 -0400, "Jim Wilkins" wrote:

"Atila Iskander" wrote in message
...

After both did their spiels about all the features of their
respective product, the H-y salesman took his calculator and threw
it as hard as he could at the ceiling a good 20+ feet up

Too bad Honda generators break and are VERY expensive to fix. I went
instead with a couple of very cheap second hand Colemans I can
maintain with a chainsaw tool, and a noise-reducing folding weather
enclosure made from fireproof ceiling tiles, which quiets them enough
that they can't be heard from a moving car in the street. We lose
power for a week or more after bad ice storms and a 2KW Honda won't
start my washing machine; the Coleman 3750 can barely supply the
starting current.

The smaller Coleman is light enough to carry through deep snow without
shoveling a path, or lift into the back of the car. Those can be
important.

If this happened with any regularity (read: twice), I'd have a permanent
installation by the time the power came back on. Sometimes, 0ur power goes
out daily but it's usually just long enough to screw up all the clocks and set
the 'fridge alarm off. It's rarely more than an hour (even after a storm has
taken lines down) and never a week after an ice storm. ;-)