On Sat, 25 May 2019 10:42:46 -0400, Ed Pawlowski wrote:

On 5/25/2019 6:38 AM, Marius Josipovic wrote:
On 5/24/19 7:09 PM, Ed Pawlowski wrote:
I'm considering buying a generator.Â* Just a portable that would keep
the refrigerator going, maybe the TV or internet.Â* Nothing of higher
power demand and only for a few hours a day if power goes out after a
hurricane.Â* AFAIK, this is not a really bad area for that and out
lines are underground so that help.Â* But stuff happens. I'm in Florida
now and they do get hurricanes.

The inverters run a couple of hundred more from what I've seen. I'd
like to keep it down to less than $1k.Â* I'm thinking 2,000 to 3000
watts should handle my needs.


Refrigerator

Kitchen range

Washer

Dryer

Dishwasher

Water heater

Modem/Router/Computer/TV/Cable box

Cellphone charging station

Lighting


Hot water is gas. Cooking is gas but would lose the oven. Can easily
go two weeks with laundry. Biggest single load is the refrigerator,
maybe a room AC to sleep.

I think you could run the washer on that 2kw but you would be using a
clothes line to dry them. We did that for towels.
Since the pool was blue, we stayed there a lot

In article ,
danny burstein wrote:

In Fred McKenzie
writes:

I keep ten gallons of aviation fuel on hand. It seems to hold up quite
well. After using the generator, I turn off the fuel valve and run it
dry.

Don't know if this is your Master Plan For World Domination,
but there are versions of avgas still readily available
that contain... yes... lead in them.

Not like the good old days when Superman could use a bucket of
it to shield the kryptonite, but yeah...

You caught me!

At first I did not know about the lead. I was only interested in having
gasoline that would hold up over time.

Now I find there are other blends that do not have the lead, primarily
used in marine applications. But if I get the marine gas, how well does
it hold up over time? The hurricane only drops by every two or three
years.

Fred

On Sat, 25 May 2019 08:49:45 -0700 (PDT), trader_4
wrote:

On Saturday, May 25, 2019 at 11:29:24 AM UTC-4, Ralph Mowery wrote:
In article , says...

I'm going to use cords for now. I don't know how often the power may go
out but if only a day or two a year, no big deal. If for a week at a
time, you can be sure I'll do more.

I was never able to justify a generator for 53 years but here, I may.



Just a word of caution, make sure the exhaust of the generator can not
get back in the house where you run the cord. My generator goes to a
dedicated socket on the outside of the house so all windows and doors
are closed.

That's another advantage to the panel/inlet approach. Just one cord
and it can go to an inlet that's outside.


Mine is on the far side of the garage. Just don't skimp on the wire.
Those generators may only put out 115v and by the time that gets to
the kitchen fridge (well over 100' away the way the wire runs) that
ends up being more like 108-9. That fridge seems not to run that well.
I rigged up a variac for that for next time.
I can dial the voltage up to 120
http://gfretwell.com/electrical/Henc%20Variac.jpg

On 5/25/2019 12:02 PM, wrote:

I lived without one for 33 years and Irma was really the only time I
needed it. After Charley the lights were back in a day. We went to bed
in the dark and the power coming on woke us up. The only reason I
bought one was someone made me a deal I couldn't refuse ($300 for one
new in a 10 year old box). He bought it after Charley (2004) and sold
it to me in 2014, never having even started it. He had oil in it and
pulled it over every year or two but did not put gas in it. .


That's why I don't want to invest in a big whole house unit for $5k to
$10k installed. Would be cheaper to fly north of a week until the power
comes on.

On Saturday, May 25, 2019 at 1:02:41 PM UTC-4, Ed Pawlowski wrote:
On 5/25/2019 12:02 PM, wrote:

I lived without one for 33 years and Irma was really the only time I
needed it. After Charley the lights were back in a day. We went to bed
in the dark and the power coming on woke us up. The only reason I
bought one was someone made me a deal I couldn't refuse ($300 for one
new in a 10 year old box). He bought it after Charley (2004) and sold
it to me in 2014, never having even started it. He had oil in it and
pulled it over every year or two but did not put gas in it. .


That's why I don't want to invest in a big whole house unit for $5k to
$10k installed. Would be cheaper to fly north of a week until the power
comes on.

I got one of those for free, a Generac. A neighbor had one that was maybe
five or seven years old, it crapped out, the company said it wasn't worth
fixing. It was in good shape, the engine started up, it ran for about
30 secs, then shut down. Knowing just that, I figured maybe it was
something fixable, so I picked it up. Quickly found out that after it
started, it wasn't producing any voltage. Got the service manual and
as best I could tell without special eqpt, it was likely the rotor that
was shot. I think a new one was $350. But I wasn't sure that was all
that was wrong with it either. And then I looked at reviews on Amazon,
and OMG, what a disaster! Review after review of people having everything
from brand new ones leaking oil, to similar failures to this after just
a few years. So, I gave up fixing it and parted it out on Ebay.

That was interesting. Most of the modules went quickly. Oddly, first
thing I sold was the cabinet. Then some nut
in IL wanted all kinds of weird stuff, like the front panel, the wiring
harnesses. Turns out he paid $800 for basically an engine and the
generator section, nothing else! Bought it on CL. Unbelievable.
I mean if that's all you have, how are you ever going to find all
the other parts and what will all that cost? He bought a couple hundred
just from me. I'd lay bets it all went into the crapper or he had to
sell it on Ebay.

The engine took awhile. I was asking $350. I had it listed for local
pickup only, so that makes it much harder. Some guy in Puerto Rico
emails me and wants to know if I will sell it to him if he has a
company pick it up and ship it. I said, sure, but unless you have
some special way, that's going to be expensive. He buys it, it takes
a couple weeks, I have to prod him along, but finally the shipping
company calls me up. They want to know if I have a loading dock and
confirm that it's ready to go on a pallet! ROFL. Took another week,
they set up a time to pick it up, no show. Second time, they show
up and take it. I asked the guy in PR how much it cost to ship,
he said they initially told him $300, it wound up being $800!
Also, hard to imagine that a generator company in PR that sells Generac
would not have a used engine there, from some other crap one where
the gen section failed, instead of getting it from me.


ROFL

I told him he should have just told me that, I would have agreed to
cancel the transaction. But he says he's a man of his word, so he
went through with it. This was before their big hurrican, I hope he
had it working and it served him for that. If it ran giving him power
for several months, it would make it worth it. But with all those
terrible reports about Generac on Amazon, I wouldn't put any faith
in their products. In the end, I think I probably made $700 bucks
off that free generator.

On 5/24/19 7:09 PM, Frank wrote:

[snip]

It is a pain to store gas but if I had natural gas service I would run
the generator on that.

If it runs on natural gas, it should run on propane as well. You can
store that much longer than you can gasoline.

[snip]

--
Mark Lloyd
http://notstupid.us/

"I put out these milk and cookies as a sacrifice. If Thou wishest me to
eat them, please give me a sign by doing absolutely nothing.
MMMMmmmm..." [Homer Simpson]

[snip]

For the OP. the advantage of the inverter is if you really do have a
modest load, the generator can throttle down to handle the actual load
and not have to turn 3600 RPM no matter what the load is.
With light loads, gasoline lasts a lot longer.
I was burning 0.5 GPH gasoline and 0.8 GPH on Propane. with my old
school generator.
Inverter guys were bragging about a couple gallons a day with their
2kw Honda..

It's also a lot quieter at low speed. I knew someone who bought a Honda
(EU2000i IIRC), usually just to run a couple of fans. It was hard to
hear it running 40 feet away.

--
Mark Lloyd
http://notstupid.us/

"I put out these milk and cookies as a sacrifice. If Thou wishest me to
eat them, please give me a sign by doing absolutely nothing.
MMMMmmmm..." [Homer Simpson]

On 5/24/19 8:15 PM, Ed Pawlowski wrote:

[snip]

I do have natural gas but I've not seen any small generators that use
it.Â* Well, one, but it had terrible reviews.Â* I have a gas line on the
lanai for the grill so it would be easy to use a connector for a generator.

I've seen a few. IIRC, most can be converted for natural gas or propane.
However, I don't know about installing this on a inverter generator. A
small generator (3kw?) can use a 20 pound propane tank. Larger ones can
take 2 or more tanks (or a larger tank).

I'd keep minimal gas on hand for the occasional outage but for a big
storm, there is enough notice to stock up.

--
Mark Lloyd
http://notstupid.us/

"I put out these milk and cookies as a sacrifice. If Thou wishest me to
eat them, please give me a sign by doing absolutely nothing.
MMMMmmmm..." [Homer Simpson]

On 5/24/19 10:06 PM, Ralph Mowery wrote:

[snip]

It is best to rotate the gas out.

I keep gas for no more than a year, then use it in my car (mixed with
fresh gas).

I quit using the gas that has ethanol
in it. That sutff is death on small engines if left in the tank very
long.

Also, I've been stopping the generator by shutting off the fuel (with no
electrical load) so it stops within 2 minutes when it uses up the fuel
in the carb.

Using the ethanol free stuff and I do add the Stabil to it, I
have keptit for about 4 to 5 months in sealed gas cans over the winter.
No problems. My mowing season stops from about the last of Novermber to
around March.

Here, no mowing from around Thanksgiving until April (March is a time to
let the wildflowers bloom).

The ethanol free wwith the stabil in it is fine. If it
was the ethanol stuff I would have to clean out the carborator. Have
had to do that several times for being lazy.

As I mow for about half the year, I have 3 of the 5 gallon cans and a 2
gallon can. When I get two of the 5 gallon cans empty, I fill them. It
usually takes me about 1 1/2 gallons per week to mow the yard.
Over the winter I do try to have at least 2 full cans. We usually just
have mild winters, but some have been without power for a week or more.
That seldom hapens. I have only been out for about 2 days one time and
a day the other. I have been without for 3 or 4 hours a few times.

About like that here, although there have been a couple of 5-day
outages. Usually they're in good weather (no air conditioning needed).
Once it did get how, but a small window AC was enough and the small
generator was enough.

--
Mark Lloyd
http://notstupid.us/

"I put out these milk and cookies as a sacrifice. If Thou wishest me to
eat them, please give me a sign by doing absolutely nothing.
MMMMmmmm..." [Homer Simpson]

On 5/24/19 10:11 PM, Ralph Mowery wrote:

[snip]

The main thing is how much gas do you want to use and store. The
inverters usually use less , especially if not loaded too much.

I think Honda makes an inverter generator that is about 2 kw for right
at $ 1000.

Yes, that's what my friend paid. It was very quiet. I've seen other 2 kw
inverters for half the price, although I don't know how good they are.

--
Mark Lloyd
http://notstupid.us/

"I put out these milk and cookies as a sacrifice. If Thou wishest me to
eat them, please give me a sign by doing absolutely nothing.
MMMMmmmm..." [Homer Simpson]

[snip]


I have to do some more checking, but mostly the fridge is the big value
thing to keep going.Â* Gas range and grill takes care of cooking, city
water.

I used a meter, and my fridge (new in 2008) was using just about 1A when
the compressor was running. It could be more with the external heater
turned on.

--
Mark Lloyd
http://notstupid.us/

"I put out these milk and cookies as a sacrifice. If Thou wishest me to
eat them, please give me a sign by doing absolutely nothing.
MMMMmmmm..." [Homer Simpson]

On 5/25/19 12:29 AM, wrote:

[snip]

A natural gas house should run fine on a little 2kw inverter. Look at
any 240v (2 pole) breakers in the panel because those pieces of
equipment are not going to work. The other issue is trying to put
transfer equipment on your panel will be tough too since you will only
be able to feed one phase. You also would have to be sure all 240v
breakers were tripped.

If you did feed the output of a single-phase generator to both hot wires
in the house, this might cause problems with 240V equipment that uses
the neutral, but would it cause any other problems?

[snip]

--
Mark Lloyd
http://notstupid.us/

"I put out these milk and cookies as a sacrifice. If Thou wishest me to
eat them, please give me a sign by doing absolutely nothing.
MMMMmmmm..." [Homer Simpson]

On 5/25/19 6:24 AM, Frank wrote:

[snip]

Someone told me that if you want to save money you go to the store after
a big storm and get a returned generator.

Here, 2000 would have been a good year to buy a generator. There were a
lot of never-used "used" ones around after Y2K.

--
Mark Lloyd
http://notstupid.us/

"I put out these milk and cookies as a sacrifice. If Thou wishest me to
eat them, please give me a sign by doing absolutely nothing.
MMMMmmmm..." [Homer Simpson]

Ed-

The Honda EU2000i would seem to be the ideal generator for you. The
only drawback would be its small gas tank.
Other inverter generators in its class are less efficient because they
may not throttle-down when lightly loaded. And they are loud compared
to the Honda. (Apparently some use a different method of measuring
their sound level.)
I have the Honda EU6500i. It probably uses more gas than the EU2000i,
but has more power and a larger gas tank. With my light load, it will
run at least 16 hours.
Fred



I just phoned my local Honda dealer south Ontario Canada
to check out the EU6500i - he says it's now replaced with
7000 i es @ $ 4900. $ 3650. US dollars

https://powerequipment.honda.ca/gene...quiet-7000i-es

... someday ...
John T.

[snip]

If you have a "smart meter" you can just look at that. If it has a
display, the power is back.

My meter isn't a "smart meter" but it does have a LCD that can be used
that way. I suppose some people don't want to keep going outside to look.

Here, a neighbor across the street has a green porch light he keeps on
all the time.

--
Mark Lloyd
http://notstupid.us/

"I put out these milk and cookies as a sacrifice. If Thou wishest me to
eat them, please give me a sign by doing absolutely nothing.
MMMMmmmm..." [Homer Simpson]

On 5/25/19 8:19 AM, trader_4 wrote:

[snip]

Ed could get a window unit for $125 to have on hand if needed to cool
a room or two in an emergency. If you had a hurricane and power is out
for a week, that would sure make a huge difference in comfort,
especially sleeping at night.

I have one for that purpose. It won't cool a whole house, but one room
is better than nothing. Another thing it could be good to have is a
small propane stove (the king used for camping).

--
Mark Lloyd
http://notstupid.us/

"I put out these milk and cookies as a sacrifice. If Thou wishest me to
eat them, please give me a sign by doing absolutely nothing.
MMMMmmmm..." [Homer Simpson]

On 5/25/19 9:06 AM, trader_4 wrote:

[snip]

You can go a lot longer than that, unless you need to use something that
runs on electric. A fridge that's not being opened can easily go for
6, 12 hours or more.

That's what I did during outages, no need to run the generator all night
(although the noise was acceptable then, since many did). About the only
thing I had to give up was drinking cold water during the night, but
that wasn't a serious loss.

Anything I needed at night (flashlight, fan on hot nights, and cell
phone charging) could be handled by batteries, recharged the next day.

[snip]

--
Mark Lloyd
http://notstupid.us/

"I put out these milk and cookies as a sacrifice. If Thou wishest me to
eat them, please give me a sign by doing absolutely nothing.
MMMMmmmm..." [Homer Simpson]

On 5/25/19 10:31 AM, wrote:

[snip]

More like $100. I got mine from US Carburetion and it was a tad over
$100. Installing it is easy. You remove the carb, swap out the studs
for longer ones, put the venturi plate in for the gas, replace the
carb and mount the regulator. I probably spent close top an hour doing
it but I could do another one in 15 minutes now that I understand what
needs to be done. The kits for the little inverters mount the
regulator remotely since there is no good place to put it on the
generator. There are actually 2 regulators, the demand regulator for
the engine itself and another one on the supply line to get the input
pressure right but you might not need that one on a natural gas setup.
I actually bought 2 of them for propane. One is on the big built in
tank line and I have another one so I can run off a 20# portable tank.
All in I was closer to $200 with all of the extra regulators and
hoses. It is handy to have the portable capability tho if I want to
use the generator away from the house and still not screw with
gasoline. Once you use propane, you will wonder why you ever messed
with gas. It starts easier and you do not need to worry about getting
every last drop of gas out of the system when you put it away.

They have something now that's called "motor snorkel". This thing is
much thinner making installation a lot easier. There's no stud extenders
since the "motor snorkel" is no thicker than the existing carb-air
cleaner gasket. The demand regulator is the same, so you still need to
find a place to mount it.

--
Mark Lloyd
http://notstupid.us/

"I put out these milk and cookies as a sacrifice. If Thou wishest me to
eat them, please give me a sign by doing absolutely nothing.
MMMMmmmm..." [Homer Simpson]

On 5/25/19 10:46 AM, Fred McKenzie wrote:

[snip]

The Honda EU2000i would seem to be the ideal generator for you. The
only drawback would be its small gas tank.

I remember something about a 5-gallon external tank for it. Since the
tank is external, you could fill it while the generator is running. It
connects to the generator through a replacement gas cap.

[snip]

--
Mark Lloyd
http://notstupid.us/

"I put out these milk and cookies as a sacrifice. If Thou wishest me to
eat them, please give me a sign by doing absolutely nothing.
MMMMmmmm..." [Homer Simpson]

On Saturday, May 25, 2019 at 3:10:38 PM UTC-4, wrote:

Ed-

The Honda EU2000i would seem to be the ideal generator for you. The
only drawback would be its small gas tank.
Other inverter generators in its class are less efficient because they
may not throttle-down when lightly loaded. And they are loud compared
to the Honda. (Apparently some use a different method of measuring
their sound level.)
I have the Honda EU6500i. It probably uses more gas than the EU2000i,
but has more power and a larger gas tank. With my light load, it will
run at least 16 hours.
Fred



I just phoned my local Honda dealer south Ontario Canada
to check out the EU6500i - he says it's now replaced with
7000 i es @ $ 4900. $ 3650. US dollars

https://powerequipment.honda.ca/gene...quiet-7000i-es

... someday ...
John T.

Or you can get a nat gas/gasoline fuel generator with a Honda engine
and similar output for $2300, but it's not inverter style:

https://www.electricgeneratorsdirect...tor/p1176.html

On 5/25/2019 3:19 PM, Mark Lloyd wrote:
On 5/25/19 8:19 AM, trader_4 wrote:

[snip]

Ed could get a window unit for $125 to have on hand if needed to cool
a room or two in an emergency.Â* If you had a hurricane and power is out
for a week, that would sure make a huge difference in comfort,
especially sleeping at night.

I have one for that purpose. It won't cool a whole house, but one room
is better than nothing. Another thing it could be good to have is a
small propane stove (the king used for camping).

One benefit here, I have a natural gas grill and even the coldest day of
the yer it may be 40 degrees so cooking is not a problem.

On 5/25/19 11:25 AM, wrote:

[snip]

Mine is on the far side of the garage. Just don't skimp on the wire.
Those generators may only put out 115v and by the time that gets to
the kitchen fridge (well over 100' away the way the wire runs) that
ends up being more like 108-9. That fridge seems not to run that well.
I rigged up a variac for that for next time.
I can dial the voltage up to 120
http://gfretwell.com/electrical/Henc%20Variac.jpg

I got 10 gauge wire for that long (100 foot) cord. Testing with 1500W
load at the end of that cord. Voltage at the generator is 122.1V.
Voltage at the end of the cord is 118.6V. Most of the time, the load
will be less.

--
Mark Lloyd
http://notstupid.us/

"I put out these milk and cookies as a sacrifice. If Thou wishest me to
eat them, please give me a sign by doing absolutely nothing.
MMMMmmmm..." [Homer Simpson]

On 5/25/19 12:02 PM, Ed Pawlowski wrote:

[snip]

That's why I don't want to invest in a big whole house unit for $5k to
$10k installed.Â* Would be cheaper to fly north of a week until the power
comes on.

It is too expensive to be worth it, but a whole house generator would be
nice to have.

--
Mark Lloyd
http://notstupid.us/

"I put out these milk and cookies as a sacrifice. If Thou wishest me to
eat them, please give me a sign by doing absolutely nothing.
MMMMmmmm..." [Homer Simpson]

In article , lid says...
he main thing is how much gas do you want to use and store. The
inverters usually use less , especially if not loaded too much.

I think Honda makes an inverter generator that is about 2 kw for right
at $ 1000.

Yes, that's what my friend paid. It was very quiet. I've seen other 2 kw
inverters for half the price, although I don't know how good they are.




Harbor Freight has a 3500 watt inverter generator on sale now for $ 700.
Says 11 hour run time. Wonder if that means it will be used up after 11
hours andyu have to get another one. They have a regular one on sale
for $ 350.

I bought one of the little 750 or so watt ones a while back. Have not
used it very much, mostly to run my electric chain pols saw away from
the house and an electric drill or impact in my out building. It is
very hard to start, but found that if I give it a shot of starting fluid
it will crank right up. Then need to let it run for a short time to
take the choke off. The voltage varies all over the place so would not
want to run anything I really cared about off of it that had any
electronics in it.

In article , lid says...

If you did feed the output of a single-phase generator to both hot wires
in the house, this might cause problems with 240V equipment that uses
the neutral, but would it cause any other problems?




If you cut off the 240 volt breakers and equipment I do not see any
problems.

On Sat, 25 May 2019 12:44:46 -0700 (PDT), trader_4
wrote:

On Saturday, May 25, 2019 at 3:10:38 PM UTC-4, wrote:

Ed-

The Honda EU2000i would seem to be the ideal generator for you. The
only drawback would be its small gas tank.
Other inverter generators in its class are less efficient because they
may not throttle-down when lightly loaded. And they are loud compared
to the Honda. (Apparently some use a different method of measuring
their sound level.)
I have the Honda EU6500i. It probably uses more gas than the EU2000i,
but has more power and a larger gas tank. With my light load, it will
run at least 16 hours.
Fred



I just phoned my local Honda dealer south Ontario Canada
to check out the EU6500i - he says it's now replaced with
7000 i es @ $ 4900. $ 3650. US dollars

https://powerequipment.honda.ca/gene...quiet-7000i-es

... someday ...
John T.

Or you can get a nat gas/gasoline fuel generator with a Honda engine
and similar output for $2300, but it's not inverter style:

https://www.electricgeneratorsdirect...tor/p1176.html



Same GX340 engine as my 20 year old EM5000
but mine is 4500 watts vs the Winco 5500 watts !
Winco has a much larger fuel tank.
... not sure what my noise level is - but probably ~
the same ~ 72 db.
The large Honda inverter unit is less than 60 db and I think
that this difference would be significant.
I always feel a little guilty about the noise - during a summer
outage, when neighbours have windows open.
As someone said - perhaps the inverter technology
wouldn't stand up for 20 years .. but .. then again ..
neither will I .. :-)
I use mine about 2 or 3 times a year for power outages.
If I haven't used it in ~ 4 months I test-run it , with a couple
little electric heaters plugged in. I do very little maintenance -
.. maybe 3 or 4 oil changes in 20 years ; 1 air filter.
I use regular gasoline always with stabilizer.
John T.

On Sat, 25 May 2019 16:38:00 -0400, Ralph Mowery
wrote:

In article , lid says...
he main thing is how much gas do you want to use and store. The
inverters usually use less , especially if not loaded too much.

I think Honda makes an inverter generator that is about 2 kw for right
at $ 1000.

Yes, that's what my friend paid. It was very quiet. I've seen other 2 kw
inverters for half the price, although I don't know how good they are.




Harbor Freight has a 3500 watt inverter generator on sale now for $ 700.
Says 11 hour run time. Wonder if that means it will be used up after 11
hours andyu have to get another one. They have a regular one on sale
for $ 350.

I bought one of the little 750 or so watt ones a while back. Have not
used it very much, mostly to run my electric chain pols saw away from
the house and an electric drill or impact in my out building. It is
very hard to start, but found that if I give it a shot of starting fluid
it will crank right up. Then need to let it run for a short time to
take the choke off. The voltage varies all over the place so would not
want to run anything I really cared about off of it that had any
electronics in it.


If it's used for an occasional not-too-critical use ..
ie trimming trees ; lights in a remote cabin.. etc.
... go for it ! Go cheap.
If it's used for survival items - medical machines ;
etc do not go cheap.
John T .

On Sat, 25 May 2019 12:10:43 -0400, Fred McKenzie
wrote:

In article ,
danny burstein wrote:

In Fred McKenzie
writes:

I keep ten gallons of aviation fuel on hand. It seems to hold up quite
well. After using the generator, I turn off the fuel valve and run it
dry.

Don't know if this is your Master Plan For World Domination,
but there are versions of avgas still readily available
that contain... yes... lead in them.

Not like the good old days when Superman could use a bucket of
it to shield the kryptonite, but yeah...

You caught me!

At first I did not know about the lead. I was only interested in having
gasoline that would hold up over time.

Now I find there are other blends that do not have the lead, primarily
used in marine applications. But if I get the marine gas, how well does
it hold up over time? The hurricane only drops by every two or three
years.

Fred

People wax lyrically about how great leaded regular was but it
varnished up pretty bad too if you stored it in a vented can,
You also were dealing with fouled plugs and the extra pollution the
lead brought you.
The main problem with E-10 is it absorbs water. If your can is full,
you store it in a cool dry place and the cap is snug (vented enough
not to build up a lot of pressure but not free breathing) that is not
really that big an issue but I still would not store gasoline more
than a few months if I could avoid it. Just dump your 2-3 month old
gas in your car/truck and buy fresh.
I have a boat so gas doesn't hang around here long enough to go bad.
Buying LL100 AvGas really does not make a lot of sense unless you are
driving a car so old that it doesn't have Stellite valves. Even then
you can buy valve lubricant to add to the gas that will work.
They have the exception about E-10 for aviation because of legacy
engines and the fact that icing up the fuel at 8000 feet is not the
same as if you are just sitting in your driveway.

On Sat, 25 May 2019 13:02:39 -0400, Ed Pawlowski wrote:

On 5/25/2019 12:02 PM, wrote:

I lived without one for 33 years and Irma was really the only time I
needed it. After Charley the lights were back in a day. We went to bed
in the dark and the power coming on woke us up. The only reason I
bought one was someone made me a deal I couldn't refuse ($300 for one
new in a 10 year old box). He bought it after Charley (2004) and sold
it to me in 2014, never having even started it. He had oil in it and
pulled it over every year or two but did not put gas in it. .


That's why I don't want to invest in a big whole house unit for $5k to
$10k installed. Would be cheaper to fly north of a week until the power
comes on.

I feel the same way about a bigger gen set. 5.5kw seems to be plenty
for that once every 30 year storm that knocks the power out more than
a few hours. The strange thing is my ex up in Maryland seems to have
more need than me, mostly because they have a lot more blackouts and
they are usually in the winter where survival starts looking more
important.

On Saturday, May 25, 2019 at 6:03:14 PM UTC-4, wrote:
On Sat, 25 May 2019 13:02:39 -0400, Ed Pawlowski wrote:

On 5/25/2019 12:02 PM, wrote:

I lived without one for 33 years and Irma was really the only time I
needed it. After Charley the lights were back in a day. We went to bed
in the dark and the power coming on woke us up. The only reason I
bought one was someone made me a deal I couldn't refuse ($300 for one
new in a 10 year old box). He bought it after Charley (2004) and sold
it to me in 2014, never having even started it. He had oil in it and
pulled it over every year or two but did not put gas in it. .


That's why I don't want to invest in a big whole house unit for $5k to
$10k installed. Would be cheaper to fly north of a week until the power
comes on.

I feel the same way about a bigger gen set. 5.5kw seems to be plenty
for that once every 30 year storm that knocks the power out more than
a few hours. The strange thing is my ex up in Maryland seems to have
more need than me, mostly because they have a lot more blackouts and
they are usually in the winter where survival starts looking more
important.

I think the neighbor that had his 12KW Generac go kaput is the kind of
guy that was sitting there with all the lights on, stove running, multiple TVs,
hot tub going, AC too. Maybe if he had a lesser load on it,
might have lasted longer. And around here, the power outage distribution
is something like 20 secs maybe few times a year, couple hours maybe
once a year. The exception of course being Sandy. And his Generac
didn't make it to Sandy. It probably got more hours with the weekly
exercise for 10 mins than it did from actual power outages.
He replaced it with an 18KW one. I agree with you, I think 5KW is
plenty for most people and depending on what you want to do, even
less could be fine. During Sandy we had two big houses running on
the neighbors Chinese one, I think it might have been 3500 watts.
That was lights, power vent water heaters, 4 fridges/freezers,
two furnaces. And the second house was with probably 150 ft of
regular mostly regular extension though I did have one 50 ft ten gauge.
He was a little like the other crazy neighbor. At one point the
lights were dimming, the generator was struggling, turns out he
was trying to run the washing machine! Great idea, right? This
was during Sandy, when the power was out for a week and he had
to load that generator with the washing machine too. If he had to
do it, you'd think he'd have let me know, so I could have shed all
loads here first. He also was using an electric space heater,
I showed him how to get the gas furnace running. It's amazing he
didn't kill that Chinese thing.

On Saturday, May 25, 2019 at 4:39:39 PM UTC-4, Ralph Mowery wrote:
In article , lid says...

If you did feed the output of a single-phase generator to both hot wires
in the house, this might cause problems with 240V equipment that uses
the neutral, but would it cause any other problems?




If you cut off the 240 volt breakers and equipment I do not see any
problems.

That would include turning off any Edison circuit breakers, which
aren't technically 240V. They are *supposed* to have handles tied
together per code. If someone did one without handle ties and/or you didn't
turn those off, you could overload the neutral if you put enough
load on it.

On Saturday, May 25, 2019 at 5:27:36 PM UTC-4, wrote:
On Sat, 25 May 2019 12:44:46 -0700 (PDT), trader_4
wrote:

On Saturday, May 25, 2019 at 3:10:38 PM UTC-4, wrote:

Ed-

The Honda EU2000i would seem to be the ideal generator for you. The
only drawback would be its small gas tank.
Other inverter generators in its class are less efficient because they
may not throttle-down when lightly loaded. And they are loud compared
to the Honda. (Apparently some use a different method of measuring
their sound level.)
I have the Honda EU6500i. It probably uses more gas than the EU2000i,
but has more power and a larger gas tank. With my light load, it will
run at least 16 hours.
Fred



I just phoned my local Honda dealer south Ontario Canada
to check out the EU6500i - he says it's now replaced with
7000 i es @ $ 4900. $ 3650. US dollars

https://powerequipment.honda.ca/gene...quiet-7000i-es

... someday ...
John T.

Or you can get a nat gas/gasoline fuel generator with a Honda engine
and similar output for $2300, but it's not inverter style:

https://www.electricgeneratorsdirect...tor/p1176.html



Same GX340 engine as my 20 year old EM5000
but mine is 4500 watts vs the Winco 5500 watts !
Winco has a much larger fuel tank.
.. not sure what my noise level is - but probably ~
the same ~ 72 db.
The large Honda inverter unit is less than 60 db and I think
that this difference would be significant.

I've heard those Honda inverter ones running at food festivals.
Huge difference, in fact you notice it because it's so quiet.




I always feel a little guilty about the noise - during a summer
outage, when neighbours have windows open.

You would think someone would come up with a super muffler just for
that purpose. Even if it's as big as the generator, as long as you
could put it next to it and connect it and it made it much quieter
you'd think a lot of people would want it and pay a decent price
for it. A $1000 generator and $300 muffler sounds like a good option
compared to a $3000 quiet inverter generator.




As someone said - perhaps the inverter technology
wouldn't stand up for 20 years .. but .. then again ..
neither will I .. :-)
I use mine about 2 or 3 times a year for power outages.
If I haven't used it in ~ 4 months I test-run it , with a couple
little electric heaters plugged in. I do very little maintenance -
.. maybe 3 or 4 oil changes in 20 years ; 1 air filter.
I use regular gasoline always with stabilizer.
John T.

In article ,
says...

You would think someone would come up with a super muffler just for
that purpose. Even if it's as big as the generator, as long as you
could put it next to it and connect it and it made it much quieter
you'd think a lot of people would want it and pay a decent price
for it. A $1000 generator and $300 muffler sounds like a good option
compared to a $3000 quiet inverter generator.




Lots of times the generators make mecahncal noise and an exhaust muffler
would not be much quieter.

On Saturday, May 25, 2019 at 7:37:08 PM UTC-4, Ralph Mowery wrote:
In article ,
says...

You would think someone would come up with a super muffler just for
that purpose. Even if it's as big as the generator, as long as you
could put it next to it and connect it and it made it much quieter
you'd think a lot of people would want it and pay a decent price
for it. A $1000 generator and $300 muffler sounds like a good option
compared to a $3000 quiet inverter generator.




Lots of times the generators make mecahncal noise and an exhaust muffler
would not be much quieter.

I'll bet 90% of the noise and almost all the objectionable noise is
from the exhaust.

On Sat, 25 May 2019 14:19:55 -0500, Mark Lloyd
wrote:

On 5/25/19 8:19 AM, trader_4 wrote:

[snip]

Ed could get a window unit for $125 to have on hand if needed to cool
a room or two in an emergency. If you had a hurricane and power is out
for a week, that would sure make a huge difference in comfort,
especially sleeping at night.

I have one for that purpose. It won't cool a whole house, but one room
is better than nothing. Another thing it could be good to have is a
small propane stove (the king used for camping).

We have a central system and 2 mini splits. so there are lots of
options. I really think a mini split in the bedroom is the way to go,
even if you are not thinking about the generator. You can keep the
bedroom cool at night and let the rest of the house drift up
overnight. By morning it will be cool again anyway most of the time.

On Sat, 25 May 2019 16:39:30 -0400, Ralph Mowery
wrote:

In article , lid says...

If you did feed the output of a single-phase generator to both hot wires
in the house, this might cause problems with 240V equipment that uses
the neutral, but would it cause any other problems?




If you cut off the 240 volt breakers and equipment I do not see any
problems.

You could theoretically overload the neutral on a multiwire circuit
but not likely with a 2 kw generator.

On Sat, 25 May 2019 19:36:59 -0400, Ralph Mowery
wrote:

In article ,
says...

You would think someone would come up with a super muffler just for
that purpose. Even if it's as big as the generator, as long as you
could put it next to it and connect it and it made it much quieter
you'd think a lot of people would want it and pay a decent price
for it. A $1000 generator and $300 muffler sounds like a good option
compared to a $3000 quiet inverter generator.




Lots of times the generators make mecahncal noise and an exhaust muffler
would not be much quieter.



I hung mover blankets around mine and it quieted it down enough so my
neighbor was not bothered. Just don't put one on the exhaust side.

On Sat, 25 May 2019 16:42:18 -0700 (PDT), trader_4
wrote:

On Saturday, May 25, 2019 at 7:37:08 PM UTC-4, Ralph Mowery wrote:
In article ,
says...

You would think someone would come up with a super muffler just for
that purpose. Even if it's as big as the generator, as long as you
could put it next to it and connect it and it made it much quieter
you'd think a lot of people would want it and pay a decent price
for it. A $1000 generator and $300 muffler sounds like a good option
compared to a $3000 quiet inverter generator.




Lots of times the generators make mecahncal noise and an exhaust muffler
would not be much quieter.

I'll bet 90% of the noise and almost all the objectionable noise is
from the exhaust.

I have heard people say a better muffler might not make it that much
quieter. There is a lot of mechanical noise going on there.

On Sat, 25 May 2019 10:07:22 -0400, wrote:


The only problem with the mechanical interlock is that
you don't know when power had been restored ...
no street lights here, but I did happen to see a light in
the neighbor's house, but that's pretty far away. BTW, there are
"reverse alarms" available to detect power returned and sound an alarm.
I have not installed one of these yet.



" Power-Back "

https://www.amazon.com/Reliance-Cont.../dp/B003KREORA

I just installed one last year - no problems -
and the screeching loud noise would probably
even wake me in the night.
Keep earplugs handy to get to the panel to turn it off !
.. it's painfully loud & an awful screech.
John T.

+1 on ALL that

On Sat, 25 May 2019 10:42:46 -0400, Ed Pawlowski wrote:

On 5/25/2019 6:38 AM, Marius Josipovic wrote:
On 5/24/19 7:09 PM, Ed Pawlowski wrote:
I'm considering buying a generator.* Just a portable that would keep
the refrigerator going, maybe the TV or internet.* Nothing of higher
power demand and only for a few hours a day if power goes out after a
hurricane.* AFAIK, this is not a really bad area for that and out
lines are underground so that help.* But stuff happens. I'm in Florida
now and they do get hurricanes.

The inverters run a couple of hundred more from what I've seen. I'd
like to keep it down to less than $1k.* I'm thinking 2,000 to 3000
watts should handle my needs.


Refrigerator

Kitchen range

Washer

Dryer

Dishwasher

Water heater

Modem/Router/Computer/TV/Cable box

Cellphone charging station

Lighting


Hot water is gas. Cooking is gas but would lose the oven. Can easily
go two weeks with laundry. Biggest single load is the refrigerator,
maybe a room AC to sleep.
Of you want to sleep with the generator on the inverter MAY be worth
while as it runs a bit quieter