Recently had a transfer switch installed on the house for those times when we lose power (at least 4-6 times a year) and i'm looking for a good 240V generator that won't break the bank. If we didn't need it to run our well pump i'd stick with our current spare generator. What says the 'Fire regarding backup generators?

What's the HP of the well pump?

Generac Guardian 70381 20kW Aluminum Automatic Standby Generator with WiFi.

https://www.zillerelectric.com/prod...um-automatic-standby-generator-with-wifi

The total amps you might need?

Take a look at Central Marine Diesel:

http://www.centralmainediesel.com/

If nothing else it will give you an idea of what is out there ... and ball park prices.

No idea, pump has been in the ground before we moved into the house.
Don't really need anything that big but that's a nice unit.

We really like the Honda's as we have 2 of them and have had zero problems with them.

I'd probably lean towards honda at about 10,000 watts. Should cover all needs I'd bet. And I"ve faith in the honda to run when needed in the worst of times.

If it were in TX where we have China freight I"d just but theirs and run it monthly and toss it once it died, if it ever did. I've run one on the airboat many hours bowfising, just have to clean the carb every spring after it sets up all winter.

OR can you find a used GPU?

If you happen to have a tractor with PTO do a little research on PTO generators.

Look at the pump control box, it should tell you how many amps, or the horse power of the pump.

Invertor ?????????

that's my ????

we need clean power for PC's to keep tabs on 24 HR.......

Yikes........$5K.............

Your pc's have power supplies, the power supplies filter the electricity they use. Most generators can feed modern computers.

Well without knowing lets guess at it being a 1hp well pupm.

I've ran my 1hp well pump on 3500 watts, it makes it grunt like an SOB and nothing else can run at the same time. 5000 watts would be more practical.

If you want dead nuts reliable power with unprecedented dependability and simple to fix when it does break look into an "ST" style gen head. you have to mate these to a prime mover yourself but they are very reliable and trouble free.

If your not capable of the DIY aspect your better off buying one of the Chinese generators on the market.

Good luck.

sooooo

don't need an invertor ????? for whole house ?

I have 2 Perkins diesel generators that I use .

Not unless your using Batteries. An inverter changes DC power to AC power, You might be thinking about a filter, they do make power filters that smooth out the sine wave a bit for more sensitive electronics.

been thinkin of a X/fer switch for the house..........

yes I have a tractor as DD mentioned .....

An Inverter Generator takes generated AC voltage that has been converted to DC voltage or straight DC voltage that has been generated and through the use of IGBT transistors or simple SCRs and inverts DC to a Sinusoidal 60 hertz voltage regardless of machine rpm, whereas a simple generator produces AC voltage that is reliant on machine rpm and alternator poles for hertz cycle. Out of hertz tolerance will effect anything with sensitives electronics.

I only get inverted in planes and choppers. What I have cost about $1200 and runs the house. That includes the well pump and A/C, fridge/freezer, lights and stove. We can't use the oven if the A/C is running. 41KW.

The tractor was extra.

dd what h p tractor ?

Yes.

Nice, Perkins diesels are fantastic engines, how many KW you running?

They really aren't very fuel efficient.
Stick with the Honda inverter generators.

https://www.electricgeneratordepot....el-efficient-generator-with-imonitor-lcd

Does it have a FEL??

fuggin A.............

Ooohhhh! A PHD as well I see!


Fancy!

Both mine are 3 cylinder 10k units .

yea.........I have a PHD............

what a PIA to put on..............

and use.........them there 8' cedar posts are nuthin but work.........

Meanwhile, back at the no power ranch.

I actually did not know you could still get cedar posts......

8' cedar posts? are you building a fort? You do live in injun country.



mike r

With my 7500 W running, 9000 W peak ( Start up currents), I can run my 5 hp well pump, refrig, two fans for two gas fireplaces, fan for hot water heater forced vent, several lights, computers,modems. It will run ( gas engine) 6-8 hours at 1/2 peak,half that at full peak .If I am without power for several days, I switch off so I can run freezers and stock tank heater. It is Champion brand ,bought from Costco for about $650.If you have big house with a lot of appliances, etc, You'd best look at about 10KW running and more at peak.
.
If your phone is a land line and your modem is on it,most likely you will lose that power along with house power

It is nice to the generator running on LP or natural gas and kick on when the power goes out and off when it returns.More bucks though. I have to keep 15-20 gallons of gas around in the winter when storms knock out our power. If you do run on gasoline, find a station that sells ethanol free gas.It sure keeps you engine a lot cleaner and makes it last a lot longer.

Most boxes that generators come in have a list of appliances/electric motors on them to tell you how many amps or watts each draw, Fix up a wire jumper that you can read amps on with a meter. You only want your meter amp sensor to go around the hot wire. If 240 V read one of the hot legs and x2

He has a great big PTO powered pencil sharpener. Pointy side up you know....

Low tech.

Very similar to my setup, except a 7037 16kW NG standby with a 200A ATS. Did it for under $4K by shopping around a little.

Ah ha! When the power goes out here I go to my kid's house, or to a motel in Mesquite.


mike r

Buy once, cry once...................

Generac natural gas wired in, auto on unit.

Then don't worry about it anymore, especially if you live in an area with frequent outages.

MM

https://www.electricgeneratorsdirect.com/stories/679-Top-Rated-and-Best-Selling-PTO-Generators.html

As far as best for the money, I have 2 Champion 3500/4000 Watt units that cost around 350 to 400 bucks each.. They have a 240 plug as well as 120s and they are good on fuel. If you get a generator that is way bigger than you need, it will suck down the gas even if you don't draw much. The Champions I have can run at for nearly 12 hours on 4 gallons of gas if you keep the Wattage draw down. They will not run a 220 clothes drier, electric range, large AC, or heat pump system, but they will run a gas forced air furnace just fine. They mainly will run enough to get you through a tight spot and keep your food cold.. .

Although those work fine they are really expencive to run...a tractor on pto load can really eat fuel and tractors are hard to start in the cold...
I'm running a multi quip welder/generater..has a 50 amp and a 30 amp service...uses about 6 gal of fuel / day...

oh yea......farm store right here in Podunk has 'em

8' long......gate or corner posts about $9 a pop.....nice & fresh

takes two guys to load them.....line posts a buck cheaper

locally.........line posts.......

https://classifieds.ksl.com/listing/57659520

I don't have the generator yet but I planned for it when we built the house. We installed a manual disconnect at the panel outside. We have a 250 gal LP gas tank and it feeds through the wall near the disconnect. I plan on putting a pad there and placing a Generac on that running off LP gas. It will be a manual start because I want to keep it as simple as I can. We don't loose electricity much but when we do it's for a long time. The Generac will be large enough to run the whole house. They're expensive and something you don't use much so it hasn't been a big priority.

I went with a 8,500 watt model. It will run anything in the house, just not everything at the same time. Using the microwave, coffee pot, oven, dryer, etc is all OK. You can generally pick up a good one at Costco for $800 - $1K. I only use nonethanol gas. Just the other day checked my records and found out it has not run for almost 2 years. It fired right up and ran it for 30 minutes. Then I removed 3 gallons of gas from the tank and added fresh to it.

Yep, inverters are the Cadillac and most efficient with electronics. but I'm not sure how high a wattage is available or affordable. About 7KWatts is around $4500. If you have a compact tractor, you used to be able to get a 15Kwatt generator for around $1500. I bought one and installed a receptacle on front standard and plugged a Hertz meter into it. I set tractor RPM to achieve about 60.1 Hertz to allow a little bog on inrush and let small diesel eat. It won't use as many dollars running as that large air cooled gasoline engine will use on Gen-set will.You have one less gasoline engine to maintain year round and worry about stale gas when you need it.

I strongly considered getting a standby generator for the house. But when I thought about it, we seldom lose power, and only for a few hours at most. The last time was due to what the power company guy called "another damn smoking squirrel" incident at the transformer behind our house. The longest outtages here come in the winter, due to extreme winds. When they happen, we just go to a hotel. The food probably won't spoil (it's winter) and occasional hotels cost a whole lot less than a generator.

Our neighbor had a really nice standby generator. It disappeared. Drag marks in the lawn out to the street, and nothing else.

We got something similar to this at Costco.



Got an outlet plumbed from our house propane supply to a quick disconnect and run it to the generator. The breaker panel has a lockout switch a 50amp breaker and 50amp plug. This allows us to scale it up if we need to in the future.

This set up runs most of the house with the exception of the oven. We could use the propane grill if we really need something out of the oven. All our electronics and appliances seem to run fine on it over the four plus hours I've tired it.

Only downside is it is a bit noisy. Need to build something to dampen the sound a bit but allow airflow and access. We're in the woods and the neighbors haven't bitched, though.

The folks I know of around my area who use PTO drive gen sets are mostly all farmers and always keep big tanks of non-highway use diesel fuel on hand anyway for farm equipment, the benefit of the PTO gen set being tax advantages.

C

How does two 3500W not equal one 7500W?