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If open to one more suggestion, consider buying or renting a dedicated propane tank to run the generator from. Propane, cause gas and diesel go bad over time and Murphy will see to it you are short when you need it. Can also remember one of the east coast hurricanes........a bunch of guys were running Honda generators and such for a few days, till the gas cans ran out. When they went to the gas stations, they were either out of gas too, or had no juice to run the pumps. So generators turned into useless lawn ornaments.
At the farm, we have a 13 KW generator......and if memory serves, projected run time on a dedicated 250 gallon propane tank is about 10 to maybe 12 days when running under load 24/7. It has an engine about same size as a 60 inch zero turn mower and burns fuel at about the same rate. A gallon per hour.
Re: Question for Electricians
[Re: Chancey]
#8024373 12/18/2308:37 PM12/18/2308:37 PM
A home owner can’t make alterations to his service period, or past it if it involves generation here. Licensed electrician/permit/inspection involved. There’s lots of cords with 2 male ends around, and I don’t blame them (I may or may not have one). Too many smart ones out there that don’t understand backfeed or how a transformer works. Some places in 2019 were out for over 2 weeks during a big ice storm. The one where crews from North Dakota, Minnesota, Ontario & Saskatchewan came to help, it’s usually the other way around. Couldn’t believe the equipment that they had, flex track after flex track. Is Mb & Sask linemen the only ones left with spurs on their trucks lol? I know of one customer that didn’t switch his main off and was back feeding our system through his dryer plug. No one got hurt, but when we energized the line, the gen went belly up along with some equipment on his farm, damage claim denied.
Re: Question for Electricians
[Re: Shakeyjake]
#8024397 12/18/2308:55 PM12/18/2308:55 PM
A home owner can’t make alterations to his service period, or past it if it involves generation here. Licensed electrician/permit/inspection involved. There’s lots of cords with 2 male ends around, and I don’t blame them (I may or may not have one). Too many smart ones out there that don’t understand backfeed or how a transformer works. Some places in 2019 were out for over 2 weeks during a big ice storm. The one where crews from North Dakota, Minnesota, Ontario & Saskatchewan came to help, it’s usually the other way around. Couldn’t believe the equipment that they had, flex track after flex track. Is Mb & Sask linemen the only ones left with spurs on their trucks lol? I know of one customer that didn’t switch his main off and was back feeding our system through his dryer plug. No one got hurt, but when we energized the line, the gen went belly up along with some equipment on his farm, damage claim denied.
if you use a gen transfer you are not making a change to the service
the concept of backfeeding is really simple to turn off the main breaker and back feed on a 240 plug in the garage and close the door on the cord the issue is when the guy who set it up isn't the one using it , wife , kids , next owner , owner after that
that is why the gen transfer switch only moves the circuits as you move the switch for those 6 , 8 , 10 circuits it disconnects the circuit from the normal circuit breaker then the circuit is wired to the other side of the transfer switch
the transfer switch has a long through one side is house power the other side is generator power and the middle is off so you are moving to off then to gen power and revers that when going back to the house power this is why you can move things live and they only see a momentary loss of power
America only has one issue, we have a Responsibility crisis and everything else stems from it.
Re: Question for Electricians
[Re: Chancey]
#8024454 12/18/2309:35 PM12/18/2309:35 PM
Looks like you’ve got a U/G service, where does that pipe go after leaving the junction box up through the under eve? The inter locks are mandatory, but out here, alterations to a service box need to be reapproved. But as soon as there’s generation, certified electricians must be involved. Wind storm….tree rips down tap feeding into farm property. Bill fires up a small gen back feeding his dryer plug to keep his fridge cool. All good. His grandkids come out to play because it’s sunny out and all kinds of cool damage, checking out the huge tree across the drive way. They grab the little steel line that looks like a barbed wire fence with no barbs…..aaaand it’s game over for lil Johnny. When good times go bad. True story. The crew that comes out to fix, they should be taking steps to prevent this before starting work, but the general public doesn’t.
Re: Question for Electricians
[Re: Chancey]
#8024883 12/19/2309:43 AM12/19/2309:43 AM
Primary voltage of 7200 going through transformer puts out 120/240v. Backfeed of 120/240v going back through transformer puts out 3600/7200v. I would contact your utility about using a generator.
Re: Question for Electricians
[Re: goatman]
#8024906 12/19/2310:19 AM12/19/2310:19 AM
That physically prevents you from being able to have power from the pole and power from the generator at the same time. Thats bad if that happens.
Then you install the main generator breaker in that location of the panel so that interlock thing form the link above works. That will be a 220 breaker so it feeds both sides of the panel. Then you feed an outside outlet from that breaker, that outlet will be what you plug your generator in to. Your gen is probably 30 amps, that breaker needs to be 30 amps, and the wire you run needs to be rated for 30 amps too. So your generator needs to have a 220 plug rated at 30amps. (so the 220 out of the gen through the 220 plug through the 220 wire through the 220 plug on the house to the 220 breaker in the panel to run throughout the house)
The next thing you do is go through your panel and flip the breakers to figure out which ones run the freezers or whatever you want to be on. Mark all those breakers with a silver sharpie or on the label or however you decide to do it.
The only weird thing is to figure out your cord from the gen to the outlet. You need to decide if you are going to have a male outlet on your house to plug a normal cord into, (the cord also needs to be 30A.) Or if you are going to have a double male cord running from the gen to the outlet which can be hot if the gen is running.
Install some cheap emergency lighting in those areas that are off when the power is on from the pole and kicks over to battery power when it goes down then you can see what you are doing when the lights kick off.
This is what I did after a bit of research. Wife can get it going when I’m gone, no worries. Easy peasy to do if you have room in your panel. I just had to move a 220 dryer breaker up to a blank space to make room for breaker and lock out on bottom. Love it.
Double male cord would not be a good idea around here.
If open to one more suggestion, consider buying or renting a dedicated propane tank to run the generator from. Propane, cause gas and diesel go bad over time and Murphy will see to it you are short when you need it. Can also remember one of the east coast hurricanes........a bunch of guys were running Honda generators and such for a few days, till the gas cans ran out. When they went to the gas stations, they were either out of gas too, or had no juice to run the pumps. So generators turned into useless lawn ornaments.
At the farm, we have a 13 KW generator......and if memory serves, projected run time on a dedicated 250 gallon propane tank is about 10 to maybe 12 days when running under load 24/7. It has an engine about same size as a 60 inch zero turn mower and burns fuel at about the same rate. A gallon per hour.
Or a generator that can run on both. My dad has one that you can use either gas or propane.
Re: Question for Electricians
[Re: Trapset]
#8025063 12/19/2302:19 PM12/19/2302:19 PM
Double male cord would not be a good idea around here.
When I was still a trainee, things got really ugly when the crew I was on showed up to an outage and found one in use. The old senior J man and operator were going to get physical.....LOL