"Im sorry but I hear you talking about convenience and comfort... not survival."

It's always a good idea to keep in mind what conditions are likely to immediately after a disaster. When the roads are cleared, you will probably be expected back to work no matter what conditions are like at home.

Having a generator can keep Grandma's oxygen machine going, operate a fan for her, keep all that meat from rotting, etc. In the winter, it's nice to be able to come in from putting a tarp on the roof where the ice-laden tree limb fell, and warm up in front of a small heater. Older people can get hypothermic in a cool house. And if you happen to have a sick baby, cold isn't likely to hurry improvement.

Preparedness is preparing for all levels of a disaster, not just the immediate 3-day aftermath.

Sue

If you mean "don't focus on comfort so much that basic needs are overlooked", I agree.

If you mean "if you ain't sufferin', you ain't survivin'", you're welcome to sleep in your
tent. I'll be inside with the generator powered air conditioning, hot shower, cold drinks
and television. :-)

Okay but once again youre still talking comfort... not survival. Except for the case of Grandma's oxygen machine of course and like I said in my original post, if you are that 0.0001% (like Grandma) that truely *needs* electricity for survival, then go get the best generator you can afford (and ofcourse maintain also).

Yep and Im not arguing that you'll be more comfortable... you will be. <img src="/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" /> But we will both survive. So while you're "Equipped to be Comfortable" I will suffer with only merely being "Equipped to Survive" <img src="/images/graemlins/grin.gif" alt="" />.

That also might be a difference between survival theory and after-disaster reality.

Armchair survival isn't as comfortable as reality. The real thing has GOT to be quite stressful. And if you can handle it okay, what about the people you're living with? A couple of lights and a bit of hot water goes a long way toward helping people who aren't mentally prepared for a distressful situation.

Besides, if you can afford a small generator, you can keep that $800 worth of meat in the freezer from going bad. Just think about all that labor you'll save not having to dig a big hole (at 110 F) to dump all the stinky, rotted packages in when you find out that garbage pickup won't be available for the next 5 weeks! <img src="/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" /> (Sometimes there just aren't enough big dogs around when you need them.)

Sue

I'm not saying it's wrong. I'm just saying its not about "survival". It's about "comfort".

Paulr, I agree with your setup. I have several inverters to charge up 15-min rechargeable NiMh batteries and run a light bulb and a small TV directly intermittantly from my car. It doesn't make sense to spend a lot of money in my crowded urban setting for a generator and worry about stockpiling large amounts of fuel, fuel stabilization, maintenance and possible mechanical faillure. Generators require .5 to 1 gal per hour - thats a lot of fuel to store. With two cars, I already own two built-in generators with 10+ gallons of gas each, though not the most efficient power source, it'll do in an emergency, since the car generators don't run constantly.

For a last ditch power source I have a solar battery charger for my Nimhs.

Generators make sense for rural folks with lots of room and less of a safety problemfor fuel storage .

Gosh, sure seems like are a lot of "I'm right and everyone else is wrong" kinds of posts on this thread. Also several alternatives that haven't been discussed yet.

Here's my take: Just in the USA alone there are so many diverse climates, built environments (rural, semi-rural, town, major urban area, etc), personal circumstances (age, condition, equipment, ability, etc.), varieties of potential (even probable) "disasters", etc. etc. that it's nonsense to argue about this sort of thing or claim some kind of superior idea, attitude, philosphy, etc.

Most people most places in most situations would get along without a generator. Let's suppose that all the big tough guys (and gals) here would get along in the Backpacker Magazine vague situation with just a knife or just a lighter or just a sleeping bag or... But that's not what this forum is about. "EQUIPPED" to survive, not Tom Brown's naked scout survival school - which is a really cool thing, but not the topic here in general or the original thread in particular.

Got little kids? Live in a cold climate (as opposed to someplace that gets freezing temperatures a few times a year)? Not a real experienced outdoorsman? MacGuyver seems like a genius to you? A little skinny on the equipment for the whole family? - Toss very many of those things together and asking about a genset is a VERY smart question.

Our homes, even if damaged, are a cornucopia of useful items for even the more inept of us, offer great emotional aid to kids (and even adults), even damaged are darned good shelters, etc. Like I said, most people don't need a genset, but that doesn't mean it would hurt to have one. Evaluation of the desirability should be a personal discovery and decision, period.

I am neither endorsing nor naysaying a genset, but I will add some information based on my experiences here and abroad.

Most climates, running a genset for 1 hour out of 4 is quite frequent enough to keep freezer contents safely frozen.

Household refers aren't worth the genset time - eat it, toss it, transfer contents to coolers and rotate gallon jugs of ice from the freezer to the coolers, whatever - be sure to prop the door of the empty refer open, of course.

Need the furnace to run? Same cycle as the freezer will do unless it is below zero F or very windy. In those conditions, there are other decisions to make. Examples: Run 15 minutes every hour (PITN), drain water lines and run furnace on freezer cycle (doable), drain water lines, close down house to interior core (fireplace room?), and only run genset once or twice a day for an hour, etc.

Want to run power tools for interim or permanent damage repairs if the utility lines are down for for extended period of time? Genset... you might as well; an inverter big enough to run a circular saw is expensive and kicks the heck out of your automotive battery and alternator (yes, I am well aware of exceptions) plus usually needs to be hard-wired into your vehicle on the DC side. (and there's a whole grounding issue with power tools that everyone casually forgets to mention or do). I like inverters a lot; I have them in two of my vehicles. But not for household emergency use as a primary backup.

Maintenance? Fuel Storage? Repairs? yadayada - not really problems. What maintenance and repairs? There's very little to do with an infrequently used genset; that's a fact. Store no fuel in it (get a siphon hose for your vehicle - it will have fresh fuel in it), check the hoses and fuel lines annually (more of an "after 5 or more years" thing in most climates), and run it for a half-hour or so once a year if you think of it - use it to power some tools or something cyclical like that to exercise the rpm controls and variably load the generator and engine. Run it bone dry. That's about it, really, even with a "cheap" genset. Sure, you COULD do more if you want to squeeze several thousand hours runtime out of the genset - but that's not the point here; there simply is no need.

There are plenty of downsides to storing and using a genset. It's an expensive thing to sit there waiting to (hopefully) never be used. They seem to always be in the way when you need to get to something else. The noise may attract undesired attention of various sorts - including the sudden silence that happens when it is stolen. If you don't attach it to a good ground, you're gonna get some unpleasant surprises sometime when you're running a power tool. People who know you have a genset will want to borrow it for non-emergency situations. Etc.

We each have to evaluate our own situation and make our own decisions about this, just like anything else. There certainly is no hard-and-fast answer. Arguing that someone else doesn't need a genset is silly and really misses several reality checks. Ditto for arguing that someone else needs a genset.

This isn't after all, as serious and cut-and-dried a decision as which knife is best or which caliber is best - y'all are wrong about those! <img src="/images/graemlins/wink.gif" alt="" /> <img src="/images/graemlins/shocked.gif" alt="" /> <img src="/images/graemlins/grin.gif" alt="" />

(No animals were harmed, no wait, wrong disclaimer - YMMV and hope no toes got stepped on - isn't my intention).

Regards,

Tom

After retirement, I have been involved with designing and building homes that were not initially on the power grid. These homes need, by their remote mountain locations, a backup generator. These homes have transfer switches which are tailored to have only essential appliances, well pumps, ground source heat pumps, and lights run off the generator when power is lost. Not all generator sets need constant maintenance. It all depends on the fuel used and technology used to generate the power.

Having formerly been a maintenance engineer, I still have every generator I ever owned including a gas fueled Honda that is twenty one years old. My favorite two generators are Auragens. They require no maintenance other than visual inspection to see that nothing is loose or worn. The only part that can wear out are bearings. My vehicles diesel engines power the Auragens. These are very unique generators. That are used by the military, utility companies, and aid vehicles.

These generators normally cost thousands of dollars, but I have obtained new ones off of eBay for less than $350 and that includes the adapter for my specific diesel truck. That is less than the cost of a cheap gas generator. You can check their web site if you are interested, aurasystems.com. But if you had to pay someone for installation and programming, expect to spend substantially more money.

It is a pleasure to have both 5KW generating capacity and a vehicle with a sixty five gallon diesel fuel tank. It sure is weird to provide AC power to a filling station in order to pump diesel fuel into your own truck. One of the problems for utility and rescue vehicles is obtaining fuel when there is no power to the fuel stations. I can even run the Auragen while I am driving which is great for a parade tow vehicle!

This is one of the "not discussed yet" options I mentioned in my previous post, and your well-powering example is on-the-spot (need 240v for most well pumps these days). My Dad is miles from water if his well doesn't work, and a portable genset is part of his primary backup. It's so important to him (not simply drinking water - he lives in amongst the pinion nut trees and scrub brush - wildfires are a threat) that he even has a second well on standby with a 120v pump (instead of 240v).

The Auragen is a very neat system. Basically a 200+ amp alternater mated with a sophisticated sine wave inverter. I've seen this sort of set-up under the hoods of built 4x4s (and in cabs, for the inverter). I didn't know about the remote-start option, though.

You're right - this would be a very slick "stealth" setup for the urbanite. AFAIK they sell mounting kits for about any mid-90s or later big 3 full-size truck/SUV, not just big-rig diesels.

Regards,

Tom