Outfitting my house with a Generator--options

I want to outfit my house with a generator to run at least fridge/freezer and heating system in case of a prolonged blackout. I live in an urban area in Western MA, so blizzard and ice storms are the biggest threats. Oh, yeah, and I need to do it without breaking the bank. My electrician says I can get buy with 2000 watts for those needs, but I'm looking at some 3500w machines.

Here's the background.

Gas generators seem relatively cheap, but would require me to store too much gas. I've got three young kids, and no garage, so I'm not crazy about that idea.

When we switched our heating system from heating oil to Natural Gas I kept the heating oil tank in the basement. In theory I guess I could use this to supply a diesel generator.

I've now got Natural Gas for home heating, but I don't want to spend the money for one of those instant-on Kohler-style generators. I'm researching portable generators that could fueled with NG. From my perspective this would be my preferred option. Any thoughts here? Good generator leads?

I could also run one of propane, but to keep things simple I'd rather not have a big 100lb propane tank behind my house.

Any input on best options would be appreciated? I found a company in CA, duropower, that makes dual fuel gas/ng generators.

Thanks!

Hello Horus. Welcome to the forum. This subject comes up often. Here is a link with some good posts about the pro's and con's of the various approaches.

http://forums.equipped.org/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=138718&page=1

Good luck!

If you are worried about storing about fuel then propane or ng would probably be best for you.

The other thread probably answers a lot of questions if you have more please post

Welcome to the fire, Horus!

If I had an unused heating oil tank in the basement I'd seriously consider using it to store fuel for a diesel generator. From what I've read (no first-hand experience) diesel generators have a higher initial cost but give you the best energy-to-fuel output. My understanding is they also have lower maintanence requirements. Danger-wise, I'd put diesel equal to heating oil as far as storage safety goes. If you've been storing heating oil in your basement for years, diesel isn't much worse.

That being said, try to track down the tank's manufacturer and discuss it with them. Diesel might attack gaskets or washers differently than heating oil or something like that. I'm not too concerned about that, but it doesn't hurt to check.

How big is the tank? If it's something huge like 350gal I doubt you could afford to fill it full of diesel. Leaving it half empty would expose the diesel to air, which isn't great for long-term storage. Maybe the people who swapped out you furnace have/know where you could get a smaller tank. Just a thought.

-Blast, who isn't an expert but occasionally plays one in magazines

Thanks. I believe, up here in MA anyway, the only difference between heating oil and diesel is a dye that's added to the heating oil. I'm going to look into this.

Great link. Thanks!

They are similar but heating oil is thicker and a little bit harder to ignite. It'd probably be best if you found some way to clean out whatever dregs of heating oil remained in the tank. Adding biodiesel to the tank might help as it is a better solvent for "oil goo" than regular diesel fuel. You don't need to get the inside of the tank spotless, but if there's several unused gallons of heating oil in the tank you might have problems due to it raising the flash point of the diesel.

-Blast

Think that #2 fuel oil is diesel, check with your local heating oil supplier. Even if you don't use fuel oil you can get off road diesel and not have to pay road taxes on it.

Don't be too quick to dismiss the gasoline generator. I agree that storing a lot of gas can be dangerous and expensive. I don't know your situation in power outages, but where I live, when my house and neighborhood is without power, I can drive 2 miles and have always found operational gas stations. They are on a different, and clearly more reliable part of the grid. Thus, I just have to make "gas runs" to keep the generators going. I store just enough gas (5-10 gallons) to get thru 24-36 hours until I can resupply.

So, maybe it is worth thinking about how much you want to prepare for a large scale, wide spread power outage where there is no gas to be had anywhere close, or, like my situation, where you are just at the far end of a circuit that goes down whenever the wind blows a branch off a tree.

On one memorable occasion, we were without power for 7 days while I could see homes with power from my front porch. Everyone else was up except us.

Frankly, I would put more thought into what you want to power, how much power you need and consider a supplemental panel to power these circuits from a single point where you can plug in the generator. The alternative is running extension cords from the generator to the things you want to power.

Anybody have any good suggestions for a diesel generator manufacturer? Ideally one with a fuel pump--maybe the all have this.

Heating oil/diesel Tank is in the basement per code. Generator would obviously be outside.

The other latest wrinkle is that according to code I was supposed to get rid of this heating oil/diesel tank in my basement when I switched to NG over the winter, so getting a licensed plumber to plumb this might be a challenge. The heating company who I bouight the tank from won't send their plumbers to do it.

I hope more people chime in, this is one of those threads that is such a teachable lesson for all of us.

I need to see this sort of dialogue, as I have no generator and often thought these same things.

i'm more of a outdoor problem "survival" person but a home generator to power our natural gas furnace fan and a light or two is something that crosses my mind every time i'm in a Big Box store buying a couple 2x4's or a can or paint.at sub zero temps it would not take long to freeze us out but running the furnace enough to keep the place in the 50's would be good enough and save on gas.the only thing that keeps me from walking out with one is that a generator with the power to start a fan motor is sort of spendy.keeping the fan running is not the problem.i have had the furnace pilot light go out a couple times but a restart is no hassle..that seems to happen on a really cold AM when every furnace in Minneapolis kicks in at 6:00 and the pressure drops..but i digress---yes,a generator would be a good idea for short term --less than a week--use..

Well, I really like this one.

So what happens if you someday try to sell your house and it still has that tank in it? Though "converting" (yellow paint and some warning stickers?) it to store diesel fuel might give you a pass.

-Blast

Blast - That is the one I plan to get It's from old school refridgerated train trucks. HF had/has them rebuilt and they will run the home owner until they die. Those units if purchased new are 20,000$+ Keep in mind you still need a control box and a few other things.

Just look at the specs of that thing though...
1200rpm = Run forever & Cool
2.40 gallons per hour
20,000 watts!

Could power more than your house with that Sips gasoline compared to the medium size gas engines. It will last at least 10x longer than the gas engine that size. And the price is awesome.

Did I mention HF runs 20-30% off coupons

For the price that generator can not be beat.

(There are also other companies who rebuild and sell the same one as kits or as coplete units w/gas tanks, etc, if anyone is interested.)

Basically if you have 10,000$ to spend on a complete diesel setup those old diesels rebuilt are AWESOME.

I'm interested.

My dream is to run one of these on WVO to power the house full time in the winter and use the coolant to heat the house.

Any generator hookup will be required by code to have special isolators built in to prevent energizing the "grid" from your house. This is a safety thing for the crews working on the power lines. We had an electrician wire up the heater, the well pump, hot water heater, kitchen, bathroom and workshop lights and outlets to a plug-in and circuit breaker box/isolator. When power goes off, we plug one cord into one socket and fire up gen set. Necessary stuff works, but we don't need a very big generator.
I prefer the NG or propane over gasoline or diesel. Gas and diesel will eventually "rot" and not be usable if stored long-term. NG and propane lasts forever in storage. Propane tanks are now made to be burried, so there's no unsightly tank in the yard, just some pipe and valves that are easily hidden by shrubs or an artificial "stone" made to hide septic cleanouts hidden.

Just came off 48 hours of "no power" after a vicious windstorm. This is at my parents' rural home. Big tree took out the 15KV feeder line and ripped out the anchors and the top right off the transformer. They were out of town, so I was on call. Saturday night.

The big worry was three big freezers and a fridge full of meat and other good food. I knew the freezers would hold for 12 hours for sure, probably up to 24, but I wanted to stay on the safe side.

It was well past dark dark by the time I got my place set up and went over (my power was off too, but only 11 hours luckily.) High voltage wires on the ground got my attention; probably dead, but had to stay well clear of the metal fence they were lying on.

Starting an unfamiliar genset past midnight, when tired and groggy, is a hassle. Found gas, double-checked it wasn't diesel or 2-cycle mix (healthy paranoia), double-checked the genset did in fact use gasoline, double-checked oil, double-checked for any fuel spills, made sure two extinguishers were within reach.

Luckily the transfer (isolation) switch had just been wired in with a cable and compatible 220VAC plug; I was expecting to have to run 12 gauge extension cords right to the freezers and plug them in directly. I still opened the case to confirm the wiring looked right. Again, healthy paranoia in an unfamiliar setup.

Moved the transfer switch to off, plugged in the cable and fired up the genset, a big worksite DeWalt. Away she went. Flipped the transfer switch and she went from idle to full roar.

Power in the house - now we're in business. Kept a close eye on the generator a while, then made sure all the freezers were running. Called in the outage to the wires provider - no surprise, they were swamped.

Now I was on an 8-hour schedule - drive over, run genset for a couple of hours, secure everything and leave. Had to reposition the genset the next night when rain started splattering down. Should have thought of that beforehand. Found some planks for ramps, and rolled it under an overhang with some rain and wind cover, but still far enough from the house for fire/carbon monoxide safety.

Crew showed up this morning (Monday) to fix the wiring. Power on my mid-afternoon. Freezers survived - nothing lost. Parents showed up an hour after the mains came back on.

Other random thoughts and learnings FWIW:
- Some corded telephones have an internal rechargeable battery that runs the keypad. This will konk out after a day.
- The information by the phone is vital when friends/family are helping out. I.e., legal land location, first call numbers for utilities, stuff nobody else knows off the top of their head.
- Thou shalt not forget thine headlamp at home (idiot).
- Thou shalt wear shoes inside a darkened house.
- Know how to turn off (disable) the alarm system; they freak out when the internal battery runs down.
- CO detectors will cuss at you after 24 hours off line power. I just yanked out the batteries. If I'd have been sleeping over, I would have kept one in operation just in case.

All is well, but I'm beat. My bed is calling me.

Word of wisdom gained through bitter experience I am sure.
Glad it is all good for you now.

I wouldn't worry about this, but if you stored gas in it, that might be an issue.

Diesel and home-heating fuel are the same thing. When I used to move the stuff in bulk, we moved "2 oil" in barges, which was also regularly referred to as both diesel and home-heating oil. I have heard people lament because there was no real diesel fuel anymore and all of it was No. 2 oil, but when there was a real difference is not something I can tell you. From the statements, it was implied that what they considered diesel was a lighter and better grade of fuel.

Also, see: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fuel_oil

Which provides: "No. 2 is the diesel that trucks and some cars run on, leading to the name "road diesel". It is the same thing as heating oil."

I would do some research into what you would need to do to keep the diesel, gas or any fuel you choose to store, stable and usable.

FWIW, I have a generator that runs off of NG piped into the house. Neat, simple, works. So long as we pay the gas bills and the pipeline still has gas running through it, it should continue to work for a long time.

If you use NG, then the storage tank might be something you could fit out to store something else, or replace it with something else. For example, I wouldn't store water in an old fuel tank, but that space might make for a great store of water.

How long have you had the NG generator? Is it one of the automated units? If so, when it performs its scheduled exercise, does it actually put a load on the generator or does it just run for a while? Thanks for any info that you might provide.

There is one problem with old furnace oil tanks not being mentioned. The bottoms do tend to rust out from the inside. Condensation and the occasional bit of wet fuel leave water in the bottom of the tank. The tank is rusting from inside so it looks fine from the outside until it finally rust right through and leaks all over your basement.
If you are considering using diesel power you are better to put a new tank outside.
You should consider draining or pumping out the fuel in the tank you have and getting it out of your basement before it empties itself on your floor.

Consider also that diesel does rot in storage. There really are bacteria that break it down.

The generator was installed during our house renovation, which is a mild word. We gutted the place, took a year, moved back in in March. So, it's been in since early this year.

When it cranks up Thursday shortly after noon, it only idles. There is no load put on the generator. It's only turning over to keep things lubricated. It runs for less than an hour, but I have not timed it.

The generator is a Guardian Elite 10KW model.

Thanks for the info, Dan.

I think that in most places the generator will not be able to have a load put on it, when it is cranked up for only a scheduled exercise. If you put a load on it, the load would need to be for providing power to something off the grid. Anything else risks running power back into the grid, which I something I am sure that the power companies do not want to happen if it's not within their power to manage.

I had been thinking about this as well, but at some point I had a gestalt and thought... Hmm. Maybe putting a couple of solar panels on the garage roof might be better. No gas to worry about, and no noise to attract unwanted attention...

http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/B000MS8SHM

-john

Mostly that's for safety, so you don't energize a line that's being worked on. I'm surprised you don't have an isolation switch -- that's mandatory under Code up here.

I think a generator should be tested under load. It's easy enough to unplug your refrigerator and air conditioner from the grid, connect them to a 12 gauge cord, and plug directly to the genny. Otherwise, how do you know what you really have?

My 0.02

I recently upgraded from a 14 year old 5,000 watt with a briggs and stratton to the Honeywell with a Honda engine and 7,000 watt, sold at Costco. It' also the electric start which is great for me as the pull start on the old one was getting hard for me. I've ran a test and real happy so far. I too thought of going propane as storing gas can be a real pia. I do have acreage so I keep about 30 gallon in a shed during the winter months, that's a good 400 feet from the house and rotate in my truck about every 3 months. If I didn't have secure storage a good distance from the house I wouldn't go with gas.

Consider a Listeroid: Big, dumb, slow, low maintenance, and the most efficient design in terms of diesel consumption. They seemingly always start:

http://www.kk.org/cooltools/archives/001011.php

The Rocketboy link especially is an enjoyable and informative read: http://www.f1-rocketboy.com/lister.html

Blast, I was just doing some reading of an old--but still very informative--thread. That Harbor Fr link now points to some other product. Could you provide an updated link (if they still have it) to what you were referring to so I know what you were talking about?

Doesn't sound like an off-the-shelf option, but intriguing.