Quote:
Originally Posted by upthesaukee
Our electricity has gotten more reliable on our street than when we lost power for a week. We heat with wood, we have access to the stream to get water for the toilet, and we did fine with stove top cooking. We are closer to getting a generator to put all our headaches to rest. Getting too old to haul water...  and chop wood.... may have to let the wife do it all... she's younger than me!! 
(And no, she doesn't come on the Forum. Phew!!!!) |
I looked at Generators every time I went to Lowe's or Home Depot. My wife said OK by one of the darn things. I finally broke down and bought a Colman 6500 watt generator.
We first set it up to power the furnace and a couple of lights in the cellar. We later set it up to power the Breaker Panel.
We put in a twist-lock Receptacle outside under the deck wired back to the breaker panel. We installed what is known as an INTERLOCK Device. The device blocks the Generator breaker form being thrown with out the Main Breaker being moved to the OFF position. Till the Generator Breaker is put in the OFF position you can not move the MAIN BREAKER to the ON POSITION.
Depending the Breaker Panel manufacturer you can find one these devices at Home Depot for under $20.00. You can do most oof the installation yourself. I would maybe recommend having a licensed Electrician do the final connections at the Panel.
We have had the Generator for six years and have used it 5 times. of the 5 times 4 of those time were for an hour or less. The one time we had to use it for a longer period was for about 3 hours.
We have set a rule where we wait at least wait an hour before hooking up the generator.
As upthesaukee said the overall Grid here in Moultonboro has been vastly improved.
I consider it like an Insurance Policy against outages!
WINNOCTURN