Anybody have a (home) generator?

Until recently, when we sold our house, we had a 4800 watt generator. We needed it for the fridge and freezer.
The smartest thing I did was to get a 6 foot heavy duty extension for the fridge so I do not have to pull it every time to pull the plug from behind the fridge.
 
Yes, as a retirement gift to ourselves 5 years ago.

We had a Generac 26KW Whole House Standby Genset installed. Ours is fueled by Natural Gas.
It comes on automatically when there is a Power Outage.
See pic of our unit below.

We lived all along the Gulf Coast and went thru many Hurricanes and Power Outages by weather. Lost food and meat due to spoilage afew times.

The Genset has been used several times since we got it during outages.

Our neighbors also run extension cords from our outside Power Receptacles to their Refrigerator and Fans.
Our Daughter and baby Granddaughter live near us and during Power Outages they come to stay with us. So that is a good thing.

Was it worth it? For us yes, but it was not cheap - at least to us.

Total installed cost including a larger Gas Meter and putting in the line from the Meter to the Genset was so close to ~$15K that I would call it $15K.

We spent another $5K when the Electricians found our ~23 year old Main Electrical Panel had some serious issues and some of our electrical cabling to our homes interior was overheated - to the point the insulation was charred.
So we replaced the Main Panel and a good bit of wiring. We were really glad we found out about it as it was a fire hazard for sure.

It is very nice now, not having to wonder if and when the Power is coming back on. And not having to worry about losing the Freezer(s) contents is a good thing also.
 

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Yes , we had a 48 hour black out in a severe heatwave in March this year.(43c + for 4 days) with strong winds ….right on top of having other blackouts due to dust on the insulators ( as we’d not had any rain for 18 months )

My freezer is an upright and in my laundry which gets the afternoon sun so the food in the freezer was OK for about 22 hours ..then it started defrosting at a rapid rate ~ so it all got binned
My freezer is good however its approx 35 years old and I don’t think it has the same insulation as modern versions .

We are not taking any more chances~ so we bought a 2 kva generator
 
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Yes.

In 2003 we had bought a Honda 3000 when we were ready to move, as we knew we would be living in the camper for awhile. We also didn’t know how often the electric might go out once we got in the house.

It got used every evening for a few hours, for two months, waiting on the house. After that it has only been a handful of times during storms, but well worth it if the power goes out more than an hour.

The year of the BIG ice storm, power kept going out because trees were snapping left and right. It sounded like a literal war zone up on the ridge. The total hours of lost power that week were 108 hours — I kept track.

So yes that 22 year old generator has more than paid for itself.
 
We have a whole house generator GENERAC 22KW fueled by natural gas. We have a service contract with the company that installed it. They come once a year to check on everything.
We had one while we lived in NW Florida, so we decided to have one here too in Central Florida. We have not used it much so far but we feel at peace having it there.
NW Florida has had its share of hurricanes and bad storms. Here in Central Florida, we had Hurricane Irma in 2017. It caused quite a lot of damage to our community (downed trees and powerlines, roof damage, roads blocked by trees, power outages to half of our community for 11 days).
 
I have a couple - a 2kVA and a 3,7kVA petrol ones They don't get used much since the government fixed up the feeder to my suburb.

Last time the power went off it was off for about 5 hours. I use the generator to power my fridge, my chest freezer and my microwave.

I only have two because one packed it in so I bought another then I was able to fix the original one. It was just a matter of replacing a servo.

This is the one I use most, it starts easily every time.

iu
 
When I built my house, I wired two circuits to a box near where the generator (3500 watt) would sit in the garage.
Then I installed 2 SPDT switches that you can get at the hardware store for around $10 each plus the cost of the box and outlets.
The two circuits powered the fridge, a couple receptacles, a few lights, and the entertainment system.
The majority of the time, the switches would be in the "Panel" mode.
When the power would go out, I would flip the switches over to "gen", plug it in, and fire it up.
It worked out great.
(I had a wood fireplace for heat.)
 
I have a Kohler 26RCA whole house generator which restores power within 15 seconds of an outage. When I first moved to my current area, the power went out for 8 days. It was freezing and I had no secondary heat source. I decided right there and then to install a Vermont Casting Wood stove and
Buy the generator. It wasn't cheap but it's been a blessing so many times.
 
We are away most of the winter and when we go we leave the house 'alive'. We keep the water on for the furnace and needed something to protect against the lines freezing in case of an extended outage. So when we retired in 2015 we had an 11k Generac generator with 2 - 125 gal propane tanks installed. It handles connections to 90% of the house circuits and is more than enough to run whet we need in an emergency. It has never failed us. It exercises for 10 minutes every Wednesday and we get yearly maintenance done on it.

I am friends with our generator guy and he told me that the 11K is the sweet spot because (at the time) the next size up had a much larger motor, used a lot more propane and was for some reason not as reliable. The 2 tanks will last about 2 weeks. A street gas connection would be perfect but not an option. We haven't seen more than 8 days outage at a time usually when we got our autumn hurricane or winter Nor'easter's. I have it so it emails me every time it runs. So for us that is definitely worth it jif iust for the piece of mind.
 
Generators seem as necessary as Central A/C around here. .. expensive but necessary.

My SIL went from hard labor in the oil fields in West Texas years ago, to become a generator installer. .. he is lucky that he can get Sundays off!
The demand never stops.

I think there might be a new law in this state that Senior apartment complexes need at least one generator for emergencies .. not sure where that stands, but it’s a great idea .
 
We have a generator that’s attached to a pony panel for everything that we need in case our electricity goes out. We have extra gas for running it which we check every now and then. We have a Woodstove which works great and a basement which stays cool in case the electricity goes off during a heat wave. We have a stocked up cellar of canned goods etc., and freezers full of food which is plugged into the pony panel. We are well prepared for any type of power outage.
 
I don't have one and keep intending to look into it. I have other sources for heat and can drain the well so it won't freeze but it sure would be nice to have water when the electricity is off.
 
They are worth the money, whether it's a portable or whole house. Better to have one & not need it than to need it & not have it.

We had no power for 5 days when Hurricane Ike went through Ohio. The next day after loosing power I found a portable gasoline generator that handled everything we needed power in the next county north of us who didn't loose power as much power. We ran it in the morning before work & turned it on as soon as we got home in the afternoon until 9 PM. We lucked out with the weather so we didn't need the heat or A/C. We used it to keep the freezers, fridge, water pump, tankless water heater, basement lights & TV going.

After it was over, we redid some wiring to make hook up the next time easier for us. We also found out how often we needed to fill it up with gas. All of the local town was out except for a small pocket which had the gas station so we had a local supply for that. We didn't use it after that time, but we decided to get a whole house.

There are certain things we want to be able to run like the A/C, water pump, water heater, oven, washer, dryer, basement lights, garage lights/door, barn lights & heated water buckets/tank for livestock in winter. We've always had the wood stove for heat so that was covered. Everything would not be on at the same time, but we wanted to know what the max usage would be if we had everything on in the house.

Our neighbor had has electrician buddy come over with a meter that he hooked up to the panel to measure the usage when we turned on everything in the house at one time. Once we had that number, we knew the size of the generator we needed to buy.

We bought a 20KW Kohler LP gas generator which our electrician installed & the plumber ran the gas pipe for power. We replaced our 500 gallon LP tank with a 1,000 gallon which allowed more gas to be on hand. We can also turn it off if we think we need to conserve the LP gas.

We have had it now for 5 years & only used it twice. Once for over 6 hours when the construction crew at a neighbors cut the main power cable digging until the power company could fix it. The second time was after a car hit a power pole in the area during the heat wave this summer for several hours.

Like @gamboolman, we don't want to loose the food in our freezer & we need our well pump. We also can't leave & go any where else because of pets & horses if it's an extended outage. We learned during Hurricane Ike that some people had to drive a fair distance to find a room.
 

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