another bloody power outage - until the 2 o'clock in the morning
vandalism, apparently
I think this is my second time of asking - any suggestions for a temp. domestic application ?
I would have thought a couple of kW
I bought a 7.5kVa Briggs one, very simalar to this one, but in red!
Of course when we did have the power cut (a few months ago) I made sure I turned on all the lights, so we were the only house in the street with any lights on :-)
I also got this transfer switch
You need to decide what you want to run on it and add up the power consumptions. Then you can realise that 1 day is awful expensive, and maybe you could cut back a bit.
I'm not saying dont go the gen route, but its worth mentioning there are other options, depending on what you want to run. Eg a UPS, a lead acid battery & charger, gas lighting etc. Probably all of those are more reliable than gens, a lot less noisy and easier to use.
NT
Thats Wotfud for you :-)
We were somewhere around Barstow, on the edge of the desert, when the drugs began to take hold. I remember geoff saying something like:
In message , Toby writes
It's called the umbrella principle
In message , The Medway Handyman writes
prolly some Chatham chavs out for a good time ...
In message , Grimly Curmudgeon writes
link
Agreed what do you *really* need to maintain comfort and not waste to much. That essentially boils down to enough power to run the CH/HW system and keep any fridges and freezers cold. If you have kids having the TV might be useful.
A couple of KVA should be able to do that without problem. Remember the fridges and freezers don't need power all the time you could just plug each into the genny in turn for say 1 hour in every 4.
With the price of fuel it might be worth looking for a diesel, that will run on Red at about 50% the cost of road fuel (diesel or petrol). At a pinch you could probably add veg oil but veg oil is more or less the same price as Red now. Disadvantage is the diesels tend to be noisier than a similar rated petrol, our cheap chinese diesel jobbie is fupping noisy.
If some one "non-technical" might have to start it up electric start is a useful addition. Pull starting a diesel is a different technique to a petrol as there is no way you can pull a diesel through compression. The repeated pulling to spin a diesel up with the decompression lever pressed might be beyond some.
Gas lighting is good, much better than any battery based electric light, longer run times and better light. Think about being able to at least boil water for hot drinks or cup a soups, a camping stove. Try to standardise, so a gas cannister for your light can also run your stove, then you only need to maintain a stock of one type of cannister and can (with the right type of cannister) safely interchange between the two if needs be.
In message , Dave Liquorice writes
I'm only talking of a couple of hours of an evening on the rare occasion that power is lost. I live in the centre of town, extended and prolonged outtages are unlikely to be the norm
of course, the umbrella principle will prolly come into force, once I have one, power cuts won't occur again (not!)
But would they be able to find their way? It's a bit further than Strood.
I'd go for a minimum of 5KVA, that would allow you to run a small microwave or a washing machine. That could be damned handy. A 5KVA generator can be had for about £700 rated as "silent" at 70dBA. Most open frame generators are 96dBA or more. It's worth looking at a model with remote start, because once you've used a generator in anger a few times you'll really wish you had that feature.
In article , Dave Liquorice scribeth thus
A mate of mine works for a telecoms company and sometimes when they have power cuts he drives his van along and plugs that up to the equipment needing powering. Seems his van has some sort of modified alternator thereon which delivers mains and quite a bit too so I understand.
Wonder of theres a market for modified car alternators that could double up as standby generation?..
Just another mad idea that might work;!....
By the way, last time I looked it was cheaper to buy from kipor-generators.com rather than peakgenerators.co.uk. They appear to be the same company, but the former had cheaper prices (not the former quotes exc VAT, but adding VAT was still cheaper).
I'd go for a 12Volt liesure battery with trickle charger and inverter with sufficient power to run the CH system. Then I'd buy a small portable gas hob and a bottle of propane (unless I had a gas hob already). I'd also buy a couple of Aladdin lamps which give a good light but make no noise. They run on paraffin but don't smell. I used them when I live on a boat. I would not worry about fridge and freezer for a few hours of cut.
That's handy to know, thanks. I'll be looking for a 13kVA+ generator that I can convert to run on chip oil soon. Just after I get the details of how to make a biodiesel reactor worked out.
I'd really like to use a proper centrifugal water separator/filter unit but the price is putting me off. I'll have to see if I can buy a s/h olive oil centrifuge I think.
We were somewhere around Barstow, on the edge of the desert, when the drugs began to take hold. I remember tony sayer saying something like:
Everybody already has one - just clip a decent sized inverter across the battery and turn the idle speed up.[1] 'Swat I do for the moment, until I build a proper one using a VW diesel.
[1] Problem with most modern engines is the lack of easily twiddleable throttle control, but it's not insurmountable.
Why bother, diesels will run on filtered oil and a bit of red diesel mixed in. You only really need to process it to replace petrol.
They only save time, how long is it between refills? Just use a bigger filter.
In measurements I did on an old mini with a Lucas alternator, it could produce 34A at tickover (42A was max rated output). With that old engine, you needed to just touch the accelerator to get it back to idle speed with that load, but a modern engine with computer control will make that adjustment automatically. Contrary to popular belief, it's not necessary to rev an engine to get max current out of an alternator (might have been more the case with dynamos).
If you live in the town centre, dont have any life support equipment and arent running a business there then why would you need backup power? Gas lighting would be handy, but thats it really.
I second the suggestion to standardise on gas canisters, an especially good plan for equipment thats rarely used and often not maintained.
NT
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