Generator

[KentuckyWildcat]

I've been debating on a backup generator for a few years now. I'm going to do something before winter, I hate dragging out the fridge and running extension cords. But I can't decide what I want to spend. I'm leaning toward getting the plug for a portable where I turn off the main breaker, but part of me says go with the stand by systems.

What do you guys have and are you satisfied with it? Convenience, cost, power, and being practical seems to be a hard balance on this.

I've even thought about diesel, propane, gas, and PTO. I know what my options are, I just can't make up my mind.

[Doc]

We have a small whole home unit. Had it for 10 years and just last week finally had it wired in correctly. Ours runs on LP. We have a 250 gal tank buried in our yard that fuels that, our pool heate, grill and kitchen stove. If we lose power we should be good on generator only for 3 to 4 days.

One thing to keep in mind is the cost to put it in. You need a transfer switch. I had to plop down $800 for that plus the installation which I'm expecting a grand or so. The generator we have was about $2500 and that is big enough for emergency power of the essentials for a 3,200 square foot home that everything is electric (well water, etc). So a budget of 5k should do you well. That would put you on something that automatically starts weekly to keep the battery charged and kicks on automatically should the power go out.

For us it's a big selling point when we sell our house.

[KeithKSR]

The advantage to the generator like Doc's is you can use LP or natural gas and not need to worry about keeping a good supply of gasoline on hand. LP is good for a long duration, maybe forever. Natural gas is the same way. Today's gasoline begins to break down quickly and even with a product like Stabil will have a fairly limited storage life. Diesel isn't a bad alternative, has a better shelf life than gasoline, but isn't as handy as LP or natural gas.

If you don't want the hit all at once you can add the generator now with it wired into your system through a breaker, then add the automatic breaker in later.

[KentuckyWildcat]

If you don't want the hit all at once you can add the generator now with it wired into your system through a breaker, then add the automatic breaker in later.

I'm starting to lean toward this. I'm willing to the spend the 5K that Doc mentioned, but I just do not know if it is worth 5K to me. I'm a part time farmer so we go through plenty of gas and always have diesel on hand. Right now I just have a 3500w, it will run the fridge and some lights and would be fine for 90% of our outages.

I'm starting to think a hybrid system to run my 3500 most of the time, and PTO to run during the big outages. You can get a lot of power fairly cheap on the PTO driven generators. Or just buy a larger diesel portable.

But then I think about the wife and how if we had the stand-by, she wouldn't need me at home to do it. It just time to get off the pot and make a decision...

[KeithKSR]

I'm starting to lean toward this. I'm willing to the spend the 5K that Doc mentioned, but I just do not know if it is worth 5K to me. I'm a part time farmer so we go through plenty of gas and always have diesel on hand. Right now I just have a 3500w, it will run the fridge and some lights and would be fine for 90% of our outages.

I'm starting to think a hybrid system to run my 3500 most of the time, and PTO to run during the big outages. You can get a lot of power fairly cheap on the PTO driven generators. Or just buy a larger diesel portable.

But then I think about the wife and how if we had the stand-by, she wouldn't need me at home to do it. It just time to get off the pot and make a decision...

PTO generators are definitely a good option, lowers the price point quite a bit as well.

A portable diesel operated system would be handy on the farm, and has some tax benefits.