Posted: 4/17/2011 1:53:22 PM EDT
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Powers out. Watching direct tv....
The champion inverter generator is humming along nicely by the garage. ;-) Sherlock Holmes is on hbo. Posted Via AR15.Com Mobile |
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I have yet to fire mine up. Still sitting in garage in original packaging for... 3 years now? 2 years? Anybody remember when the Advance Auto Parts sale + mail in rebate made them like $100 or $150? I remember it being a hot topic for a bit. Smoking deal. Posted Via AR15.Com Mobile |
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1st lesson.
My 1600 watt continuous inverter generator will easily run my 1300 watt microwave, but not on 75 ft of extension cords. My generator grunted under the load and kept going, but it was not enough power to run it. I reduced to 70% power and it ran like a champ. Posted Via AR15.Com Mobile |
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How does your champion inverter genny sound when running? Mine seems to have an occasional miss. Not bad but seems to be there. Besides that it runs fine. It's very smooth under load. It seems to miss slightly when cold with no load. Posted Via AR15.Com Mobile |
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Running the refrigerator because it was getting warm after 4 hours. I turned off both tv's and let it start up then turned them both back on. The refrigerator doesn't seem to draw much at all.
The extension cords are not super convenient, but its not a big deal at all. Posted Via AR15.Com Mobile |
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Now I am running the fridge, freezer, and two tv's with direct tv. It's cool up here so the oil lamps are making heat and light.
I love being prepared. Wonder what the neighbours are watching with the three or four other gennies that are running in the neighborhood? Posted Via AR15.Com Mobile |
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Why are you without power? Pretty windy now in my part of ohio but nothing serious. Not sure why, but the power is only out for a few square miles as far as I can tell. It was extremely windy today. I just helped our neighbor unload his generator a few minutes ago. Posted Via AR15.Com Mobile |
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are you using the orange extension cords? they are too thin to carry any power over a long distance. next time you are out, get some 12/3 construction grade cords and dedicate them for the genny. they will cost ya, but if you look around you can find em reasonable. my set up is, heavy cords from the garage to the house, 75 feet. plug that into a 4 outlet gang box. distribute power from there with the lighter cords. I have 2, 12/3, 100 footers and 4, 16/3, 50 footers dedicated and i keep this whole set-up with the genny so its always ready. |
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I have a heavy, very expensive 50 ft.12-3 bringing the power through a back window with foam to insulate the gap. That cord has three outlets that are branched off with lighter cords to the loads.
One thing I did learn is to use multi plug strips on those cords so you can plug in little stuff without unplugging the direct tv any more than necessary. It takes a while to start back up. The 50 ft 12-3 combined with the 50 ft 16-3 must have represented enough line lose to not run the microwave on full power. I am not an electrician. Posted Via AR15.Com Mobile |
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with a little experimentation, im sure you will get it figured out. anyway its a microwave, no biggie, at least you have power and life goes on. you can still cook i'm sure. Propane stove. I need to stock up on wet wipes. I love my kerosene heater. Since the temps outside are mild the little one is enough to do the job. My little genny is more capable than I realized! It was a great buy. I need more toilet flushing water.... Posted Via AR15.Com Mobile |
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I have yet to fire mine up. Still sitting in garage in original packaging for... 3 years now? 2 years? Anybody remember when the Advance Auto Parts sale + mail in rebate made them like $100 or $150? I remember it being a hot topic for a bit. Smoking deal. Posted Via AR15.Com Mobile Mines been in the garage for a year now except I did get mine out of the box and put a wheel kit on it. Never been used. |
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with a little experimentation, im sure you will get it figured out. anyway its a microwave, no biggie, at least you have power and life goes on. you can still cook i'm sure. Propane stove. I need to stock up on wet wipes. I love my kerosene heater. Since the temps outside are mild the little one is enough to do the job. My little genny is more capable than I realized! It was a great buy. I need more toilet flushing water.... Posted Via AR15.Com Mobile I keep a 300 gallon portable water tank outside next the to bathroom window. I can use a small battery operated sub pump to bring water in the house. I bought the tank at a Tractor Supply for $250 a few years ago. |
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Quoted: If burning gasoline in order to watch television is YOUR idea of the "Shit Hitting The Fan".... ...... I do sincerely hope you are NEVER faced with any sort of emergency, as you may be psychologically ill equipped. Oferpeetsache. Give him a little credit. Power went out, and it gave him an excuse to start playing around to see what he could run off his generator. If the S had actually HTF, he wouldn't be wasting his gas on Sherlock Holmes. SHTF practice in the sense of messing w/ his generator, extension cords, etc. Hell, he's a light year ahead of me because now he's actually unboxed his generator and used it. |
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If burning gasoline in order to watch television is YOUR idea of the "Shit Hitting The Fan".... ...... I do sincerely hope you are NEVER faced with any sort of emergency, as you may be psychologically ill equipped. You saw in this thread atleast 2 other folks who have never even TEST RUN their generator. Yet you are giving this guy big balls over test running his generator and enjoying himself? Atleast he knows his works 
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I should also mention that my loads were way smaller than I originally thought.
I had planned to run the fridge for 4 hours, the freezer for 4 hours, then 4 hours off. My freezer runs at 225 watts, the fridge runs at 150 watts, I didn't check the two TV's, but I am sure they weren't more than 300 watts between them. That puts my running loads at around 675 watts, not including start up watts. I used my kerosene heater, but I could have easily run our furnace with the other loads. It has a very slow start and runs under 300 watts if I remember correctly. We used oil lanterns to supplement the kerosene heater. Energy efficient appliances really pay off in these situations. It was nothing running both major appliances at the same time with enough capacity to run a lot of lights and other stuff. There is a huge convenience advantage to having the whole house wired up for a transfer switch. I was not even tempted to run the whole house so it was not a big deal at all. Grabbing an LED lantern as I moved about the house was a very slight hassle, but you start remembering after a few times of walking into a dark room. The coleman high tech lanterns were awesome in this situation. They are so efficient that I thought nothing of leaving one on in the bathroom on low so my mom would not trip on the extension cords. I reviewed them recently. I believe 300 hours on low was not a problem. The most used setting on my flashlights? 3 to 10 lumens. When I refilled the genny I used a magnetic bayco light I reviewed recently. I used the magnet mount to stick it to the garage door runner so I could see what I was doing while using both hands to fill it. |
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I picture the batman house with assorted lights almost everywhere. I know. flashlights mounted to the ceiling fan blades It does take a while to choose.......... ;-) I did use the tk35 to light up the yard for the dog to pee. The bayco is a spectacular work light for its size and weight. I had my nitecore ex 10 on me for the last few weeks. Posted Via AR15.Com Mobile |
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Good on you for playing around and seeing what works. I recently bought a 12/3 25ft extension cord and it most certainly lets tools work to their potential even when using grid power. If you happen to have a volt/ohm meter it might be worth measuring the resistance in your single long cord and your single short cord and then connect them and measure that resistance. I was always told that the connectors are like a water valve and they restrict power a bit. So a single cord that length might actually do better than the 2 cords connected. I have some of the cheap orange extension cords around here but they are for low draw stuff. I used to have some serious extension cords but they went to a buddy who has a business and actually could make money with them. The yellow 12/3 stuff is my current price point but I might see about making my own. We had a recent thread on extension cords, could be 2 months ago though, and I was told that harbor freight tends to sell extension cords for cheaper than I can buy the parts for making similar cords. I still plan to get some parts since now and then a cord needs repaired. I could also use some short, 10ft length, extension cords for stuff like the window air conditioner where the genny will run it but I want the genny a bit further away than I can get it with the stock air conditioner's cord. I consider this sort of stuff a way to live my day to day life even during minor bad times. Like the power is out and I am working doubles but the air conditioner will let me sleep better for the short amount of time I have to sleep before going back to work. I would probably have my neighbor dealing with the fridge and freezer running if I can't be at home much and we can work something out for that effort. I do like the idea of the extension cord that has 3 branches built into it and I have several old surge protecters as well as just plain old power strips. The surge protectors are considered bad after several years from what I have read so I consider them power strips now. They are better built than a lot of today's stuff as well and use a larger cord as well. But once again, making some stuff out of the available parts is on my mind because it will do just what I want to do and knocking some length off extension cords can be useful if close to the load limit. |
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Good excuse to run the genny. I do a spring and fall run of it every year now and run it for about an 1/2 hour and give it a good once over for minor maintenance issues that do crop up. Also - keep extra fittings and internals on hand.
(oh hey - page 2 - yippee me) |
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If burning gasoline in order to watch television is YOUR idea of the "Shit Hitting The Fan".... ...... I do sincerely hope you are NEVER faced with any sort of emergency, as you may be psychologically ill equipped.  I was having fun.......Testing equipment is Good. Practice is a good thing. I Apologize for harshness there. Stock as much fuel as you can, rotate regularly. Drain the carburetor Fuel Bowl after each use. |
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Quoted: 1st lesson. My 1600 watt continuous inverter generator will easily run my 1300 watt microwave, but not on 75 ft of extension cords. My generator grunted under the load and kept going, but it was not enough power to run it. I reduced to 70% power and it ran like a champ. Posted Via AR15.Com Mobile http://www.elec-toolbox.com/calculators/voltdrop.htm |