Royal or any other of you electrical gurus, i need some help.........

[Wayne in BC]

My generator is a 2500 watt model that i got last year. It was a pain running extension cords into the house from the shop so i made up a heavy extension with two male ends. I could then just kill the outside breaker and plug the genny into the wall of the workshop. Soon after i realised that i would be working off of one 30 amp breaker and only on one side of my panel.......hmmmm
Now i just got done wiring a 220 cable the same way and through the wall in the utility room to plug into my dryer recepticle. Will that light up both sides of my panel?
I am really DUMB about electrical stuff but i gets ideas sumtimes....

 

[Royal]

want to make sure you use a three wire cable.

I just bought a 20ft piece of 12-3 with ground today. Each leg will handle 20 amps. The thing to do is shut off the main and your other breakers, crank up the generator, turn on the breakers one at a time, furnace etc.

Also you can have quite a few breakers on eventually but it is not the breakers you have to worry about. It is how many lights you have on on each circit. A hundred watt light pulls less than an amp. Just watch the lights and keep the frig door closed and you will be fine. At least warm

 

[VT Dave]

before energizing any circuits! I know a few linemen that have been hit by gen power!

 

[Wayne in BC]

but a remind is a good thing! I will also cut the water heater out of the circuit. No furnace here just a woodstove, i have not bought furnace oil since 1990.
Royal i used very heavy 3 wire cable, 20 feet of it. I just fired the genny and tested the dryer plug with a lamp, both 110's are hot so i hope i'm good to go and glad to hear that it will energise the whole panel
I reckon i will bring the necessary but high drawing items online one at a time, like the well pump, freezer, etc. I have a propane cookstove.
This is gonna beat the heck outta having extension cords all over the dang house Best probably would be to wire directly to the panel but i won't touch that without a sparky around!

 

[Sunny]

n/t

 

[Sunny]

said this was 2500 watts? Ours is a 15,000 watt and we can run the whole house on it, but try to conserve lights and keep to the basic stuff! Tell Carol to snuggle! Body heat is good!

 

[Wayne in BC]

2500 is enough to run the well pump, lights, TV, puter, freezer and fridge. Last bad outage we had was nearly 6 days, does not happen like that often, mostly a day or less.

 

[George-CT]

I have one with my gas welder but been thinking of getting a small one for the house. Torn between a 3500 watt unit or a 10kw one that runs off the pto of my tractor. That 10KW one from Harbor Freight is $289 bucks, cheap enough and their 3500 watt gas generator is $399. All from China of course..... I'm not sure how regulated the voltage is in the cheap ones. decisions decisions...

Geo-CT

 

[Wayne in BC]

fuel system and starting qualities are not as good as major manufacturers but quite acceptable. 10k is more than i need and too fuel hungry. This 2500 watt is fine.

 

[George-CT]

Think they make the Honda engines also or so I was told. I know Pep Boys carries them also and a lot of the camper folks didn't want to spend the big bucks on the Honda or the Yamaha, so went with the copy and them seem happy with them when I read the forums for Good Sams Club Camping.

I hope to get to Harbor Freight and see what they have next week. They had a 2500 watt one like yours and 3500 and 5kw. The5 kw is heavy. I looked at a diesel also.....also shipped from offshore, enclosed in a box on Ebay, for 900 bucks....6 kw I think it was. AT least the diesel will start if it sits along time. My luck with gas don't always go that way for rarely used items, especially with this oxygenated fuel today.....

Geo

 

[Wayne in BC]

mine has a remote electric start but always requires that i manually give it some throttle for a cold start after sitting for a few weeks

 

[George-CT]

n/t

 

[Wayne in BC]

n/t

 

[rmptr]

George, if you plan on shopping at harbor freight, review their online ads before going to the storefront.
If you see a good deal on something, run a printout and the store will honor it.
Otherwise, you pay full price for that chinese junk.
rmptr

 

[George-CT]

in West Warrick, RI. They beat the catalog quite often. I purchased a tire changer for cars and the motorcycle attachment. In the catalog both items came to $149.00. I called them and they had it on sale for $79.00 bucks, Only a 1 hour drive so I went and got it. While there they gave me their flyer for the store and the prices were much less than the catalog. But, as you say, its all China. Unfortunately, so is Sears now. Pretty hard to get around it and I usually make a major effort NOT to buy anything but from China. Its getting harder and harder.

George-CT