Electricians????

For both peace of mind and practicality, I'm buying a standby generator. A friend of ours who works for the local electric system estimated our house would take 8,000 watts, max. Considering our furnace, water heater, and kitchen range are all propane, does this sound reasonable?

Obviously, during a power outage in the winter the furnace and the well are the two most important things to keep going. The house is 1800 square feet on one floor with 6" outside walls and extra insulation. There's a lot of stuff we could turn off if we had to.

Menard's have a 10,000 watt peak unit on sale for $800+ that looks attractive. I've figured out how to wire it in, but I'm having a local electrician back me up on it. When it's zero degrees with the power off is no time to find out you didn't do something right.

The last outage we had was several years ago when the power went off on Christmas Eve and came on the next morning so outages are not a real concern, but when they occur it's under the worst conditions.

Don't forget to ground it, ooops, here we go :lol:

8000 sounds high considering all your propane appliances--- back in 1985 after hurricane gloria, brookhaven national laboratory determined that a 4000 watt generator would suffice for most homes---so they ordered hundreds of them and made them available to all employes---had to use mine 11 days straight after hurricane sandy in 2012

I have a 10,000 W continuous that will run everything except the oven and water heater can't go at the same time! Just to give you an idea of what it takes. You should be comfortable with that 8,000, you can get by with less if needed. Only reason I have one that big is it also welds...

I've had very good luck with my 8kw. Sure you have to be a bit selective but its only there to keep the place warm and dry until the power comes back on. My main panel was full and I wanted to add some extra circuits anyway, so I installed a gen panel with 12 circuits just for the important stuff (furnace, fridge, freezer, sump, etc) it has an approved transfer switch so no chance of back feed. And that freed up circuits in the main panel for non-critical stuff. One thing to remember is big gen = more fuel and when power is out fuel is sometimes hard to get.

Just put in a manual transfer switch that transfers your entire service, then choose what you want to run

I'd be wary of buying something with a motor from Menards. They are a lumberyard at heart, and not an implement dealer. Last I knew, their units were Generac... also a brand to be wary of. It doesn't look like "Generic" for nothing, you know.

Sorry if this sounds cynical. But if you are going to the effort of installing a standby unit, gety one that will do the job.

Look for the continuous duty rating of the generator, probably around 80 percent of peak output, but it could be different.

8000 watts is 33 amps at 240v. In summer when you are not as likely to need the generator you might be pinched for power running air conditioning. Otherwise you should be alright.

Don't know what your budget is for this, but if you could find a propane fueled one, sure would make it more dependable for starting than trying to keep fresh gas in it.

Something that hasn't come up. I always run my generators on Hi-Test gas. There is less or no ethinol in it. Also most generators have been tuned to run at 3600 rpm and the carbs are set to run wide open. Also they will not do that "hunting " crap. Reguular gas is not all fhe same. One thing I have done with EVERY generator I own is get hold of or borrow a meter that reads HZ, cycles per second and fine tune your govenor screw to get 59.80 to 60.20 cycles per second. Todays electronics including your hi-efficency furnace must be on the nose or you stand the chance of blowing up some very very expensive electronics. ALWAYS turn off the gas when you are done and let her run out. Change your oil once a year or after every long time of running. Be good to your generator and , you know the rest. I would say the 8000 is good, IF you only turn on this and that only when needed. Be a bit on the conservative side. The 10K would be even better in MHO. Another thing I do is store at least 20 gallons of hi-test in a cool dry place and pour it in the truck once a year so the new gas is fresh again.

I have same situation as you and do mine with 5000 watts. Would not think of running air conditioning.

Most of the generators sold new now days have an impressive figure for the selling information and on the box. Very few can produce that figure under a continuous daily sustained load. So what you are getting is a momentary surge of that much power but only a sustainable amount of about 60-70% of that figure. They are also noisy 3,600 rpm screamers built with a life expectancy of probably 100 or so hours and then you spend enormous amounts of time trying to find parts or service for them. Ask Mr. Billy Shafer on here about that part of owning a generator.

Find you one of the older Onan, Kohler, Winco or some of the older cast iron monstrosities set up for propane or natural gas or even better the tri-fuel set up and can burn all of the above plus gasoline. The diesel sets are nice and if you have fuel oil heating tanks you can burn that for generating current. Not all are cast iron, some are lighter aluminum. They usually produce their total amperage at 1,800 rpm and are quieter plus they last longer and have less fuel consumption Most of them can carry the advertised load continuously.

I have an older Onan 20 Kw natural gas fueled one with the transfer switch. This will power my whole house and have a little reserve. I have some gas heat and some heat pumps.

I prefer to have a little too much capacity than to have too little. Sure it will burn a little more fuel, but when it is freezing, sleeting and snowing you will feel better about it. Take care of your generator and it will take care of you when you need it.

I use ethanol of all of my small engines including my generator and have never had a fuel related problem with any of them. Last time we needed the generator it started on the second pull with two year old ethanol in the tank. Of course the carb was drained.

As previously stated , I would not load a 10,000 watt generator beyond 8000W continuous.
Safer to add up the amps. As adding watts does not account for reactive power that loads the generator but does no work.
When the well pump starts with a generator that small the voltage will drop. This will make starting the pump slow or impossible and it will make some other equipment shut down and have to be restarted.
10,000watt in your application is a do-able solution but on the low end.

Go over to smokstak.com then onan generator. Post your question. Someone always has a good genset to sell.

I've got a propane gap-pak for heat, a propane oven/stove, and a propane dryer. I've got an 8500 watt diesel (2 cyl Lister Petter) and I've run mine for a week, plus when we lost power in a big winter storm.

The only thing I had to do back then was turn the water heater off to insure I didn't draw too much if the well pump kicked on. At the time I had a 1HP pump, but when it blew I replaced it with a 1/2 HP and I shouldn't have to turn anything off now, based on the numbers, but I still do.

During the winter you should be able to run on 8000 to 8500 watts with no problem because all it takes for the heat is to open the gas valve, and a blower.

In the summer time you won't get as lucky because you have the compressor on the A/C drawing a lot more power.

If it was me, I'd check the max amp draw on the stuff drawing the most juice. In other words your HVAC unit, your well, washer and dryer (together or separate}, and the refrigerator.

If you've got any other loads that may be on the large side, I'd check them and allow a bit for them too. Ultimately though it all comes down to exactly how 'comfortable' you want to be when the power goes out.

From experience I'd say the 10,000 watt would be plenty for you. You can't run everything at once, but you should be able to live comfortably with no issues. Too it's not so big that it drinks a lot of gas.

The one thing to make sure if is that it has 220 capability and that it can be split into two 110 circuits.

What's the continuous rating? That's the number you really need.

I wouldn't buy one that burns gas unless it had a honda. Their small engines are so good, even the chinese knock-offs aren't bad.

Thanks for all the responses!

I'll set one up and hope I never have to use it.

For once in a while use for a few hours do you need the expense of a generator big enough to run the whole house all at once? If you want to keep the freezer or refrigerator cool, pump water once in a while, and maybe run the furnace or air conditioner now and then you can run one thing at a time and do with a smaller unit. I know it is more hassle to be switching around what you are running but for a day or so once every year or two maybe not too big of a deal for a lot less expense for the generator.