Q's about Back-feeding Electricity from Generator

[Jgray152]

BTW, where are you located? I am in NH and we lost power for 4 days. People down the road are still without power since December 11th at 11pm. Thats 11 days and 1.45 hours. haha. Yikes. My girls parents house is the house I was sitting for. They 7 minutes away from me still without power due to the ice storm.

Trying to keep both my tanks warm and aerated was a PITA!

Lucky for me, I know how to fix small engines and know about electrical. I got the pleasure of tearing their engine on the gen apart to fix it when it died. Before that though, I was driving to their friends place, 50 minutes away at 1:30am to borrow another gen untill I got theirs running again.

The Gen that I picked up, had a 240v plug on it too. Except it was a 30 amp and not a 20 amp like on the old gen so I could only hook up there outdoor wood furnace, refrigerators, and recirculation pumps for the heating system with an extension cord. I didn't like that setup but it was needed. I got to bed at around 4am. Woke up at 7am to work on their gen.

 

[Dan F]

BTW, where are you located? I am in NH and we lost power for 4 days. People down the road are still without power since December 11th at 11pm. Thats 11 days and 1.45 hours. haha. Yikes. My girls parents house is the house I was sitting for. They 7 minutes away from me still without power due to the ice storm.

Trying to keep both my tanks warm and aerated was a PITA!

Lucky for me, I know how to fix small engines and know about electrical. I got the pleasure of tearing their engine on the gen apart to fix it when it died. Before that though, I was driving to their friends place, 50 minutes away at 1:30am to borrow another gen untill I got theirs running again.

The Gen that I picked up, had a 240v plug on it too. Except it was a 30 amp and not a 20 amp like on the old gen so I could only hook up there outdoor wood furnace, refrigerators, and recirculation pumps for the heating system with an extension cord. I didn't like that setup but it was needed. I got to bed at around 4am. Woke up at 7am to work on their gen.

Yikes! That story makes me feel a lot better... We got power back last night after 20 hours without. A couple of my bigger tanks had problems getting back up to temperature, but none dropped below 73-74 degrees. My old 10 HP generator works pretty well, but there's no chance of starting it cold without starting fluid (pull start).

I couldn't run our well pump because it is located on the other end of the property, about 1400' away from the house. Our heater uses a heat pump and I was leery of trying to run it, as you know they draw a ton of power at start-up.

We live in Oregon in an area called the Silverton Hills (foothills of the Cascade Range). We get snow here all the time from December-March, but it was freezing rain in the valley that caused our outage. I've heard the Northeast has been getting hammered, 11 days without power would be a nightmare!

Thanks again for your help!

 

[johnptc]

important !!! turn the main breaker off before you do any of this.....live power on the mains could KILL a lineman working on the system !!!!

only turn the main back on after the generator is powered down and the jumpers are removed..........

 

[Jgray152]

TURN MAIN OFF!!!!!! Also Turn off all other breakers as well.

I got to it before you

For more permanent installations, use a higher gauge wire such as 8/3 or 6/3. 12/3 and 10/3 are cheaper but can get the job done for non permanent installations. A 50-70 amp breaker should be used. Depending on the rating of the Generator.

To find out the total current that generator is capable of, Divide the gens total surge volts by 120 (house line voltage).
Example, 6250 / 120 = 52 amps. A 60 amp breaker should work just fine.

If you go by the 5000 watt continuous power rating which is 41amps, and you use a 40-50amp breaker, you may pop the circuit when a large surge comes. If you use a 60 amp breaker, you will be using less than 80% of the total breake rating for your continous power.

BTW, thats a VERY LONG distance for a well pump. holy crap! haha. 1400 feet!!!! I doubt your gen would be able to handle it.

For you heat, there is no issue with "trying" to energize it. You won't hurt anything. There are three things that can happen if the gen or another thing can't handle the load. 1) the breaker you use could pop 2) The breaker on the gen will pop (both are resettable) 3)The gen will stall out.

Since you power is back on, its not an issue anymore.

I would have someone come out and install a perm setup. You can have the electrician install a 30amp 240v recepticle on the outside of your house so you can plug your gen into it with ease. You would only have to make a small patch cable which runs from the Gen to the 240v plug on the house.

 

[Dan F]

I got to it before you

For more permanent installations, use a higher gauge wire such as 8/3 or 6/3. 12/3 and 10/3 are cheaper but can get the job done for non permanent installations. A 50-70 amp breaker should be used. Depending on the rating of the Generator.

To find out the total current that generator is capable of, Divide the gens total surge volts by 120 (house line voltage).
Example, 6250 / 120 = 52 amps. A 60 amp breaker should work just fine.

If you go by the 5000 watt continuous power rating which is 41amps, and you use a 40-50amp breaker, you may pop the circuit when a large surge comes. If you use a 60 amp breaker, you will be using less than 80% of the total breake rating for your continous power.

BTW, thats a VERY LONG distance for a well pump. holy crap! haha. 1400 feet!!!! I doubt your gen would be able to handle it.

For you heat, there is no issue with "trying" to energize it. You won't hurt anything. There are three things that can happen if the gen or another thing can't handle the load. 1) the breaker you use could pop 2) The breaker on the gen will pop (both are resettable) 3)The gen will stall out.

Since you power is back on, its not an issue anymore.

I would have someone come out and install a perm setup. You can have the electrician install a 30amp 240v recepticle on the outside of your house so you can plug your gen into it with ease. You would only have to make a small patch cable which runs from the Gen to the 240v plug on the house.

We have power (for now) but the snow is still falling, so you never know...

I will try the heat next time, of course I will shut off the fridge and most other circuits when I turn on the heat pump.

I like the idea of putting a 240V receptacle on the outside of the house. If I put the plug on the house just behind the panel I will be able to put the generator in a small shed about 30' from the house without buying any more wire.

My sump has it's own circuit with outlets under the crawlspace, dragging extension cords down there in the cold was never fun, this makes my life a lot easier.

 

[johnptc]

to get 110 from 240 the neutral will have to be connected.............4 wires

240,240, neutral and ground

 

[johnptc]

I got to it before you

thanks...id hate to get someone injured !!

 

[Jgray152]

to get 110 from 240 the neutral will have to be connected.............4 wires

Just to clarify, for others, you never want to connect directly the neutral and Hot wires. This could cause a fire if a breaker is not tripped. What Johnptc means to get 240v, you will need to use the white wire, if you are using a 2 conductor wire with ground cable. The white wire needs to be disconnected from the ground strip in the circuit box, and connected to a 240v breaker. Lots of times people will use the 2 conductor wiring with copper ground which has White, Black and Copper (ground). In this case, copper would be neutral and White and Black would be HOT

In the OP case, he has a 4 wire recepticle which has two hot wires and 1 ground and 1 neutral. Red and Black are hot (120 each). The Neutral wire stays connected to ground.

In a 3 wire recepticle, you are semi correct. Although to do it right, you should have a Red, Black and White for a 3 wire 240v recepticle. Red, black are hot while white stays neutral.

Do not confuse Neutral with Ground. Power flows from HOT to Neutral. The appliance connected between the two acts as the resistance in the current flow. The Ground is a fault circuit. Stray power which could damage equipment or seriously hurt YOU will be deverted to ground.

Both neutral and ground are wired to the same place in the panel but are not used the same.
Understanding Neutral and Ground

120, 120, neutral and ground

Typo I fix.

 

[Jgray152]

Gen Transfer Switch Installation Wiring (Not my diagram)
http://images.google.com/imgres?imgurl=http://www.smps.us/connecting_generator.GIF&imgrefurl=http://www.smps.us/transferswitch.html&usg=__QeZ9RXAQPcj_n7E-ZGHsmlNPJZE=&h=529&w=688&sz=15&hl=en&start=8&um=1&tbnid=QPZaHK3vh1QxUM:&tbnh=107&tbnw=139&prev=/images%3Fq%3Dwiring%2Bdiagram%2Bfor%2Ba%2Bgenerator%26um%3D1%26hl%3Den%26rls%3Dcom.microsoft:*:IE-SearchBox%26rlz%3D1I7DKUS%26sa%3DN

 

[pussyfishhunter]

everyone do be careful running amps higher than wire is rated for. if breakers dont trip fires can happen. 60 amps requires 8 gauge copper wire where im from.