Posted: 9/12/2009 9:07:50 AM EDT
Just got a DeWalt DG4300 generator, this thing is 100% new, still has tags on it, no oil or fuel has ever been in it.Got it for free what a major score for me  . What can i expect to power with it. I have electric baseboard heat, i know i will not be able to run my heay, but just how much do you think i will be able to run? The things i would like to be able to run are, my well pump, my septic pump, my pellet stove(electric feeder), refridgerator, some lights. Any insight on what i can actually run with this gnerator is greatly appreciated. Also, should i keep this generator or sell it/trade it towards something with more power.Thanks in advance....
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| You have to figure it out. The genny is probably 3700 watts continuous and 4300 surge. Check how many watts each device uses. Then see how much the surge demand is for the devices in question. Sometimes the surge use is 3x the run rating. Look at the plate on each device and it should be labeled.You might want to see if you could sell it and use the money to get a Briggs and Stratton 7500 watt which sounds like what you need. Its probably about the same price as the Dewalt. |
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I would figure out how much power you need and what needs to run at the same time before thinking about changing to another generator.
A well pump shuts off once it pressurizes the system so if you set things up so you just run the well pump for a while to get a bunch of water stored up you won't need to keep on kicking the well pump on. Basically you can flush the toilets and leave their fill tanks empty while the pump is off. If you have some buckets of water you can then fill the tanks and flush the toilets again without needing to run the pump. When you do run the pump the toilets tanks get filled, the buckets get filled, and I would fill other stuff as well. The septic tank pump varies, is it just a lift pump or an aerator or what? My uncle just had to redo his septic system and now has a lift pump setup in it. For how little he and the wife are home the pump does not run all that often and if the power was out the lift pump would only get power when it needed to actually do some work. An aerator is different and I don't know much on those. Some pellet stoves just need 12 volts to run the hopper motor so in some cases people just rig up a car battery or a couple golf cart batteries to run that motor for a while and then charge up the battery when it needs charged up. Refrigerators vary greatly, all my cheap fridges still kept things cold for a few hours with no power so I would only run them until they got things nice and cold and then shut off the power to it for a while. Getting a cordless temp sensor setup makes this stuff easy, you can watch how the fridge works normally and then have a better idea of what to do when the power is out. I personally like smaller generators since they are more efficient. I am not worried about being able to run everything in the house at once with the generator so getting something fuel efficient makes more sense. Run some searches on kill a watt meters and start figuring out how much power you actually need and start figuring out how often you need all that power. A smaller generator would probably run all your stuff if doing it one at a time but if you want to run a few things at once then you might prefer to keep what you have. And you need to figure out if your well pump is 110 or 220 and see if the generator can run what you have or not. |
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Just want to second the advise of "biere", check out your well pumps starting watts required. I have a 600 foot deep well and a 1 1/2 horse pump. It demands roughly 6500 watts to start then once running only 2600. Apparently you may be able to get some water with an undersized generator but even if this is true it would be very bad for the pump. As far as lights and refrig, etc. you should be fine, just watch what's running all at the same time and stagger your loads!
Prepper |