Preparing for Infrastructure Lapses...
 

Sorry, I just couldn't think of a better title. I thought of "Preparedness" and I thought of "Surviving... etc.", but they all sounded so 'Guns and Dogs, and Bags of Beans', and I've been down that road, and that's just not where I want to go anymore.

But I think that preparing for temporary lapses of the infrastructure seems very much more civilized and realistic and likely to happen, and easier to prepare for. I can live with that one.

Case in point:

A month or so ago, the power went out, when it was night. I was lucky to remember the general area where I had last left my flashlight, and I "brailled" my way around in total darkness for 5 minutes or so (seemed like five hours) until I found one tiny LED single AA cell flashlight.

That helped me find other stuff. So I used the inconvenient moments to take stock...

Here's what I didn't have:

• No house lights
• No electric cooking (resistance, induction, microwave)
• No Internet
• No telephone (I have no cell, I use IP-phone)
• No mini-split heat (it wasn't very cold then, so no problem)
• No TV
• Dead refrigerator
• Dead freezer

Here's what I did have:

• Natural gas cook stove
• Heat from the stove's oven
• Hot water (NG demand DW heater ignited by D-cells)
• Water (hot & cold)
• Portable battery-powered radio
• A refrigerator full of food
• A freezer full of food.

Honestly, the first thing I did was to take a nice long hot shower because my gas demand water heater is always ready, and because I could. It made things much better.

But it was quite startling to be in the midst of an outage (could have been a crisis, but it wasn't) and not have any communications. I couldn't even communicate my plight to anybody... that is a problem.

Especially vexing because I know that the phone line (my dsl) is working... (at least, The Telco has it act together).

But my connection to the Internet is out because some low voltage devices:

• my Internet modem 12V
• my IP phone adapter (Ooma) 12V
• my cordless phones 9V

...are not functioning because of no 120 VAC power.

Then I realized that I have all the parts scattered about because I had started collecting the parts to build a "Lapse-Proof" battery backup to keep my fundamental stuff going.

So I started thrashing about through my house with my tiny LED light looking for the pieces in the dark:

• 12V Lead-Acid Battery
• Inverter
• 12V power cable to attach the two together.
• misc. cords & cables & plug strip

Turned out that the 12V power cables were the hardest to find, and one of the cables required some modification. So down I go into the gloomy dark basement, while holding the little flashlight in my teeth, I cut and modified the cable to fit the purpose.

As I was bringing the modified 12V cable upstairs, the power came back on and the TV started yammering and all the rest of the house came alive... crisis over.

So, at least, I have all the parts together in the same place, even if they are not assembled.

LESSONS:

• Searching for tiny flashlights in the dark really sucks. (not finding them would be much worse)
• D-cell ignited NG demand hot water heater is very good
• Gas stove is good to have (I also love my induction & microwave)
• Having a kit to provide essential communications power (in the absence of a cell phone) is a worthy goal

-AC

You should try a power outage in a foreign country some time... I got one once while working in the Bahamas. Power dropped out in the midst of taking a shower after work. It's not nearly as convenient as being at home when you're fumbling around in a dark hotel room trying to find that flashlight you packed "just in case". Once I finished getting cleaned up, I drove to the other side of the island, where there was power, for dinner. When I got back to my hotel later, power was on again, but I never forget that dark night. I now make absolutely certain I pack a flashlight or LED head lamp when I'm packing my bags for business or vacation trips. (fortunately, the power stayed on during my two trips to mainland China this year).

Flashlights are really nice to have - if you can find them. I've resolved that by purchasing a couple of plug-in LED lights. They are always ready, and automatically turn on when the power goes off (provided they are in the charging stand).

We used to regularly have power outages of 3-10 days, almost always caused by limbs taking down lines during storms.. PG&E restores power in order of how many customers are affected, with maybe a couple hundred houses in our area, we waited, sometimes days.

With a wood stove & natural gas wall furnace for heat, we were fine. With a well, no water. Not being able to flush toilets really sucks! Most of the time we would get by, collecting water from downspouts to flush with. For extended outages, the sky would clear leaving us with no way to flush again. Eventually, I bought a gas generator to run the well and the fridge. But, keeping a generator running for a refrigerator is maddening, Especially burning $20 in gas to save $3 in milk. Now, I put fridge contents in ice chests, and hope for the power to return soon. Haven't had to throw any milk out yet :)

Many years ago, after they were found liable for a couple of fires caused by limbs and power lines, PG&E really stepped up their vegetation control programs - in California, the utilities are responsible for maintaining the utility ROW. Now, we rarely have outages.

I am now planning a battery back up system for the cable modem, router and phone (Ooma VOIP). My cable provider seems to be pretty good at keeping the cable powered up during outages.

Pat

I tend to keep my mobile(cell) phone in my pocket at all times, the led light on that helps me locate a torch in the dark.

Our power goes out regularly, in the year we,ve lived here it seems to go out at least once a month. Neighbours tell me it's much better than it used to be!

So far we,ve lost a washing machine and a nas drive.
The washing machine was mid cycle when the power went out, control board died and machine wouldn't cycle after that.
The nas died in another power cut a few weeks later. It would power up but not mount the drives and would crash after a couple of mins. Had to buy some recovery software to read the drives on my PC and retrieve our data.

Since then I,ve added ups's to our PC's, one for my remaining nas drive, router and phone.

Have another ups waiting to be fitted to the lighting circuits for the whole house, with led and cf lighting it only takes a small ups to provide backup for all our lighting.

I started gathering some bits for a backup micro CHP unit but haven,t had time to work on that yet.

Water almost never goes off in the UK, guess if required we do have a borehole we with pump so water would not be a problem.

Steve

We regularly get outages here. This leaves us with no heat, light, water. Basically everything goes. I keep planning to buy a generator but somehow it never happens. Perhaps because our outages are usually short; more like minutes or hours rather than days.

I have used an inverter running from a car battery to run a few things. That is always useful because (although not efficient) I can always run a car to re-charge a battery.

Another solution after a long outage in winter is to take stuff from the freezer and put it outside, where it is often colder than a freezer anyway. Also I can freeze water outside and put it in the fridge to cool that. Not much use in the summer of course.

You are actually much further ahead than many because you have NG for cooking and water heating and have water pressure (city, I assume). I lived through the NE Blackout of 2003. We had no water pressure but were able to "share" power from the neighbor's generator for an couple of hours every 6 hours.

While you can do a lot with a couple of deep cycle (marine) batteries and a good inverter, you can do a LOT more with a GOOD small inverter generator. The Honda EU2000i is the "Cadillac" of this type of generator, but there are several decent challengers (Yamaha EF2400i/EF2800i and Champion).


Bigger generators are NOT better when it comes to temporary power. With careful energy usage management, you can comfortably live on 2-3kw except maybe A/C (more on that later). Larger generators use a lot of fuel which is a pain unless you have one set up for natural gas. (There are retro fit kits for portable generators.)

The simplest way to hook up your portable generator is a bunch of extension cords. Start with a 12 gauge (10 gauge would be better for over 2kW generators) to get the power from where the generator is located to inside the house (another win for smaller, inverter generators; they are a lot quieter !) Then use a heavy duty "triple tap" to split the power to your priority devices (refrigerator, freezer, furnace, etc). Use adequately sized cords (14 gauge would be good).

The tricky one to hook up with a portable generator and extension cords is your furnace. The Reliance TF151W is THE solution !

http://www.transferswitchplace.com/1...tch-tf151w.jpg.


IMHO, transfer switch panels are a waste of time and money !

http://ecorenovator.org/forum/attach...7&d=1415805053

If you don't like extension cords, get a generator interlock for your breaker panel. You can still plug you generator in to an outside plug and then power the circuits YOU WANT POWERED AT THE TIME OF THE BLACKOUT and not endanger anyone working on the wiring outside of your home !


If you live in a part of the country where A/C is a "must have", buy a window A/C unit for one bedroom or a small (120V) mini split. Wire it to a pigtail on the outside of the building directly next to a god quality weather resistant outlet. When you have power, plug it in. When you don't plug it into a second small generator ! If you have a 3kW generator and are careful with your loads, one generator is probably enough.


The biggest problems with generators is fuel. Storing a reasonable amount on hand, SAFELY. Rotating your stock every 6 months or so. NG is the way to go or propane if you already own a large tank. Every generator should be started and a load applied once every 4-6 weeks just to make sure it will start.

I have a small 5,000 watt generator but I have been thinking about switching it to natural gas.
https://www.propanecarbs.com/

I have been eying up PTO generators I have a 36 HP diesel tractor that could run it.
I like the NorthStar PTO Generator — 7200 Watt maybe a black Friday sale.
NorthStar PTO Generator — 7200 Watt, 14 HP Required | PTO Generators| Northern Tool + Equipment

We don’t lose power very much at all but in the winter we can have ice storms. In the past we have lost power for almost a week from an ice storm and we are the very last house on this power line.

I'm surprised to hear you guys have as many issues as you do. Since I've been in my house, I think the power has gone out for an extended period of time two times in six years. One time was a couple hours, one was half a day. Neither were big deals at all.

Another source for conversion kits is US Carburetion

[/QUOTE]I have been eying up PTO generators I have a 36 HP diesel tractor that could run it.[/QUOTE]
Those show up for sale occasionally on Craigslist.


Power distribution is usually the biggest issue. START PLANNING NOW !!

Concur ! 37 years in the same place and other than the NE Blackout, I have never been without power for more than a few hours and even those were rare.


I drag generator of the garage every month or 2 and run it for 15-20 minutes. Biggest issue is keeping fresh gas in it, so I never fill it more than 1/4-1/2 full.

This is why I would like a PTO generator.



Yes that is the kit I will probably get off ebay their older one. My generator you don’t need to cut the support so the older kit should be fine.
I could just hook the generator up at my sub panel it already is setup to back feed 12.5 KW solar.I would just lock out the main breaker.

Triage
 

I've been giving more thought to this project over morning coffee...

I'm thinking that the most important backup would be communications, since I'm using VOIP.

The most basic chain of communication devices is:

1. DSL Modem (12V)
2. VOIP (Ooma) (12V)
3. Wireless Router (12V)
4. Wired phone (no volts)

I could even relocate the Wireless Router to a lower level in the Triage hierarchy, because the convenience of Wi-Fi is not absolutely required. My current Wi-Fi router has a dual-processor, and a dual-band 3x3 radio. The power supply is 12V @ 2 Amp. It works great, but I could do without it in an outage.

So, I'm thinking that I could power the above equipment directly from a 12V battery. This would eliminate efficiency loss from the inverter, and also from the wall-warts.

I could run the communication chain off of a modest 12V battery all the time. Then if I had a trickle charger that was just large enough to keep the battery level up.

Seems like the lowest-tech, cheapest, simplest, most reliable way to keep my most basic communication link going.

Thoughts?

-AC

A fully charged 12V lead acid battery is NOT 12V. It could easily be between 11V and 13V.

Also a lead acid battery does not start to "accept" a charge until at least 13.2V and some chargers (not a typical trickle chargers) will be over 14v.


I don't know how sensitive those pieces of electronics are to voltage.

From memory the magic numbers for keeping a battery topped up for standby use is
13.5-13.7V
I was going to do the 12v battery to router, nas and so on myself then upgraded my switch to one with a built in power supply so need 230V.

The easiest 12V backup setup I could find was picoUPS-120 12V DC micro UPS system / battery backup system

This handles battery charging and regulation to the load.

Steve

Just perfect!

I now have one on the way.

Ormston Rules!!

-AC

This does look nice !

I would put my AC power source on a cheap mechanical table lamp timer and set it to run 10-20 hours/day. This way the battery does actually get partially discharged and recharged.

Pretty much all of the small network stuff that runs on 12V will be fine with a little higher. In fact, you'll probably find that a lot of the stock wall warts supply about 15V no load.
Easy way to float charge is to set it to 13.8V and forget it. Somewhat more elaborate is to hold it around 12.8-13.2V most of the time but boost it to 14.4V for about half an hour every few days.

I suggest looking at fossil fuel free setups such as solar/wind and stationary bicycles, to be used all the time. In other words, convert key functionality to being able to run off grid full time.

As Murphy says it, you'll probably find that once you have the right stuff to go (at least partly) off grid, the grid seems to become too reliable...

Sounds great!

Can you post some photos of your stationary bicycle setup??

-AC

There's a whole thread about stationary bicycles as power sources, including my entry somewhere in there.
http://ecorenovator.org/forum/applia...tto-style.html

That 2A 12V current draw for the 3x3 Wi-Fi router would be challenging for a small PV setup. I tried running my Linksys WRT-54G from my 20W PV setup, and I could go 3-4 days before the low voltage cut-off on the charge controller kicked in. Obviously, I needed to use my 50W PV panel. One of these days, I'll make a roof mount for my 50W panel and get it powering some static loads around the house.

There's a reason why my main PV system is grid-tied. In 16+ years in this house, I've been without power for more than 24 hours on only 3 occasions. In 2 out of 3 cases, the eye of the storm passed right over my house. For times like that, there's a generator in the garage that had the fuel system completely drained and dried out. There's no fuel residue in the carburetor bowl, because I removed it and dried it out inside.

The actual draw is probably a lot less than that. I have an Asus router that is labeled 1A but actual draw is more like 0.4A. You can also look into getting one of those travel routers (like the WR703N) which have very low power usage.

With a grid tie solar setup, you can add a connector to directly tap power from the panels when needed. It would be easiest if the system voltage range is between 150-380V, as you can use a hacked PC PSU (to try to regulate the input as well as the output) as a DC/DC converter.

I don't go quite that far ! I just turn off the fuel while it is still running and let it run until it stops.

Funny you mention that, I have a WR703N I keep in my travel bag, running DD-WRT. :thumbup: The challenge running it off-grid is that it wants 5V.

You're right about the current draw, I just checked my WRT-54G at 0.44A. The current draw looked marginal for my 20W panel on a 17Ah battery with some shading where my 20W panel lives on my lower story roof.

As for tapping into my big PV panels before the inverter, my grid-tie is microinverter based, so I'm running 24-30V DC up on the second floor roof. I could use a PV tap to charge 24V batteries, but I already have two 12V Morningstar charge controllers and a 50W panel, in addition to the 20W panel.


I used to do that with the riding lawn mower, but it still tended to gum up on today's modern, lousy gasoline blends. I just find it's easier to drop the float bowl and dry out the last dribble of fuel from the generator rather than unclog the jet when I wish the generator would just start and run.

I have a 7kw I rebuilt it to hold 18 gallons of fuel and put it on an off road cart that can go over rough ground, handle the additional weight of the fuel and be cargo strapped to a trailer under high tension. Its more intended to provide power for remote job site.
It will run the plasma cutter (with a gasoline powered air compressor), mig welder, stick welder at partial power or an air compressor and other tools.
Then I found an L14-30 cord at the scrap yard. I lopped off the female end and installed it into my breaker panel on a 30 amp breaker. To disconnect from the power grid I pull my meter and connect and crank the generator then flip the breaker on.

They make a device called an interlock (some panel manufacturers sell them also). It installs on the breaker panel face plate. It will not allow you to turn on the feed from your generator until the main is turned off. Typically under $100 and saves you from having to pull the meter.

Having a Propane fireplace as I do with 100# tanks will keep you warm threw the power lapse, as would a wood stove etc.

Also

A small even a 2 battery Solar bank a person would have lights radio and a charger station for various battery powered items , flashlights phones etc.

Pulling the meter will take no more than 30 seconds and its cost is free.
That is 30 seconds with the power companies stupid little lock on it. Yes I know what a grid interlock is and precisely how they work, that is why I don't need one. They are idiot proofing for all the non-electricians out there with a backup home power supply.

Here is my generator.
I bought it for $100, Aside from a dead battery it would start and run fine but not put out any power.
So I put ran multimeter leads line to line to do a volt check and got 7 volts. I know that that means no excitation. When you have no excitation you get the same reading for 7kw generators as well as 72kw 3 phase 400hz generators.
So I knew the voltage regulator was toast, brushes were bad or the armature was bad. I figured the most likely cause was bad brushes or bad Vreg.
Once I pulled the dust cover off the back of the generator it was clear right away the brushes were bad. Bought 2 brush sets off ebay for $14, installed one problem solved.

The way the original battery was mounted was a joke.
I have multiple power inverters too. Since that 7kw generator is electric start there is an excuse to have a battery one there. So I equipped with a group 31 AGM battery and 1000 watt pure sine inverter.
Other mods I did was put a more robust useable breaker panel on there, with plugs I actually use (NEMA 10-50 and L14-30).
Then I added an additional 5 gallon generator fuel tank I picked up for free.
There is a spot on the frame to cargo strap another 5 gallon gas can on there for storage or transport too (not pictured).
Its got multiple hoisting and tie down or security points.

I'm fortunate that "heat" is never a problem when the power goes out around here. It's usually 92°F with a feels like of 102°F during the day, and gets down to a low of 82°-84°F at night with humidity in the 70-95% range.

Now that I have the Norcold 40qt and 60qt compressor driven 12v/120v coolers, I've got some options for keeping things cold without running the generator quite so much.

If it looks like it might be awhile, there's always the 2kW inverter I picked up off craigslist for free, or the collection of smaller ones I have lying around.

The cell phones can recharge off the 20W PV setup.

Based on the measurements from my TED 1001, I could technically run my central air off the 5,500W generator, but finding ~10 gallons of gas each day gets to be challenging and expensive.

Not everyone here is an electrician and most people think that they would be "in big trouble" with the POCO for cutting the seal. :rolleyes:

Actually, pulling the meter is a good "visual" for a linesman to know he is not going to be zapped by the the house with light because someone is using a "suicide cord" !

In-laws had 2 for backing up their heat pump during a power outage. I don't think they ever used them !

The Pico Has Landed!
 

The picoUPS, as suggested by Ormston, back at THIS_POST has arrived.

They were back ordered on the unit he linked to. The seller had a substitute HERE, same size, same functionality, same price.

Those guys ship fast!

The unit is about the size of two postage stamps.


It ships with cables, without instructions, but the manual and other goodies can be found HERE.

The silk-screened lables on the board pretty much tell you what you need to know.

I was looking for a lightweight solution, this is it.

Thanks, Ormston!

-AC

Are you saying that having a back up heat source is a bad idea ?
Maybe you could ask them instead of making a statement that denotes the gas fireplace as less than useful.

Most people find them useful threw the winter and not just during black out.

Wizard seems to have some type of aversion to Propane :D

I have multiple heat sources. The Natural gas heat doesn't rely on electric blowers or igniters. Then I have my portable radiant heater, but only have two 20lb propane tanks to feed it.

I have cut their lock off a bunch of times. Its the only way to work on line side of the breaker box with out getting shocked to death and burning down the house.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~


We are directly reversed , my heat needs are as strong as your cooling requirements.

For your air conditioning Power consumption you could use a small window unit to keep a few rooms cool threw the power outage. then a small er 2000w generator could be used.

a 5,000 Btu window air uses about 500w , 10,000 Btu uses about 900w

No NO !! I am saying they were fortunate enough to not need to use them !

That clarifies your statement a lot

AC, what are your battery/charger plans? I don't have any batteries around, so I'm looking FLA vs SLA vs something more exotic. Gotta take everything down to check the wall warts current/voltage and actual current draw first to do the math, I'd like at least a days worth of backup.

Pat

Very good question.

In the manual, the tech note indicate that the picoUPS is tailored for Sealed Lead Acid (4Ah to 60Ah), which is OK for me. I have some heavy Ni-MH cells I'd thought to use but SLA suits me just fine.

I'm gonna make 12V connectors for my essential communication equipment, and measure the actual current draw, to see what capacity SLA I actually need to shoot for.

One day sounds reasonable, I'd thought of 2 or 3... not so much difference.

Best,

-AC

Good thread! Preparedness has become more important to me since becoming a dad and having little ones depending on me.
A couple of thoughts,
Old cellphones even without any service contract should still be able to access 911, as long as they are charged.
If you have a generator and a natural gas heater consider wiring the heater to use an extension cord end for power. Under normal conditions its plugged into a receptacle in your attic, emergencies its plugged into your genny.
I keep my cable modem and router on one ups, and my entertainment center on a separate ups. The CyberPower EC850LCD Ecologic 850VA/510-Watts Energy Efficient Desktop LCD UPS is pretty sweet and has a lcd display. Most of the time its just an overpriced surge protector but for the price of electronics I feel it gives me a little extra protection from low voltage and brown outs.
A cordless phone doesn't do much in an outage. Awhile back I was looking to replace an ugly corded phone to find out how hard it is to find unpowered corded phones. Goodwill turned out to be the best source at the time.