Power Outage in Winter

[legion]

A few of my friends were without power all weekend. I was fortunate.

Is it possible to run your furnace on a gasoline generator?

I was looking through at my furnace and it appears that it is hard-wired into my main panel.

[rammstein]

Is your furnace electric or something? I always asumed that gas or oil furnaces would not be affected by outages.

[legion]

I was wondering how big of a generator I'd need.

That's probably a little fancier than I was thinking.

I was just thinking of storing a small generator in the garage and putting it on the back porch in an emergency. I can unplug my sump pump and fridge, but I can't figure out how to power my furnace.

We're thinking of selling our house in the next year or two, so I'm hesitant to invest in anything more complicated at the moment.

Besides, our main panel has labels like "Kitchen Radio" on it, and several breakers are blank...

[legion]

Originally posted by rammstein
Is your furnace electric or something? I always asumed that gas or oil furnaces would not be affected by outages.

No, it's natural gas, but it has electric ignition, an electric blower (to push air through the heating ducts/vents), and an electric power vent for the exhaust.

Old pilot light systems were less affected, but they still had electric blowers. The only system I could think of that would be completely unaffected would be radiant heat.

[arcsine]

My gas furnace will heat fine in a power outage but the blower does not work without juice. I built a wiring harness to directly power the blower from my generator and it worked like a charm to keep the house warm when it was 20F last week and the power was down for 30 hours. My furnace draws 15A and I have a 20A/2500W generator and I turn off the breaker and disconnect the feed lines so there is no back feed issues. I do not power up anything else while the furnace was on just to be safe-sane.

My experience this winter so far is that investing in a sub-panel and larger generator will be a very good thing.

[rammstein]

Makes sense- the houses where I grew up all had radiators, so the pilot-light was all that it needed.

Make sure they leave their faucets running a bit then.

[legion]

Yeah, I was just thinking of "unplugging' my furnace and plugging it into the generator.

I don't know what code is here for that. I should look into it.

Are most furnaces 220V? Mine was put in the house in '95.

[arcsine]

My furnace was installed in the early '90's and is 110V and is hard wired to the fuse panel. That is why I had to build an adapter. I think that would be unusual for a gas furnace to require 220V.

[skipdup]

Originally posted by procon
It's required by code here, the main reason is that it prevents back-feed into the grid.

I don't remember exactly how or why... but back feed into the grid is extremely dangerous to utility workers... as in kills them- IIRC. This isn't something to take lightly.

Obviously, unplugging wouldn't cause a problem...

- Skip

[legion]

The one labeled "air conditioner" is a double. I'm not sure if it is just the condenser outside or the whole HVAC system.

[oldE]

The proper set-up isn't that expensive. Vital circuits are placed on a second panel with a switch which will power it either from the main panel or your generator. Putting power back into the lines is, indeed hazardous, but if you have your generator connected to the 'line', there is the further risk of having a VERY bad day if the power comes back on. You are working with alternating current, changing from positive to negative and back 60 times/second. All current sources on the grid have to be in phase, that is positive or negative at the same instant. If not...well, we've all seen the sparks that result when you hook a couple of 12 volt batteries up incorrectly. Just imagine that at 220volts. Things go flash and bang and you have to spend money on something besides the P-car.

Play safe
Les

[greglepore]

Utility workers? Imagine this-they open a power cut and assume that a leg is dead, but you're backfeeding the other end-pow, dead worker.

[notfarnow]

Originally posted by oldE
You are working with alternating current, changing from positive to negative and back 60 times/second. All current sources on the grid have to be in phase, that is positive or negative at the same instant. If not...well, we've all seen the sparks that result when you hook a couple of 12 volt batteries up incorrectly. Just imagine that at 220volts.

My father & brother live in Montreal, and saw LOTS of that action in the 1998 ice storm. People start doing REALLY stupid stuff after 5 days without power. BBQ in the kitchen, large hot fires in ornamental fireplaces. Something like 20 people died.

Good point about the seperate panel for necessities. When we rewire in a couple years, we plan on doing that.

[Jims5543]

We are experts at this in Florida. You should be able to run your furnace and maybe a few other things.

Get an Electrician to install a capacitor in the line to your air handler this will make the cranking amps lower and take some tress off the generator.

Then you can make a pigtail that plugs into your dryer plug and then into a generator.

Throw your main breaker and then throw all your fuse panel breakers including the dryer.

Plug your pigtail in and fire up the generator, let it warm up for a few minutes. Throw your dryer braker, now your fuse panel is hot but cut off from the main lines. Then throw the breaker on for the heater, let it start up and get running.

Then you can throw breakers for a few other items granted you generator is big enough and the amperage will not overload it. You should be able to find a chart online for load requirments for items.

Living for 20 days without power in Sept. 2004 made me go out and buy a 15KW generatr that runs on propane. I can run for about 10 days now on a tank of propane.

Of course after I install it El Nino hits and there are no more Hurricanes.... not that I am complaining.

[lendaddy]

I just yank my globe and tap in there. My gen is 9000 watt and it runs my whole house fine (even the central air) the microwave is a big draw but other than that it works fine.

[cstreit]

Legion,

My mother in law is in Decatur and is STILL without power since Friday. 19 degrees out all weekend. Fortunately a neighbor ran a honking extension cord over to their house (2 houses down) for some basic heat.

Still thousands without power after 3-4 days. WE called the power company and got the standard, "we're working on it" response. I'm thinking about driving my motorhome down there for her so she can live in that.

[Flatbutt1]

I had a transfer panel built into my house (GenTran). The generator output plugs into the Gentran panel which is hard wired into main panel. When the power goes out I throw a switch and the entire house runs from the transfer panel, including the furnace.

[legion]

Chris,

Why do you let your mother-in-law live in Decatur?

...

How much would the sub-panel run installed?

I may just give the company that installed the furnace a call tomorrow and see what they have to say...