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Old 11-28-2009, 11:15 AM
 
6 posts, read 13,765 times
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Living in the Bay Area (San Jose)- Sillicon Valley. What are the chances that we'll be out of Electricity would be out of for several days. IF all hell broke loose, there would be no gasoline available.

So, how do you justify buying a generator?
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Old 11-28-2009, 01:17 PM
 
24,834 posts, read 37,214,532 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by gsusd View Post
Living in the Bay Area (San Jose)- Sillicon Valley. What are the chances that we'll be out of Electricity would be out of for several days. IF all hell broke loose, there would be no gasoline available.

So, how do you justify buying a generator?
We keep gas too. I have a 1500 gallon tank. Most of the gas stations around here also have generators, so they could pump gas. And keep their frozen foods safe.
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Old 11-28-2009, 05:49 PM
 
4,104 posts, read 5,292,741 times
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The best reason in the bay area would be if there was a massive quake. There will be gas in all the crushed cars - thousands of gallons.

A generator can power your freezer, the radio, TV, purify water, heat a room, or power emg. medical equipment. As cheap as they are, why not?

Buy a few batteries and charge them - run some LED lights at night. The list is endless.
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Old 11-28-2009, 06:02 PM
 
Location: mancos
7,786 posts, read 7,992,777 times
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all depends on what you need and where you live. i'll take my wood cookstove and canning stuff over a genorator any day. more self sufficient dont depend on brought in fuel. got lots of wood which i prefer to store in the horizontal position wether dead or alive
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Old 11-28-2009, 06:54 PM
 
Location: Somewhere in Kentucky
3,791 posts, read 8,870,677 times
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I was one of those morons who think nothing could happen to them. Until the MASSIVE ice storm earlier this year.

I woke up earlier than normal for work because they were calling for an ice storm. I took a shower. At around 6:20 AM, the lights went out and came back on at 6:23 AM. At 6:40 AM, the power went back out...FOR 14 DAYS!!! It was winter...the WORST time for a power outage. I made my way to town...no power anywhere. I made it over to a store that had ONE 6,000 watt generator left for sale. I bought it. I was luck enough to have some gas on hand because of our garden tractor that sucks alot of gas. I had enough for a few days. Others were not so lucky. Even the police, fire and ambulances had to use their vehicles on an emergency basis only...they had no gas. It was like being back in the stoneages. No electric...no gas...no water for most people...no NOTHING!!!

FEMA and the rest of the government...NO HELP!!! The government will not help you in a crisis. How many days did it take them to get water to Katrina victims?

To answer your question, there are endless ways to justify purchasing a generator. I keep around 50 gallons of gasoline on hand. If you do it right, you can make that last around 5-7 days. I know...I did it. I also pulled my electric meter out and hardwired my generator into my house. I was able to run everything but the hot water heater, oven, etc. The most important thing was that I was able to run the blower on my propane central heating system and my well pump.

A generator can save your life!!!
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Old 11-28-2009, 07:21 PM
 
Location: Northern Maine
10,428 posts, read 18,572,579 times
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Everybody should have a small portable generator, even if you have a large one hard wired into your house. I have a Honda 2000i. It is very quiet, runs 13 hours on a gallon of fuel and is easily transported. It will run a small compressor or a set of large lights. It is stable enough to power a computer and did power as many as five laptops at the same time on an island last spring.

You can leave in a hurry with that computer. It is unlikely that you will be bringing your large fixed fixed generator with you if you need to depart in a hurry.
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Old 11-28-2009, 08:06 PM
 
Location: Cashtown, PA
298 posts, read 478,958 times
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We survived the ice storm last year because we had a woodstove that we kept running continuously 24 hrs a day to heat up an 11 room house plus storefront. We also had a gas stove that we used for cooking and lanterns. So we did all right for the days we were out.

Our sump was out, however my husband jerryrigged something off the car to run electricity to the sump to keep the water out of the basement.

Oh, and by the way...folks were out. As a member of the Red Cross, we were out in force to man and woman the shelters that were put up for folks to stay in. The National Guard was out, helping guard the shelters if the police were not available. And the National Guard was also out clearing limbs and doing whatever they could within their abilities. We had the National Guard come in from different states that were not affected. But that is Massachusetts..can't speak to the timeliness of help in other states. And also a number of the folks (myself included) staffing and running the shelters were themselves without power.

A note tho about generators...when the storm hit and those of us were able to make it to various stores to buy generators found the prices to be over a grand or out of stock completely. Yeah Price gouging really went on big time....so please as NMLM says (god forbid I should agree with him on anything , buy a small generator at least, if you don't have a woodstove to heat and gas stove to cook and you do live in the colder climes....

Which reminds me, that would be a cool Christmas present...anyone have any small portable suggestions for a generator?
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Old 11-28-2009, 08:18 PM
 
Location: Planet Eaarth
8,954 posts, read 20,609,139 times
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In spite of all the fancy plans to live with a generator it's better to prepare to live without one as America , and much of the world , has done for a long time before electricity was so wide spread in use.

It's really not as hard as many think it is to do...........
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Old 11-28-2009, 08:38 PM
 
Location: Somewhere in Kentucky
3,791 posts, read 8,870,677 times
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The National Guard...LOL I am still waiting for them to come to our house and check and see if we are ok. Sure, they came...FOUR DAYS later. FEMA showed up later than that.

You can only rely on yourself in a crisis. Our government (local through federal) is useless.
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Old 11-28-2009, 09:03 PM
 
Location: Cashtown, PA
298 posts, read 478,958 times
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Um...isn't that what we are supposed to do, be reliant only on ourselves? And if we get help from the government, that is gravy? One thing you have to remember...those folks in FEMA, Red Cross, National Guard and others were like as not as badly impacted by the disaster as you would have been. Unless they were from out of state.

You want to know how much fun it is worry about your family and how they are, when someone complains about the food going bad in their frig? I can speak to that from personal experience.

Please folks. Volunteer at your local Red Cross, Salvation Army or whatever charity organization is dear to your heart. I volunteered a straight 36 hours - no sleep because we had no volunteers. And they wanted me to stay on because there was noone to replace me but physically I couldn't do it any longer. More and more towns are starting Emergency Management teams or CERTs to deal with community emergencies. Towns are starting to try to deal with emergencies on their own, however they need folks in the towns to start volunteering.

And before folks say "But I have a job, I have 6 kids, " there are other ways to help. Oh gods, don't get me going but everytime I hear someone complain about lack of aid, it just twists my knickers cause I see and have experienced the other side of the coin. (similes much? lol)

Last edited by medievalbooks; 11-28-2009 at 09:08 PM.. Reason: spelling.uck
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