Never Thought I'd Actually Use the Generator....

[tomcaudell]

Not sure if anyone follows the CA news but it has been a s**t show here the last few days. Fire burning down entire cities and electrical blackouts everywhere. Luckily for me and my family, I was hit with the latter of the two.
Whole town went dark - all businesses closed due to no power. Couldn't even pump gas.

Anyway, getting passed the sob story, I never thought I would actually use the Pro Power generator my truck came with but here we are. Powered up the wifi, tv, fridge, and a couple lights. I have an all new appreciation for this truck.

Side note - CA actually wants to ban gas generators. That has got to be one of the dumbest decisions I could think of.

We are keeping all of you in our prayers. I have been evacuated from my home 2 times in the last 5 years. I live in Northern California. We have had some smoke damage and water damage do to power outage that lasted many days allowing my refrigerator freezer to thaw out while I was at an RV . When we got to go home floor was buckling..

Then pile on horrible forestry management and vegetation control, and you get disasters like these and the other wildfires that have hit CA.

I live up here in Northern California, and worked in hydro power in the Sierra range. I remember when they allowed seasonal grazing and logging. They had annual burning. It’s just a shame. I’m praying for those affected by these fires and praying for change that puts people and safety and infrastructure, Dams, modern water systems and as there priorities. I appreciate the people that use this form. They really helped me with my new Ford..

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[PaulGrun]

YUP... A little controlled burning would prevent all of this..

Nonsense. Utter nonsense. The shitstorm in SoCal has nothing to do with forestry practices. These are urban fires being whipped into a firestorm by unbelievable winds.

Trying to stay out of this conversation, but it’s really hard to avoid given all the misinformation being thrown around on this thread.

 

[RickBullotta]

Nonsense. Utter nonsense. The shitstorm in SoCal has nothing to do with forestry practices. These are urban fires being whipped into a firestorm by unbelievable winds.

Trying to stay out of this conversation, but it’s really hard to avoid given all the misinformation being thrown around on this thread.

Prevent, no, but minimize the impact? Absolutely. I’ve listened to a few experts break down the situation, and the majority agree that vegetation management was severely lacking. Add to that dumb polices for building in fire prone areas, and this is what you get.

 

[PaulGrun]

Please explain how switching the input phases to the service panel disconnects the neutral and ground. Considering the installation requires the generator ground to be tied to the same earth ground.

We’ve been around about this many times.
the issue is that neutral and ground are bonded at the truck and also at the service panel.
So if you hook up the truck to the service panel without also effectively “unbonding” the neutral and ground at the service panel, the GFCI at the truck will trip.
The only correct solution is to use a transfer switch which switches both the hot and the neutral. The result is that when the transfer switch is activated, neutral and ground are only bonded at one place, I.e. at the truck.
There are other ersatz “solutions” that have been repeatedly suggested (e.g. create a “cheater” cord that disconnects the ground wire) but none of those solutions is anywhere close to code.

 

[PaulGrun]

Prevent, no, but minimize the impact? Absolutely. I’ve listened to a few experts break down the situation, and the majority agree that vegetation management was severely lacking. Add to that dumb polices for building in fire prone areas, and this is what you get.

Those houses and communities have been there for decades. Nothing to do with building in fire prone areas.
I have not heard credible sources talking about vegetation management as an issue.
Again, considering the ferocity of the winds, nothing would have altered the outcome.

 

[PaulGrun]

i have been in contact with them this morning. The ProPower setup in our F-150 is not compatible with this setup, per Global Power support.

I was hoping it would. Does anyone have one that works with the 7.2kw ProPower system?

I can’t quote the part number (sorry) but pretty sure Generac supplies an appropriate transfer switch.

 

[Gros Ventre]

Nonsense. Utter nonsense. The shitstorm in SoCal has nothing to do with forestry practices. These are urban fires being whipped into a firestorm by unbelievable winds.

Trying to stay out of this conversation, but it’s really hard to avoid given all the misinformation being thrown around on this thread.

Baloney...

 

[cjm83]

Prevent, no, but minimize the impact? Absolutely. I’ve listened to a few experts break down the situation, and the majority agree that vegetation management was severely lacking. Add to that dumb polices for building in fire prone areas, and this is what you get.

YUPPPPP. No further comment needed.

 

[Bossharp]

I believe California is counting on the federal government to step in with BILLION dollar checks..I don't think my great great grandkids should pay for their stupidity..

 

[SonarChief]

Those houses and communities have been there for decades. Nothing to do with building in fire prone areas.
I have not heard credible sources talking about vegetation management as an issue.
Again, considering the ferocity of the winds, nothing would have altered the outcome.

Now you’ve heard…

https://news.berkeley.edu/2023/12/1...forests-are-healthier-when-burned-or-thinned/

“ The California Wildfire and Forest Resilience Task Force issued a Strategic Plan for Expanding the Use of Beneficial Fire to expand the use of prescribed fire and cultural burning to build forest and community resilience statewide – efforts critical to forest management and wildfire mitigation. “

https://thehill.com/policy/equilibr...-risk-of-catastrophic-wildfire-by-60-percent/

If you need any more examples, I can help you with using Google’s search function, it’s very straightforward.

 

[PaulGrun]

Baloney...

Which part of it is "baloney"? The part about the destruction being mainly due to ferocious winds?
There's no point in any further discussion on that because it's fact and indisputable.

Now you’ve heard…

https://news.berkeley.edu/2023/12/1...forests-are-healthier-when-burned-or-thinned/

“ The California Wildfire and Forest Resilience Task Force issued a Strategic Plan for Expanding the Use of Beneficial Fire to expand the use of prescribed fire and cultural burning to build forest and community resilience statewide – efforts critical to forest management and wildfire mitigation. “

https://thehill.com/policy/equilibr...-risk-of-catastrophic-wildfire-by-60-percent/

If you need any more examples, I can help you with using Google’s search function, it’s very straightforward.

Hey chief, thanks a ton for that helpful exercise in google! I never woulda thought of that!
Unfortunately the helpful links you provided are not relevant, since they talk about mitigation in forests, while the point I was making is that these are urban fires, not forest land fires. The point is that given the ferocious winds, there is almost nothing that could have been done by way of preventative measures to have prevented this catastrophe.

Unless of course you're talking about periodic thinning of residences through controlled burns? But even then embers were spreading so far and so fast...

 

[SonarChief]

Which part of it is "baloney"? The part about the destruction being mainly due to ferocious winds?
There's no point in any further discussion on that because it's fact and indisputable.

Hey chief, thanks a ton for that helpful exercise in google! I never woulda thought of that!
Unfortunately the helpful links you provided are not relevant, since they talk about mitigation in forests, while the point I was making is that these are urban fires, not forest land fires. The point is that given the ferocious winds, there is almost nothing that could have been done by way of preventative measures to have prevented this catastrophe.

Unless of course you're talking about periodic thinning of residences through controlled burns? But even then embers were spreading so far and so fast...

I only addressed the one cause since it was brought up, the full set of issues that would have reduced the devastation, which are a huge indictment of Californias mismanagement for decades, are as follows:

In a memo from the end of last year, Los Angeles fire chief Kristin Crowley also expressed concerns that the fire department's staffing levels were half the size that a professional fire department should be, based on benchmarks recommended by the National Fire Protection Association.

In the memo, which the city has since removed from its website, Crowley wrote that the city's population had grown from about 2.5m in 1960 to nearly 4m in 2020. Yet the city has fewer fire stations today than it did back then….

LA fire chief Kristin Crowley said in an interview with CNN: 'We have over 100 fire apparatus out of service. Having these apparatus, and the proper amount of mechanics would have helped.The LAFD has a total of 183 trucks, meaning that more than half of the city's fire trucks are out of commission…

“The ongoing reports of the loss of water pressure to some local fire hydrants during the fires and the reported unavailability of water supplies from the Santa Ynez Reservoir are deeply troubling to me and to the community,” Newsom wrote in a letter

Water lines could also be upgraded to handle increased demand in the event of a drastic fire and better guarantee pressure to fire hydrants. “There are absolutely actions we can take,” said Erik Porse, director of the California Institute for Water Resources at the University of California Agriculture and Natural Resources. “We can make investments in larger distribution lines to maintain pressure or help to refill those [storage] tanks faster.”

I could go on, but I think I’ve made the point.

 

[Davexxxx]

Where we live now, the power is pretty reliable. Usually out not longer than a few hrs. and rarely at that. But our old place was different and after a tornado took out some high tension wires, were without for a week.

Anyway, with the recent ice storm looking like the first potential long term need since getting the PB, I tooled up for running cords through the house. I love a side garage and a ranch house but it does mean longer runs and I narrowed it down to 5 circuits.

The cords I had were decent enough for general use and I did have a few 20 amp rated cords but not near enough for the proposed task of running space heaters, on long runs.

Long story short, I did pick up 3 more 20 amp cords and a device called "Kill a Watt". Beyond the ratings labeled on most appliances, it tells you the actual draws, in near real time. Especially handy for things like the start up and running loads on the fridge and freezer and the defrost load on the fridge.

It reads in several different selectable units.

Anyway, it helped me map out which cord should go to which device(s), allowing me to note watts drawn, voltage drop, whether more than one thing could safely be on which cord, or even which outlet in the truck, to keep the overall load balanced etc.

Turned out, we never lost power this time but I'll be ready for the next.

Otherwise, we've used the PPOB numerous times while dry camping with our TT and was the primary reason for choosing the Powerboost in the first place.

 

[UGADawg96]

For those asking about transfer switches, here is the mega thread:

https://www.f150gen14.com/forum/threads/installed-transfer-switch-in-house.1267/

TLDR: post 297 Generac 6852

https://www.f150gen14.com/forum/threads/installed-transfer-switch-in-house.1267/page-20#post-181830

 

[SonarChief]

For those asking about transfer switches, here is the mega thread:

https://www.f150gen14.com/forum/threads/installed-transfer-switch-in-house.1267/

TLDR: post 297 Generac 6852

https://www.f150gen14.com/forum/threads/installed-transfer-switch-in-house.1267/page-20#post-181830

That’s the same transfer switch I used, works flawlessly!

I then paired it with a
Reliance 30-Amp-Space Generator Power Inlet Box

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