Power outages, I spit in your face! LOL

[cdeakle]

Im tired of power outages@#%$! Hurt my corals will yah?

I found a good deal on a used Generac gas powered generator with a 10hp Briggs&Stratton engine: 5,000 watts for 350 bucks. Now watch, I wont get any power outages now.

I pissed off a neighbor this weekend. I live in apartments but got the managers blessing to us it in emergencies. Since I got this unit used I wanted to do a full tune up and change out the fuel filter and air filters before I store it. To do an oil change on a generator one needs to run it to heat it up and then do the oil change while that sucker is still hot.

So I did just that. To be mindful of my neighbors I did it on a weekend in the afternoon time close to 1pm. I decided to only run it for 10 minutes and figured that would be enough to heat the engine up. Well at the 4 minute 30 second mark I saw one of my neighbors come out on there balcony and give me the evil eye so I cut the engine off at 5 minutes. Immediatley after this chick comes back out on the balcony and starts yelling at me.

Am I the jerk or is she being a pain in the arse? I mean, if people can play music late at night and keep me up I can't run a generator thats equivelant to a lawn mower engine on a sunday afternoon for 5-10 minutes??

 

[CarlaW]

someone is bein a big jerk, and it's not you.

 

[Witfull]

the last laugh will be yours as you watch tv (and your tank) and she is sitting in the dark...

 

[Fly n Reef]

Power outages? I woke up way too early this morning, 3:55am to mother natures call, and went back to bed and barely drifted back to sleep then that aweful click sound and dead silence. The power had gone out. I immediately went into mini panic mode. Got back up to make sure that nothing was going to overflow, then to my delight the power came back on in about two minutes. Weird that I woke up just for that. Needless to say I didn't get much more sleep.
Too weird.

Back to you, sorry I got distracted. It must be the lack of sleep. I would try to talk to your neighbor let her know what you are doing. I think she would understand if she knew what it is for.
Just me 2 cents.

Karen

 

[CarlaW]

Good point also!!

 

[Witfull]

ps...make sure you have a gas stabilizer or the gas will get old and gum up the genny and you will be in the dark,,,,again.

 

[mattseattle]

i live in an apartment as well. we had a 11 hour power outage a few months ago. i offered my neighbors 'hot' coffee in order to compensate for the loud noise. no one took me up on it but i did let them know i was going to run the generator till the power came back on and they were free to come over and use some extra power if they needed to blow dry their hair or wanted hot coffee.

i'd just let my neighbors know you have a generator and that when the power does go out you'll be using it but they are free to come over and use the power if need be. usually they never do but it's a nice gesture.

 

[uwscotch]

I need a generator. I took a big hit from a power outage last year. The overflow from the power loss was a pain but only about a gallon went over before the siphon breaks. I need a bigger sump, I use every cubic inch of it. Anyways, I lost a number of specimens due to temp. loss and asphyxiation. Before I realized how fast the Oxygen was consumed, it was too late for some of my active specimens. Within one hour, the tank was depleted. That's what I get for a small tank. This past week, we lost power twice, once for 3 hours. I was so P#!$%! off that I screamed at PSE. I have never lived somewhere where power outages are so common. All they need to do is go out and regularly trim branches, or is it cheaper to just let them break and knock out 1200 customers. I say screw the neighbors, we have mini oceans that depend on us for their survival. However I would not scream that at them, but instead offer them some power usage as well if needed.

 

[tamarindthai]

just picked up homelite 6300 generator from moving sale ,,did anybody know where can i get a manaul,and the key,,,try home lite .com ,,no luck.
thanks,dang

 

[jazznreef]

i don't know man, my old frat mentality says screw 'em. a generator's not that big of a deal. it's not like you're partying 'till 3am... or, are ya?

 

[mattseattle]

i am no expert about noise ordinances but this is only hear-say but someone told me that you can not run any noisey equipment like that after 10:00 p.m. without a permit. i know they make 'super quiet' generators now but the one i rented during our 11+ hour power outage was super noisey. definitely louder than the average lawn mower.

guess it depends on if you are nice to your neighbors or not so they don't report you.

 

[jazznreef]

yea, they are pretty darn loud... enemy neighbors are no fun. i'd say daytime is much more acceptable than nights. for what it's worth.

 

[Doug1]

Well personally I think if you need the generator as life support for your tank, and you make an effort to deal with noise abatement tuff cookies. They only notice it cause their power is off and cant get tv

 

[fishermann]

There are noise ords. after 10pm and before 8am, If you don't have one of the Honda gen sets which are very quiet, but cost quite a bit, you had better make friends with your neighbors or you could always try it in a spare room and leave the window open for the exhaust to escape, you could also check into a better muffler system. Make sure you do what witful suggest also,very important.

 

[Scooterman]

There are ways to quiten these also, look up replacement mufflers, or once I made an extension to mine, which I redirected it.

 

[cdeakle]

Thanks for all the input and support guys. You guys rock!!!

the last laugh will be yours as you watch tv (and your tank) and she is sitting in the dark...

Just what I was thinking

ps...make sure you have a gas stabilizer or the gas will get old and gum up the genny and you will be in the dark,,,,again.

Thanks for the heads up. I added it this weekend along with a new oil change (hehe) spark plug, fuel filter and air filter. If only working on my crappy corsica was that easy LOL.

live in an apartment as well. we had a 11 hour power outage a few months ago. i offered my neighbors 'hot' coffee in order to compensate for the loud noise.

I did one better!!! There are 4 units total including me in the S building, most have 8. One neighbor just moved out leaving me a total of 2 neighbors. I offered to give them both power with a maximum of 500 watts each to compensate for the noise. I did not have to do this since I got the ok from the management but why not? Can't hurt to be nice.

The A-hole neighbor is in the next building over. No juice for her. hehe

i don't know man, my old frat mentality says screw 'em. a generator's not that big of a deal. it's not like you're partying 'till 3am... or, are ya?

I know! Thats why I chose to only run it for 10 min total and on sunday afternoon nonetheless. If I cant run my gennerator then when can I run it, and for only 10 minutes!?!?

am no expert about noise ordinances but this is only hear-say but someone told me that you can not run any noisey equipment like that after 10:00 p.m. without a permit. i know they make 'super quiet' generators now but the one i rented during our 11+ hour power outage was super noisey. definitely louder than the average lawn mower.

Yes and No. I already checked with my local PD and they stated that the only law I would be breaking would be a noise ordnance law and that if I was running the generator during a poweroutage that they could not write me a violation anyways. P.S. I use to work for the Bellevue PD.

 

[Scooterman]

For short term outages you could get a huge power conditioner, W/back-up power. This UPS per-say would condition incoming power from AC fluxations , provide you smooth starts & stops (helps extend the life of equipment) & lastly provide you with emergency power for some time. The only devices you would run directly from the wall, would be lights, heaters & chillers because of their huge power demands & possible interference problems. Then the generator as a long term back-up to complete your redundant power system, this way If your away from home you will have some power for quite some time. If you really want to get Expensive, you could automate the entire system to where the generator would automatically start up.

You can tell we design huge generator & compression systems

 

[cdeakle]

I called Lynnwood Police just to verify one last time. They said as long as I ran it during an emergency, including a regular power outage, that They will not and cannot write me a violation/citation.

I specificly asked about running it during the night time and asked "What if I ran it untill 2am during a power outage?" She said go ahead and use it, you can run it as long as you need during a power outage.

If this chick gets pissed off at me for running my generator for 4 minutes and 30 seconds on a sunday afternoon I can;t wait to see her reaction when i run it untill 2am! I would even pay for a picture of her facial expression HeHeHeHe

 

[mattseattle]

*laffing*

well that is good to know......hopefully the same applies here in Seattle and I'm sure it does.

 

[MzWeazelle]

You haven't seen funny until you've seen someone standing on a step-stool in the dark and up to her armpit in salt water every half hour trying to stir 100+ gallons enough to keep the creatures happy. With that much water heat loss wasn't our first concern.

I think I was the only one who left work early that day to run into Bellevue for a generator, but we were also the only people on the block with real lights and hot water. I was actually sitting at my computer the next morning when I noticed there were sounds coming from the kitchen and realized the power had come on with out me noticing. Generators rule! Fortunately no one complained about the noise, and we ran our right through the night.