how best to get electricity for emergency prepareness

I think you also have to give some thought as to "how long" you expect to be in the disaster area?

We have a gas generator that we can use to power devices as needed.

Typically I'll run the fridge for a few hours (unless in the winter.. then I might as well just move stuff outside).

I've got to get the 220 volt side wired up to drive my water pump and possibly turn over my furnace.

Other than that.. I'll sit back and relax and wait it out.

for

I stand corrected, although, have you read certain labels and instruction manuals? Totally unintelligible!

Notan

The gun is to protect you from the storm troopers that come to forcibly eject you from your home.

Cheers! Rich

Usually mechanical stuff breaks as a result of neglect or misuse.

As James Beck said, keep it in running condition, do your routine perodic maintenance, and it will probably outlive even you.

Good Luck! Rich

Thank you, Richard. In fact, the contractors just finished installing a propane fueled backup system with automatic start and transfer switch at my dad's house (He lives next door) about an hour ago and the warning labels use the same wording.

Last thing I'm gonna need in a disaster is a computer.

You carry the generator and the TV.

Gimme a van full of fresh water and a gun to protect it. mike

Actually the term may be more correctly: "no-load" since it is a two-word term, rather than bad grammar.

I still remember the chinglish explanation of the difference between PORTA on the masked MC68705P3 and the windowed part :

"The optional PORTA pullup option on the masked version is not optional on the erasable version."

So is it always there or always not there?

HMMMMMMMMM

Even the local support guy wasn't sure about that one.

Now *that* sounds a bit better.

Thanks!

Notan

I've seen some truly wonderful Chinese examples recently.

Graham

JRC/NJR is usually a giggle for their data sheets too.

One of my favourites.....

" Featuring noiseless, higher gain bandwidth, high output current and low distortion ratio, and it is most suitable not only for acoustic electronic parts of audio pre-amp and active filter, but also for the industrial measurement tools. It is also suitable for the head phone amp at higher output current, and further more, it can be applied for the handy type set operational amplifier of general purpose in application of low voltage single supply type which is properly biased of the low voltage source. "

Hello Michael,

And maybe a bottle of Glenfiddich ;-)

Regards, Joerg

At my recent Mock cave rescue class (where I will say I was NOT playing the IC.... :-)...

Well as the review pointed out.. we had the laptop and printer (to print out all of our forms, cave maps, etc) set up early. Meanwhile we had only 2 teams in the cave and about 30 people standing around outside. Hmm... Houston, we had a problem. :-)

Now you're talking. Or perhaps Laphroaig, if you like phenolic.

Best regards, Spehro Pefhany

Or really shitty design. I was wondering why the generator I purchased was using a LOT of fuel. The tank had a porous weld sealing the tank shut, and was leaking in 10 places. Plus, simply designing down to a cost, using pistons/cylinders that have no hope of going beyond a couple of hundred hours is a problem in the very cheap units.

Just get a little Honda generator. The eu1000i, or the eu2000i. They are reliable, light-weight, fuel-efficient, very quiet, and produce very clean AC power. They can also handle large surge loads such as an electric motor starting up. (e.g., power tools). Oh, they are kind of expensive, but you get what you pay for. ;-)

If you want to run stuff inside the house, you will need long extension cords since you can't put a generator inside the house with you...

You can use this thing to charge any batteries you want, including your car battery (with a suitable charger).

If you have to do without grid power for a long time, make sure you have a Coleman stove that runs on unleaded gasoline, and I think you can even get gas lanterns that burn unleaded. If not, get the white gas lanterns and keep some white gas for them. Of course you need to keep 10 or 20 gallons of unleaded gasoline around to run all this stuff. Use a fuel stabilizer for the stored fuel. Oh, and extra mantles for the lanterns.

The microwave is questionable, but if you have to boil a lot of water it might be just as efficient to use the microwave as the Coleman stove, and I think the Honda eu1000i could drive it. The eu2000i could definitely drive it.

Since you will have the generator, you can use rechargeable batteries for flashlights and such. But whenever possible, try to just use the Coleman lantern.

Might as well keep plenty of D-cells around, too, and relatively cheap, dim flashlights that use them. Mag lights are cool, but the bright bulbs drain batteries fast, and the filaments are more likely to break if you drop the flashlight. When your eyes are dark-adjusted you need very little light to see. So I find that at night, the flashlight puts out far more light than needed anyway.

I don't see what you would want a computer for at all. Your DSL probably won't be operational. But you can run the generator to recharge your laptop as needed.

Don't forget canned food and water. If you already have drinking water, you may not have to boil water at all.

--Mac

They all look alike.

THE WEB SITES! What'd you *think* I was talking about?

Notan

Exactly... These generators are not designed to be usable for any real (read over a few days) use. Using the cheapest possible ways of building things.

That's a sweeping statement.

Not every outage is a disaster.

What about a plain vanilla situation of being without electric power due to something mundane like lightning or ice storm. Hardly a real disaster. It would be great to be able to continue to use computers.

They don't allow you to bring anything but sealed bottled water into the hurricane shelters, and I don't know of anyone who would have been willing to go out to their car or truck during the hurricane for a nip.