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This one looks like it’s going to be less of a problem for us than Harvey was, but it is a storm all the same.

5am, and our power just went out here in the Houston Westchase area. Y’all keep safe out there, and keep your powder dry.

I'm staying home from work today. Its super windy outside and still raining. Power has been blinking off all night but has returned after a few seconds every time. It safer to just stay home today.

We are getting rain this morning. I have prayed this morning that this will not be a terrible hurricane. Lord please grant grace and safety to the coast.

11pm and we’re still on generator power. We have some great friends who offered to take us in, but we’re still just fine.

Now for the good news: i had a chance to confront my tormentor tonight. To simplify dinner, I swung by the local Chic-fil-a to grab some sammiches for the family. The young lad in the drive-through window had a “Nicolas” name tag. Irrespective of his intentional obfuscation of misspelling his name, I realized that he was THE Nicholas who’d cut my power, and (in jest) gave him a piece of my mind.

It turns out that the poor lad had been catching an earful all day, and he was in good humor about it.

Vol Texan wrote: ↑Tue Sep 14, 2021 11:12 pm 11pm and we’re still on generator power. We have some great friends who offered to take us in, but we’re still just fine.

Now for the good news: i had a chance to confront my tormentor tonight. To simplify dinner, I swung by the local Chic-fil-a to grab some sammiches for the family. The young lad in the drive-through window had a “Nicolas” name tag. Irrespective of his intentional obfuscation of misspelling his name, I realized that he was THE Nicholas who’d cut my power, and (in jest) gave him a piece of my mind.

It turns out that the poor lad had been catching an earful all day, and he was in good humor about it.

Do you have a whole house backup or portable?

I live close to Galveston and am still without power. I have a 8.5KW generator that runs most of the house.

Nicholas didn't seem like it would be severe for us, to the north and west of Houston proper. But we got the backlash winds through the wee hours of the night. Not a ton of rain, though. Even so, the premiere Third-World Energy Provider, CenterPoint, couldn't keep the power on and we were without for a day. But we expected that and were prepared for it. They can't keep the power on if somebody sneezes hard three miles away.

What we didn't expect was that once the power came back, the circuit to the entire living room was gone. Breaker was tripped, so flipped it, and nada. Flipped it back off, and ran an extension cord to the TV. Only to find that Comcast/Xfinity was out; that just came back on yesterday after 4:00 p.m., so at least a 60 hour outage. Glad we don't use them for the internet. Electrician will be here today to look at the living room problem. My pocketbook is pleading that it's something simple.

ScottDLS wrote: ↑Tue Sep 14, 2021 11:24 pm

Vol Texan wrote: ↑Tue Sep 14, 2021 11:12 pm 11pm and we’re still on generator power.
(snip)

Do you have a whole house backup or portable?

Sorry for the delayed response. We run a Predator 8750 portable here at the house. It can be set up with a transfer switch to run the majority of the house, but we've not done that just yet.

We did fine running a couple of 10-gauge power cords to our indoor fridge, outdoor fridge and freezers, a couple strings of white LED Christmas lights for nighttime illumination, and a portable A/C unit. We have a gas stove and a Zippo, so we'd have been able to cook as much as we wished, had the blackout lasted longer.

Vol Texan wrote: ↑Thu Sep 16, 2021 5:01 pm

ScottDLS wrote: ↑Tue Sep 14, 2021 11:24 pm

Vol Texan wrote: ↑Tue Sep 14, 2021 11:12 pm 11pm and we’re still on generator power.
(snip)

Do you have a whole house backup or portable?

Sorry for the delayed response. We run a Predator 8750 portable here at the house. It can be set up with a transfer switch to run the majority of the house, but we've not done that just yet.

We did fine running a couple of 10-gauge power cords to our indoor fridge, outdoor fridge and freezers, a couple strings of white LED Christmas lights for nighttime illumination, and a portable A/C unit. We have a gas stove and a Zippo, so we'd have been able to cook as much as we wished, had the blackout lasted longer.

I have a 8KW portable genset and portable A/C too. I also want to set up a transfer switch, but haven't spent the money yet. In my part of DFW we rarely lose power, but I want to be prepared. I'm going to get a cheap main/generator interlock switch and 50AMP generator socket. Can use the panel to control all the loads and 8KW will do for everything except electric range and ovens and HVAC. We have gas heat, so what I really want the transfer on the panel for is running the two furnace blower fans in a winter outage. I have a tri-fuel portable and my electric panel is outside near the NG service too. When I get an electrician out to do the interlock, I'm going to get a plumber to run a tap of my gas meter. In the meantime I have 20 gal of stablilized gasoline and a couple propane bottles. Some day I'm going to get a 15KW military surplus diesel genny MEP-804 or MEP-1050. They'll run as primary power for a month at a time if you needed.

I bought the Wgen9500df this year and two heavy duty power cords from Home Dopey. So far didn't have to use it. Peak power is 12500 and running is 9500. I'm thinking next year i will get it set up with a transfer switch.

Take Down Sicko wrote: ↑Thu Sep 16, 2021 8:30 pm I bought the Wgen9500df this year and two heavy duty power cords from Home Dopey. So far didn't have to use it. Peak power is 12500 and running is 9500. I'm thinking next year i will get it set up with a transfer switch.

try this place
it goes in at your meter so your genny can run the house and you turn off loads as required.
http://www.generlink.com/

our utility charges 45 dollars to install it

powerboatr wrote: ↑Thu Sep 16, 2021 8:43 pm

Take Down Sicko wrote: ↑Thu Sep 16, 2021 8:30 pm I bought the Wgen9500df this year and two heavy duty power cords from Home Dopey. So far didn't have to use it. Peak power is 12500 and running is 9500. I'm thinking next year i will get it set up with a transfer switch.

try this place
it goes in at your meter so your genny can run the house and you turn off loads as required.
http://www.generlink.com/

our utility charges 45 dollars to install it

Thanks for the info. powerboater. I put it in my saved list for when i get ready to get the work done. My generator was in the compatible list.