I am contemplating looking into a back up power source for the house as we are all electric. So where else does one go to get straight (mostly LOL) no BS answers, MOPARTS.
I have talked with a few people over the years that have had them and if I recall correctly most said they were a BIG PITA.
Due to several outages a year, some that go for 18 hours to 4.5 days (worst one). Most are less than 12 or so hours, but the longer ones are a real PITA.
Unfortunately we do not have natural gas and due to our distance from the line it would likely be cost prohibitive coupled with the cost of the generator.
So that leaves propane, don't really want a 100+ gallon tank and I'm not really sure where I could place it out of sight but still be accessible for filling
So next would be diesel or gas. Realizing that both would require numerous trips to for fuel, my thought was to possibly drain the unused fuel before it went stale and use it in the tractors or cars. Diesel is more efficient but we use less of it through the year.
My last Idea was a 3 point generator to run off the tractor itself. It's the cheapest but will likely require frequent fill ups and I'm not sure about having it outside in cra--y weather and running nonstop for days at a time

Would really be nice if they would come through and just bury the flippin lines but that's not likely to happen unless somebody like
Warren Buffet moves nearby
Any comments, ideas, suggestions are appreciated

Yur budget ?

A bud of mine in the Keys is putting together a 7500 watt diesel gen with a 60 gallon tank ....

The gen is a used piece out of a big class A motor home

Budget? Well I'm not a Rockefeller, or related to Walter Scott but don't want constant issues with maintenance etc. 5K +/-

This may not apply to OP, but others should always consider these seldom noted aspects, any high water will kill a Genset, most enclosures are not rated for high hurricane winds, gasolene powered for more than a day is expensive and very inconvenient, most gensets fail over time from lack of use, automatic transfer switches vs manual are an ,expensive another item to fail at the worst time, utility supplied NG lines are often disrupted in high wind events from uprooted trees, diesel fuel has a limited "shelf life" but is the cheapest long use fuel IMO, and the luxury/cost of running a full house on a properly sized genset is in most cases a waste of money and mainly for bragging rights, .

I have a propane powered generac. Has worked great for over twelve years. Power goes out it automatically starts and powers my home. The only problem I have had with it was my fault. When I replaced the battery I connected the ground first then the positive and fried the control board.

5 k should get you there EZ with a good USED RV gen ....

My buds house is on 12 foot pilings .... I think he’s setting the gen set up 10 foot high.

daBeez ... isn’t a Generac a bit loud ?

What I did a couple years ago was: HF 9000W gas gen & manual lockout, works fine; 8 hours easy on a full tank.
Accessibility in crappy weather drove location, it's something to figure out.
Electric heat is horribly inefficient; propane or natural gas much better & cheaper.
For some reason the utility co ran NG into our part of the woods, and reimbursed me about 2/3 of the cost of converting from electric to NG heating.
Up here 250-gal tank is the most common for propane, not hard to camouflage or hide if need be.
FWIW I'm heating a 1650SF home (68*), 30x40 shop, and 20x36 shop (both at 45-50*)

If you want a full backup with heat and A/C, you'll probably need at least a 20KW unit.

I used to work for a Kohler generator distributor and agree that Generacs are on the loud side. FWIW, Kohler only has gas generators in their residential line. You can get a good ballpark idea of the kW size you need by seeing what your peak kW consumption was for the past couple of years. Your electric utility bill may have a month-to-month graph you can check for that info. Most manufacturers have a sizing program on their websites that allows you to plug-in your numbers and get a recommended size. Another thing to check is operating hours between oil changes, and maximum continuous run times. A lot of the smaller residential units call for 25 hours or so between changes. I'd suggest a Service Entrance rated automatic transfer switch if your entire house will be generator-powered during a power outage. It goes between the utility service and your main breaker and includes a built-in disconnect. You need to isolate your house from the electric grid to prevent having your home generator back-feed the power grid and possibly electrocuting a lineman doing the repairs. Hope this helps.

No can’t hear it In the house

Generac propane system has been in place for more than 10 years - works great - not that loud and as previously stated not heard in the house.

So I think it depends on what you need, vs what you want.

For instance, is it normally during cold months or hot months you lose power for that length of time.

do you have to have a/c or heat running? portable small a/c or fire place to heat instead?

just powering a fridge or freezer and maybe a tv and pvr/dvd player and internet isn't that big a gen set. which means you don't need that much fuel.

It also means not breaking it out till you hit like hour 8 or so instead of it automatically failing over.

I have a duel fuel 2kw genset. so I figure I store 25 gal of fuel in my old car and 2 of the bbq grill tanks of propane.
Should be good for a few days before I need to get more fuel.

If I were going to power the whole house though, that would be a lot more fuel.

thanks for all the replies The outages are year round it's just the Wife and I but I'm getting a bit tired of freezing my butt off, or sweating it off. Last summer we lost the food, which wasn't that big of a deal, it's more to do with no internet, TV, lights, hot water as well as other inconveniences. Might be a bit of the age thing as well. The last time I looked into having them run a NG line up it was pretty pricey but its worth another call, all's they can do is laugh the backsides off
Any one else with input good or bad is appreciated

The all-electric house is something I don't have to worry about. We've got gas heat/stove/water heater and are in town so gas disruptions are realistically unheard of. I've got a 5kw/6.5kw start Ryobi I picked up when my old Coleman quit again. I manually cut the main breaker and have a cord to backfeed the system through my welder plug. The garage is detached, so I block the door open 6" and run it in there since it is a bit loud when the rest of the neighborhood is quiet. It'll run the whole house, winter or summer. I drain the tank every spring and put the fuel in my truck, then keep 5 gallons of treated gas around for that and the mowers. I've got an 80 gallon diesel step-tank I picked up from a semi-truck upfitter that's my plan for a long-term outage. I've got friends with 500 gallon farm tanks that I can hit up if all of the stations are closed...

A few years back, we had a power outage that affected a large area around our home. The majority of people in several counties lost power. That power outage was unusually long, lasting 11 days. Some people had to wait over 2 weeks to have their power restored. At the time, I was using a gasoline powered generator. Unfortunately, most of the gas stations did not have power. The few stations that were open sold all their gasoline in a short amount of time. So buying gasoline required driving an hour away from home!! (And then waiting in line to buy it!!!) Every two days, I had to spend two hours of driving time just getting fuel for the generator. By the time I started looking for some extra gas cans to purchase, there were none to be found!!

Second thought, during that power outage, a LOT of generators were stolen. Having the generator well secured would be very wise.

Edit: The amount of noise that is acceptable varies from one person to the next. I would suggest, at the minimum, locating the generator away from one's bedroom!

Disregard what everyone else said (I didn't read it either). EDIT

What's your goal? Keep your food cold, keep your @$$ warm, keep your lights on, etc...

You can keep your food from going bad with a small generator and a couple extension cords. Opt for something larger based on your needs.

I moved to an area served by Duke energy. Never before in my life have I had to deal with outages on a regular basis. It’s totally ridiculous how often we deal with this, in the suburbs of a big city no less. I even moved a few streets away to a neighborhood with BURIED utilities, only to find out they are sent power via the same crappy lines as before, no main feed that is more secure. It’s just unbelievable.

Will be made much worse with the coming of the electric cars I’m sure.

My solution so far has been a Yamaha 2000 watt rig from Costco. Cost like 550 about three years ago when we finally had enough and at least wanted to keep the fridge on. I bought a good heavy cord and this gets us by for the most of a day we are left hanging usually. Just depends on what you want to do.

IIRC a 5k budget won’t get you anything near the juice to run a whole house, at least not a new setup. Trying to think what it cost when I looked about three years ago and I want to think it was more like 8k. As much as it sucks, it would only be worth it if the power is down for several days. You have to keep that jewel up. So far all I’ve done is fire up the little guy a couple times a year and it’s been flawless at running the fridge and then the freezer switching it as needed.

We got a Predator 9000 from HF. We have a manual lock out and we can pick what we want to run when we need it. Our main thing was our well pump, but we can use other items we would need. We have not had to use it yet, but I do run it under load once a month.

If you already have a tractor with a pto I would do that. Everyone on the farm has these. Big Iron currently has a few on there, also Auction Time, these can be had for $1500-$3000 usually . Stand alone needs to be kept up to use when you need it, I know of a few people that have them and always have a problem getting them going when needed.