I dunno if anyone has noticed this but without power since Wednesday,I noticed Locomotives acting strange ..not responding to some commands ..The only diffrence was house was on my Generator...got power back round 4 today..Night and day with how they act now...so if you lose power and have a generator and Legacy it might run a Lil kooky
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That must be a heck of a generator, or you disconnected the fridge to go run trains 😀
It most likely has to do with the waveform shape of the voltage. The utility system puts out a real good sine wave that things can rely on. A small whole house genset does not put out a good sine wave and that can effect loads. Kind of like that CW80 power supply that Lionel developed. I think it has a chopped sine wave output. Some equipment does not respond well to that. Gunrunner John knows all the details. But glad you are back to the utility system!
Jim K
What type of generator? Permanent (Generac) or portable?
Permanent installs have pretty good regulated voltage and cycles output. Many portables dont have regulated outputs.
IIRC legacy needs a solid ground to work properly. Could be how the gen is connected to the house too.
Glad you got your power back.
@Snkbittin posted:,I noticed Locomotives acting strange ..not responding to some commands ..The only diffrence was house was on my Generator...
@RSJB18 in on to something important here.
This is most likely a an electrical grounding problem in your house. If you're using TMCC or Legacy earth ground is critical for successful transmission and reception of commands. That's why the power brick (wall wart) for the command base (Base 1, 1L, or 2) has the ground pin on the end that plugs into the wall outlet.
When you plug it into a properly-grounded outlet everything works fine. Since it's not fine when powered by the generator I think that the generator isn't grounded properly.
You probably need to get a licensed electrician to check it out.
BTW -- It's also a safety issue for anything else you're powering off the generator.
Mike
Thanks Guys..I know Generators put out "dirty" power as told to me by my electrician buddy and being its a portable..well as far as rolling around a 300lb generator is portable..its in my garage ..seperate garage and goes into my system thru that panel ..now with power back its back to awesome...I also have a suspended ceiling in that room and the support grids are all part of my ground plane ...I didnt run them long at all once I noticed the issue
A permanent whole-house generator (ours is by Kohler) is one of the very best investments we've added to the home. Absolutely worth every penny.
Besides the random storm-induced situations, there are too many grid-related situations occurring locally and nationally to not think proactively about home electrical power. The 'green' rush will only exacerbate future issues.
All of the above IMHO, of course.
BTW, our installer also provides annual inspection/maintenance of the generator....worth considering when selecting a service provider.
@Snkbittin posted:Thanks Guys..I know Generators put out "dirty" power as told to me by my electrician buddy and being its a portable..well as far as rolling around a 300lb generator is portable..its in my garage ..seperate garage and goes into my system thru that panel ..now with power back its back to awesome...I also have a suspended ceiling in that room and the support grids are all part of my ground plane ...I didnt run them long at all once I noticed the issue
You must be south of me, we had a short outage of maybe a minute. The storm was supposed to hit us pretty hard but seemed to stay east and south.
Have you checked the generator output with a multi-meter capable of reading frequency? I recently made some minor repairs to my Generac portable and found it was putting out 134 vac at 68 Hz. That's not good on many electrical devices, your trains may have been trying to tell you something. Portables are made to idle at certain speed to maintain correct output. It is a simple process of adjusting the throttle until you get correct frequency of 60 Hz. My Generac is an older model that uses a large motor run cap for voltage regulation so everything keys off of motor speed.
@turkey_hollow_rr posted:You must be south of me, we had a short outage of maybe a minute. The storm was supposed to hit us pretty hard but seemed to stay east and south.
Have you checked the generator output with a multi-meter capable of reading frequency? I recently made some minor repairs to my Generac portable and found it was putting out 134 vac at 68 Hz. That's not good on many electrical devices, your trains may have been trying to tell you something. Portables are made to idle at certain speed to maintain correct output. It is a simple process of adjusting the throttle until you get correct frequency of 60 Hz. My Generac is an older model that uses a large motor run cap for voltage regulation so everything keys off of motor speed.
This will work until you put a load on the generator and the engine slows slightly due to the load. Then you could be under voltage/ frequency, which is just as bad. That's why they come out of the factory a little higher than standard 120/60. If a portable is one's only option then adding good quality power conditioners on critical loads is an option down stream.
Many mfr's make portables with inverters that condition the power and maintain steady outputs. A few more $$$$ but worth it if necessary.
@RSJB18 posted:This will work until you put a load on the generator and the engine slows slightly due to the load. Then you could be under voltage/ frequency, which is just as bad. That's why they come out of the factory a little higher than standard 120/60. If a portable is one's only option then adding good quality power conditioners on critical loads is an option down stream.
Many mfr's make portables with inverters that condition the power and maintain steady outputs. A few more $$$$ but worth it if necessary.
I set mine, which is an inverting generator, with no load to just under 61 Hz. When I load up the generator with all 10 transfer switches, including my digital well controller, it reads 120/60. When my portable's output was off (68Hz) this controller would throw a fault code and shut down, my first clue to something amiss.
If you look at the throttle mechanism it is a balanced spring system that will adjust for surges and load drops. Mine is 8kW with a 10kW surge.
edit: my 240vac/30amp backup has 10 switches, not 16
If it really affects your operation and enjoyment enough to complain about, use the dirty supply to float a battery string, then use that DC to drive clean inverters. The output of those will be perfect for the trains, computers, and other devices that like clean sine waves.
Or, take a look at the output of battery back-up devices (the ones that sit under your computer desk and beep when they lose input power.) Some of the more expensive ones provide perfect voltage and wave forms. You can plug them into your dirty generator supply.
I dunno, even with my Generac 10KW standby generator running. Running trains during a power outage (and we had several multi-day outages over the years) was the last thing on my mind... I had more important things to worry about.
Rusty
Just run your battery powered trains during a power outage. 
Oh wait, you say you don't have any battery powered trains... 
Lol ..I only ran them long enough to see there was a problem..weather was crappy so I worked on the railroad ..Im not concerned I cant run trains during an extended power outage
@turkey_hollow_rr posted:You must be south of me, we had a short outage of maybe a minute. The storm was supposed to hit us pretty hard but seemed to stay east and south.
Have you checked the generator output with a multi-meter capable of reading frequency? I recently made some minor repairs to my Generac portable and found it was putting out 134 vac at 68 Hz. That's not good on many electrical devices, your trains may have been trying to tell you something. Portables are made to idle at certain speed to maintain correct output. It is a simple process of adjusting the throttle until you get correct frequency of 60 Hz. My Generac is an older model that uses a large motor run cap for voltage regulation so everything keys off of motor speed.
Im in East Bridgewater..it was a mess around here
Around here there is usually nothing else to do but wait it out so why not have as many entertainment options as you can during a power outage. We have satellite tv, stereo and soon-to-be train layout all on the generator.
@Snkbittin posted:Im in East Bridgewater..it was a mess around here
S. New Hampshire. You were much closer to those 90+ mph winds than us.
I think my next purchase will be a standby generator...
From my research, the difference between a 12KW and a 22KW is only a little over 1K, so if I do it, I'll go with the bigger unit. After all, the trains take a bit of power. 
Sounds like what you really need is live steam 
Buying a generator is like buying a air compressor. Go big or go home. Bigger is always better in this case.
Early in the thread Jim K (" Boggart") replied, he said it was the waveform and I believe he is correct. Generacs, Cutler-Hammer, Briggs etc do not put out a very clean waveform and it plays havoc with cut-in, cut-out values in the electronics.
I have a lot of experience with stand-by generators and have seen these waveforms many times on the osilliscope.
I will always recommend a larger than necessary stand-by generator; as the increased inertia will absorb the load starting currents much better without dragging down the output. For most residences, 20 kw or larger is recomended. You will also have a lot less issues with internal generator failures
Or you can buy a new, all electric F150. It claims will power your house for three days. Just hope it doesn't last longer than that. Then you have dead house and truck. 
I am waiting, not too patiently, until the end of November when we are to have an 18 kW Generac unit installed. The auto transfer switch was installed in the summer. Waiting on the gen-set now. Unload those ships, unload those ships PLEASE. I will post a few photos out of joy when this event occurs! We have natural gas available at one end of the house, and the electric service at the other end of the house........ of course.
Jim K
Ground your generator to your panel's ground rod. Watch out for it's exhaust, too. Portables have been know to kill families. If your furnace does not have an external air feed, it sucks air into the house through every crack it could find when it's running. People think their safe with a generator running on a porch as long as they keep the doors and windows closed. Little do they know their furnace will suck that exhaust into the house right under the door because of a warn threshold. Also, when they start running out of fuel, they will surge and blow out electronics.
Here at Ground Zero for hurricane landfall, where the utilities can be out for a week or more, a whole house natural gas generator is a must. Without it, you can easily succumb to the oppressive heat and humidity, not to mention losing everything in your refrigerator and all of that good fresh frozen seafood in your freezer (100 pounds of Gulf shrimp ain't cheap). Plus you will want to watch local news updates on the storm/recovery efforts. General entertainment comes last, but I have not had problems running trains when my house power came from my generator.
Dave Z is correct, you can die from carbon monoxide poisoning when running a gasoline powered generator in a garage or on a porch. Also, you need to have a safe place to store a large quantity of gasoline away from the generator and the house. After a storm you can't buy gasoline from a station that does not have its own power supply to run the fuel pumps. And given the recent astronomical rise in gasoline prices.........
So, go natural gas and go BIG. Think of it as a ZW-L on steroids.
@Tom Tee posted:Just run your battery powered trains during a power outage.
And what ya gonna do when the batteries die Mr. Smarty Pants......
@Fast Mail posted:Early in the thread Jim K (" Boggart") replied, he said it was the waveform and I believe he is correct. Generacs, Cutler-Hammer, Briggs etc do not put out a very clean waveform and it plays havoc with cut-in, cut-out values in the electronics.
I have a lot of experience with stand-by generators and have seen these waveforms many times on the osilliscope.
I will always recommend a larger than necessary stand-by generator; as the increased inertia will absorb the load starting currents much better without dragging down the output. For most residences, 20 kw or larger is recomended. You will also have a lot less issues with internal generator failures
We run some big generators on our campus from 2.0 MW nat gas co-generation unit, to several 800 KW, & 400 KW diesels. Bigger is definitely better. You should see how the 400's react when the elevators come on. 
We stalled a 150KW unit on elevator startup once too.
I'm installing a Gererac soon. Based on my house (2,000 sq ft), natural gas heat (boiler), gas cooking and dryer, and a 4 ton CAC, I'd need a 14 KW min. I plan to buy either a 17 or 20 also. Along with the added load capacity, the unit will not have to work as hard under load.
Bob
Where I live now it is much more likely to lose power during a winter storm, so far a 5 day stretch after an ice storm has been the longest. It didn't make much sense to add the two central a/c units to a backup system. My wife and I agreed we don't need to cook Thanksgiving dinner or dry clothes during an outage so that dropped some more power requirements. All we really need is to keep the food safe, the well and the oil burner running (forced hot water heating). A 240/30 amp service takes care of our needs and we can run a smaller generator for less $ per hour. The generac XG8000 has very clean power and is well suited for small electronics. It's been in service for almost 12 years, has 134 hours on it and I've never lost any equipment.
I don't think anyone on this thread ever said they ran their portable generator on a porch or whatever.
@turkey_hollow_rr posted:It's been in service for almost 12 years, has 134 hours on it and I've never lost any equipment.
I don't think anyone on this thread ever said they ran their portable generator on a porch or whatever.
134hrs in 12yrs is not to shabby... I did a little over 220 hrs this year alone (New Orleans). I use two gens... a big & small (little Gen II is dedicated to the network and THE TRAINS).
I lived in S. Florida for 25 years and was just on the edge of Andrew. My good friend in Punta Gorda lived through a direct hit from Charlie. I have some appreciation for what folks in hurricane prone areas can face. The devastation to infrastructure is far worse than what we see in New England.
My only complaint is nothing in my backup system is automatic.
@turkey_hollow_rr posted:I don't think anyone on this thread ever said they ran their portable generator on a porch or whatever.
I used to run my portable generator outside my garage with the doors closed. The entry from the garage was pretty well sealed, and right inside I had a CO alarm in case anything leaked in through from outside. It would have to go through two doors and 25 feet of garage, and it never was a problem in the 30 years I lived there. In my new house, I'm considering a whole house unit as I now have NG and it would be seamless to use, no more shuffling 5 gallon gas cans!
@gunrunnerjohn posted:no more shuffling 5 gallon gas cans!
Yes, you know the drill. It is more work but I can usually fill up the cans whenever I need to. 5 or 10 years from now I may change my tune. I'm not sure how we would handle fuel storage with a whole home unit in our location. It would be nice to hook up a diesel and run it off of heating oil, but I'm sure there are regulations against that.
I grew up in Vermont and lived in NYC for 25 years. Vermont was frickin' cold and waste deep in snow for months on end... and, the City wasn't much better. I recall more than a few times when folks couldn't find their cars as the snow plows had buried them. While respectful of hurricanes... I'm probably a little more sanguine about the weather than most.
Mine aren't auto either... but, I can power them up (natural gas/propane/gasoline) very rapidly.
My problem was I had a well and septic that both required electricity, and sump pumps that also were necessary! Obviously, the fridge, some lights, etc. were pretty high on the list as well.
So, when the power was out, I needed power, no if's, and's or but's about it. Having to to out every 8-9 hours and shut down the generator, fill the gas, and then start it up again got real old when it was blowing snow or raining. Typically, I'd roll it back in the garage and fill it, then move it back out and start it up again. We had a number of multi-day outages over the years, and that got really old. The one when the tree put the power lines in the driveway and we had to park in the street (it was totally blocked) and walk through the woods was memorable!
Well... John, you certainly aren't as sanguine as I. Shutting down the gen to refuel... oh my!
I think most gasoline generators will run on NG/Propane... the kits are around 50/60 bucks.
GRJ, if you do plan on getting one that runs on natural gas, keep in mind when sizing your generator that you loose about 10% of your wattage when using natural gas. My Generac is a 20,000 watt model, but is only capable of 18,000 on natural gas. I'm guessing it has something to do with combustion.
Dan, no problem running off road diesel in anything which is not licensed for highway use.
Yep, they make that clear in the specifications. I actually have the guy stopping tomorrow to tell me what I can get and when.
Thanks Dave! It would make a lot more sense for us to use heating oil and add a second storage tank for a generator since we deal with the oil supplier all year.
Heating oil isn't really refined like diesel fuel, it's a dirtier fuel source.
Key Differences of Heating Oil, Off-Road Diesel Fuel & On-Road Diesel Fuel in Pennsylvania
"While diesel #2 and heating oil are very similar, diesel fuel contains additives intended to enhance the diesel fuel's efficiency. Heating oil is not refined or intended for use as vehicle fuel. Home heating oil may also have too high a sulfur content and will quickly ruin pollution control equipment on modern diesel engines."
Oh, I'm sure the oil company would stop heating oil pretty quick. 
But they would sell me diesel from time to time.
After Hurricane Sandy we were out for 7 days. My gasoline gen kept us on line and the fridge cold. Fortunately I could get gasoline from the pump on my campus. If I had to look for gas at the local stations, I would have been out of luck. Not to mention shutting down over night.
A nat gas generac or kohler unit is in my not to distant future.
I am planning to go the backup generator route when I have the money to do it, ASAP. Power around here has been a lot better since Sandy, the utility companies have done a lot of maintenance since then with trees and we also aren't seeing the dips and such I had been seeing (it was so bad at one point that surges and dips routinely were killing equipment like my router, put it on a UPS for that reason).
You can't use heating oil in a diesel engine for the road, besides being dirty, it is also illegal to use something in a road vehicle that doesn't have road use taxes......(not that I care personally), but more because it is dirty (happiest day in my dad's life was when the old oil furnace went out the door in pieces).
I suspect the problem is the sine wave output of the generator, computers and such can have problems on backup generators, it is why they offer inverter generators, it is a lot cleaner. You can get some of the same thing with a UPS unit where the power is continuously fed off the battery and inverter (bypass UPS units feed line power through and then the battery kicks in).
With an automatic backup generator, it depends on your needs, but I agree given that most of the cost of this is the installation cost the difference between a 12kw and a larger one isn't much last I checked (what prices are now, who knows?) and it is worth sizing up. When they wire backup generators there are a couple of ways to do it, they can wire it into critical circuits only (like heat, sump pump, well pump, refrigeration), you can get one big enough to handle your typical demand (all circuits), or you can wire it to all circuits but if your demand exceeds generator output it is set up to shut down less critical circuits. Me for the difference in cost, I would prob get a 15-20 kw unit (we don't have central ac at the moment, had years ago but decided to forgo replacing it given other priorities, will have it done sometime in the near future.
If you do stay with a 'portable' generator, it is relatively easy to convert it to use natural gas. You would need to get a plumber to create a natural gas outlet on the outside of the house, but converting a generator to natural gas and getting that line outside would be a lot cheaper than a whole house automatic backup.
Frequency is a key component. 50/60hz is important. If a generator is not running at the correct speed the frequency will be off. Some of the better handheld meters will measure AC frequency.
A modern Generac whole house generator keeps the frequency very close if it's properly maintained.
What about those who power off of solar or wind or both. Those inverters put out pure sine waves?
@superwarp1 posted:What about those who power off of solar or wind or both. Those inverters put out pure sine waves?
Depends on the inverter, there are pure sine wave inverters and those using modified sign wave (which I suspect is our old friend, clipped sign wave, like we see on some of the transformers. The honda inverter generator I have has a pure sine wave output for example. So basically depends on the inverter they get installed with the system.
Well, it was a busy week! Turkey Day with family and just prior to that we got this baby installed and connected to the automatic transfer switch that had been waiting for a couple of months!
Jim K
We have had one for a few years. Propane powered.
We just have essential things such as the well, furnace, refrigerators and some lights on line when it is running.
It bugs me still when the power is out as the cost of generating with propane is more expensive than the utility supplied electric. We lose power quite often…
Tom
I can attest to the Generac Whole house generators. Mine is about 6 years old now. Works perfect. Power goes out, 5 seconds later generator kicks on (natural gas powered) everything is back up and running, neighbors sitting in the dark, lol.
Never had a problem with the trains when its running.
+
I had this Generac 16KW installed two years ago:
I have it programmed to come on after a thirty second outage but am thinking of changing that to a minute or two.
Tom,
I agree. Ours is natural gas fired. Not quite sure just how that will play out this year. Right now electric is the lowest cost in our area. But with that said I'm tired of sitting in the dark and worrying about loosing the fridge and the insulin inside it which isn't cheap either! Baloney happens. I worked for a university and assisted the utility department. We had underground cable failures, transformer failures, switchgear failures, and the "then" rare flooding. Those systems needed help then and still do now to keep operating. Can't say I'm not a little glad to be retired and out of it. But I appreciate the work needed to repair and maintain the system............ but back to training ON!
Jim K
I'm currently getting quotes on installing one. I have NG, so it would be very convenient if we lose power. At our old place, we lost power several times a year at least, it's been better since I moved. However, with all the crap going on with the utilities and shortages, I'd like to be prepared for whatever comes down the pike.
@RSJB18 posted:After Hurricane Sandy we were out for 7 days. My gasoline gen kept us on line and the fridge cold. Fortunately I could get gasoline from the pump on my campus. If I had to look for gas at the local stations, I would have been out of luck.
My northwestern NJ home had no power for 13 days after Sandy. We had to make trips to Pennsylvania for many days to get gasoline for the generator.
No natural gas mains in my neighborhood yet, so I bought a tri-fuel conversion kit for my portable generator, and keep a supply of filled BBQ propane tanks on hand, that I rotate through.
I really can't justify the cost of a whole house generator for the number of outages we get ... but, it sure would be nice to have anyway.
@CNJ Jim posted:I really can't justify the cost of a whole house generator for the number of outages we get ... but, it sure would be nice to have anyway.
I'm getting old and crotchety and I don't feel like dealing with something that I can avoid. I've lived through a bunch of multi-day power outages, and it's no fun! I'm looking to spend my kid's inheritance anyway.
Most of our outages last 4-6 hours, but having the 20KW natural gas Genrac has made our life so much easier during those times. We rushed to have the installation the day before Sandy, although the storm wound up missing us. Previously, we used a small Honda gasoline generator on the deck to power just the lights and refrigerators. The breaking point occurred during a derecho where power went off for two days. Every 10 hours or so I would have to fill the tank and waited in line for hours at a gas station. It was then I decided that the whole-house generator would be the better way to go. A friend who didn't have the natural gas line installed the propane version of the same generator.
We don't run the high-wattage electric ovens or dryer when the generator is on. It is set to kick in at 20 seconds after an outage.
It has not been problem free. Once the generator's control board failed during an outage. Another time, during its weekly test run, the starter mechanism failed. Yet in another instance, a failure of the HVAC cold-start capacitor caused the generator to behave erratically.
Since my installation, Kohler has made major inroads into the residential generator market. I don't know which brand would be more reliable.
We have had a Propane 16 KW Genrac for 15 Years which has been excellent. It will run the whole house except the AC units & our train room. I can do without the trains (never thought I would say that) but we need the AC for my wife’s health issues. Having a 20KW Koehler being installed in 2 weeks. We were fortunate that a neighbor is buying our old one. All parties are happy.
When I was a kid and hurricanes took out power for a week or two, my folks cooked on a sterno stove and a hibachi grill while we waited for power to come back. Nobody had a generator back then. We would have saved up water ahead of time in jugs since we had an electric well pump, but my main job was to go down to the stream to bring back a bucket of water to flush the toilet.
When I was a kid, no bathroom, and you don't have to flush an outhouse! However, when I was six or seven, we got a real well with an electric pump, then we had a real problem whenever the power was out!
Captain John
Have you been waiting long to get the Koehler unit? I had the Generac supplier/contractor here back in July. They told me then November 30th would be the install date. I was pleasantly surprised when they called and moved it up 10 days. I have been in touch with them and got the ATS from them and installed by a local electrical contractor. Then just had to wait. Just wondering if all manufacturers have similar time frames.
Jim K
3 month wait on Koehler Bogart.
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