generator?

[jordan]

How many watts will it take to run a house incase of a power outage? just say a 1100 sq foot house, I cant remember what the ac unit is I think its around 2.5-3 tons. Thanks

[JOHN202]

I have a 5500 watt. It will run a fridge\freezer, 2 window units, tv, computer, and what ever lights i need.I also use one big cable i had made for it, got tired of running extension cords all over the house.I can get 10-11 hrs run time on 5 gal gas.

My neighbor has a 18KW, that will run his entire house including the 3 ton unit and stove.If you get a small generator like mine you will need window units.

[90xpress]

<table width="90%" cellspacing=0 cellpadding=0 align=center><tr><td>Quote, originally posted by jordan &raquo;</td></tr><tr><td class="quote">How many watts will it take to run a house incase of a power outage? just say a 1100 sq foot house, I cant remember what the ac unit is I think its around 2.5-3 tons. Thanks</td></tr></table>


We installed one on my grandmas house, its a little smaller than 1100 sq ft but she has central A/C and heating. Anyway its a 10KW natural gas generator and it runs everything.

fridge
heater
A/C
lights

[jcdogfish]

I have a 12kw natural gas and run everything except the 5 ton ac. I use 3 window ac units from my shop for long outages. There are some calculators on the kohler site and others to size a generator. The biggest problem is if you have a lot of big draws that cycle and they cycle at the same time like freezers refrigerators and ac compressors. The big draw is when they start.

[barchief]

if you want to do a measure, then here's how you figure wattage..

on each appliance it should either tell you the wattage or the amps..

if it tells you the amps, just multiply the ampsXvolts to get wattage..

for example.. if the label says 10 amps, and it is a 110 volt appliance, then the wattage will be between 1100 and 1200 watts.

for a 3 ton unit, you probably have at least 40 amp breakers (one for outside, one for inside).... so that is 40x220x2= so to be safe, that is appx 17.6 Kw just to run the AC.

just add them all up and that will tell you how big you need.

[jordan]

preciate yall, ive been thinking about it for a while just didnt know what to look for. We have only lost power one time since weve been here but it was about a day and a half. I guess when you live as far out as we do you aint exactly at the top of their list. Naw I know there are alot of folks that loose their power so we just have to wait our turn, it would just be nice to have backup for times like that.

[jordan]

As far as the wire coming out of the box that will plug into the generator what size should I use? It will only be about 10' of wire, I've got some 8awg 600 volt out in the shed. Should I go with some 6awg? I'm gonna use a 10kw or a 20kw so I can run the whole house. That wire is pretty expensive so if the 8 will work that would be great, but I dont want to take any chances of messing something up so if I need to buy bigger wire I will. Thanks for yalls help.