What do you do without power

[Pinesmoke]

I had a 10kw portable genny that ran like a champ but was a cantankerous wench to start. A spritz of starting fluid always brought her around.

 

[tbear853]

I have a 13.5 / 9 K watt gas generator pull or batt start as main back up ... uses transfer switching, and I have a smaller, lighter, easier to move around the yard 4K watt that's just pull start as a back up back up. I have 6 vehicles out there with good batteries, 4 of which have group 65 batteries and I have two more group 65s in the basement in a cart that I keep maintained ... and two 400 & 600 watt inverters. We have blankets and a full in ground on 3 sides basement, the 4th wall has a whole 'nother room between it and any wind.

The home's main (as in "built in") heat is an air handler that uses hot water off the 50 gallon high efficiency propane water heater that vents through a PVC wall vent, to have house heat we can be fine with just enough current to run the air handler's circulation pump and distr. fan through ducts. No way would I plan to rely on just the pellet stove.

I got carried away.

 

[bogieb]

Its not hard to do basic troubleshooting. Fuel, air, spark type of stuff. See if you have spark. A 2 cycle is a pretty simple engine. What do you have to lose if you tear it apart? Its not working now, if its not working later, nothing lost.

If you have spark, its probably fuel related. Either its not getting enough or its getting too much.

Ask questions here. Take lots of pictures.. Our advice is worth what you have to pay for it!

Brand new canned gas (just bought when it became apparent the outage was going to be a while) and it had never had gas in it before. I did all the troubleshooting steps in the manual. I have no interest in tearing it apart. I have much better things to do. Today it is snowblow, shovel, roof rake my solar panels (if needed), keep an eye on my elderly neighbor and put in 9-10 hours of work

 

[Snowmobileaddict]

Found this 3 years ago on FB Marketplace for $650. Brushless 12kw continuous, Briggs Vanguard 23HP v-twin.. Only had 95 hours on it. Best money I ever spent.

 

[GeorgeOrwell]

So I guess a pellet stove needs ac power? So what do you do for heat when the power goes out? I suppose you would have to have a backup battery and or maybe a small generator to run it. Are any of the stoves capable of running from DC power?? I thought I might replace my wood burner with a pellet but this has always been a major point to having one, HEAT and cooking.

Thanks for all the great responses. Sorry it has been so long. I meant grid down 3-6 months or more. Just because I found it... there is a non-Electric ... US Stove Company US GW1949 Wiseway Non-Electric Pellet Stove. Surprising a few ok reviews.

 

[Pinesmoke]

Thanks for all the great responses. Sorry it has been so long. I meant grid down 3-6 months or more. Just because I found it... there is a non-Electric ... US Stove Company US GW1949 Wiseway Non-Electric Pellet Stove. Surprising a few ok reviews.

If you are talking that long of grid propane, as a whole, would be the way to go George. It doesn't go bad in a tank so it's always ready. I layered my place for heat. Heat pump, propane furnace I can stay off of due to my wood stove. 1000 gal tank hooked up and the only thing on it is a stove the furnace and genny. Running the genny only enough to keep freezers cold I could do that for quite a while in a pinch. Although eventually it would run out.

ETA
If you use a small genny for the job it could run for quite a while. Most have a gal per hour under load in the specs.

 

[bogieb]

Thanks for all the great responses. Sorry it has been so long. I meant grid down 3-6 months or more. Just because I found it... there is a non-Electric ... US Stove Company US GW1949 Wiseway Non-Electric Pellet Stove. Surprising a few ok reviews.

If I was preparing for an extended amount of time without grid power, I would have put in a wood stove, not a pellet stove. Yes, there is the wisway, but I've heard it is picky on pellets and draft, so that is a no go for me (I burn cheap pellets and getting softies around here is iffy). Also, I'm a spaz, so probably using a torch to light it is not the safest thing in the world for me to be doing - LOL. There is a reason I bought stoves with electonic ignition .

Here is an old thread posted by a real-world user.

 

[BigJohnfromCT]

Found this 3 years ago on FB Marketplace for $650. Brushless 12kw continuous, Briggs Vanguard 23HP v-twin.. Only had 95 hours on it. Best money I ever spent.

View attachment 324220

I really like your strain relief feature for the cable

 

[rickwai]

I have a regular 8000w generator to power up the house via a generator outlet by my panel and backfeeding through a 30 a breaker. (all of my heating are propane). The I have a Predator 2000w inverter generator to power my 2 pellet stoves. They do not like standard gen power