POWER! Our Epic Failure and what we learned about Generators!

WHY I searched for the perfect GENERATOR and found an awesome solution for others too!

Our own real journey to more peace of mind.

From a moms perspective:

This is how I felt when I started looking at equipment that could give my family back up power in an emergency, HELP!
Because Unlike Elsa (from Disney's Frozen), in real life when the storms rage on, most women are not used to happily living like a princess in an ice castle, where "the cold doesn't bother you anyway!"
When the power went out and the severe cold in the rocky mountains came to our home, and darkness too, it bothered us all. It was my job to keep my kids warm.

I was clueless about what kind of fuel generator to purchase much less about solar generators or solar panels, and don't get me started on chemicals inside of batteries, I stunk at chemistry.

So many of these articles about energy off the grid are written by PhDs or someone trying to impress you with their science and math. Usually it is written by a guy, talking to other guys, in manspeak, about transformers, deep cycle, current restriction, circuits, etc, um WHAT!? Ugh! I am a girl...okay so I am going to be writing about my journey to Solar Generators from a GIRLS perspective. This stuff is overwhelming for some of us. We think guys should be handling the generators to keep our refrigerators going when the power goes out! I know that sounds incredibly sexist, but sometimes I am just NOT interested in getting another education in something I was hoping was easy, but probably is not. I already juggle twenty other hard things...do I need a chemical battery degree too? So I guess I thought a husband meant someone who could sweat in the sun mowing the lawn, and look sexy and strong starting the motor. HAHA. Yep, I am delusional.

So what got me involved? WELL, it started with THE EPIC Failure we had with our fuel generator.

I had finally took the dive and I just bought my husband a big unleaded gas generator I got him on sale for Christmas, I figured he could do the rest...right? I would have peace of mind now? LOL! We then found out our homeowners insurance, FIRE POLICY, did not cover us storing a bunch of gasoline in our garage. SO then I thought, well we can spend $1100 and just build a shed and store it in there, away from the house(because money grows on trees for everyone right?) and that is when I found out my neighborhood HOA covenants were against large amounts being stored anywhere on the property, as well as the City Ordinances. When you need like 20-40 gallons of fuel just for three days emergency use, that is expensive too, and now they are telling me possibly dangerous and illegal. A hotel in another town sounds like a cheaper, and a better plan, except in big emergencies fleeing isn't always the best option. PLUS where we live, the year we were making these decisions our remote neighborhood lost power 50 times in one year! I could not have afforded 50 nights that year in a hotel to be comfortable! MY NEIGHBORS can verify living in the sticks has its own way of forcing a whole new education upon you. The funny thing is I know some neighbors who have shared with me, their entire preparedness plan is going to grandmas(who lives in the city!) because they think their mom is the one with food storage and fuel. Have they never considered, family and friends are thinking about fleeing the other direction towards you? Haha. That could be a problem. Haha!

I was teaching other preparedness measures. I teach food storage, clearly with the thermal cookers we KNOW how to cook without power! I mean I am the Saratoga Jacks GIRL! I am the preparedness guru. I could purify water from a sewer practically, why was this power thing so hard for me?

I had to admit it, I was out of my depth with the whole generator issues. My brain was starting to see the weaknesses of the system I had chosen. This was starting to tick me off, the money I thought I had saved on a good deal for a gift for peace of mind for my family was going to cost me more than planned. Plus, I am one for thinking in terms of weeks, not days. I had wanted to store enough fuel for at least a full week. If I was really honest I actually liked the idea of ninety day supply. If you know me that is a good target for living ahead of the curve. The reality hit me that large scale disasters are not usually a couple days only emergencies, and I was already having trouble with being allowed to store LEGALLY enough fuel for even three days, and it was annoying. BUT trying to be positive I thought, for short term... no problem still, we can just siphon our gas out of our two unleaded gas cars in an emergency. I thought I had been smart in choosing an UNLEADED gas generator since we drove unleaded gas cars. HAHA! Until I realized the new anti siphoning devices on the newer cars made that impossible. We could not get the GAS out! We actually ruined our fuel pump on our suburban trying. ARGH! I need more money trees. Right?

Then the wind storm hit,

it was subzero temps, and the power went out, and guess what? It started out good. My manly man fired up our fuel generator outside in our backyard where at least it was in a fenced yard, but we had some immediate issues. Running that thing all night during blackout conditions was not only stinky, the wind storm blew the fumes towards our house, you could smell it though our closed windows and walls, but worse, it was LOUD! I laid inside in my bed that night with blankets piled on top of us, watching a movie, keeping the kids happy, knowing my refrigerator and freezer were full of food the generator was saving, feeling somewhat successful, but I also was painfully aware all my neighbors around me, could hear our generator. I knew they had their kids that might be in freezing dark winter conditions, no lights and their fridges probably needed some help too, and although I would have welcomed them gladly in our home to let them get cozy with us, and gladly would have let them borrow the generator for spurts of time to save their food that day, my inner voice, the one that thinks about long term zombie apocalypse type conditions started to kick in.

What would happen to us, if this kind of thing went on for a long period of time and people knew we had power when others didn't?

Not everyone is as nice as my neighbors. I began to think of the fight that broke out after Hurricane Sandy and the guy that was killed just standing in line waiting for a can of gas. I began to feel nervous that our resource for power was itself not only vulnerable to theft, being outside, it was perhaps making us vulnerable too! It was loud, drew attention, and we still relied on fuel, we could eventually run out of. I felt like we were too reliant on the system still.

So I started trying to read about portable solar generator systems. I was drawn to them for three reasons, they were quiet, we didn't need to store fuel, and I could use them safely inside behind locked doors. I went and looked at them, with my husband. I am not talking about $20,000+ whole home systems. I am talking about portable systems that are $400-$2000. Not as cheap as the gas generators, but when you included NOT have to purchase and store fuel and the increased, profoundly cheaper. There was a couple things I learned quickly. First, most of the solar generator systems out there, the ones that have serious wattage or decent power, are HEAVY! I went to Costco and picked up one that was a 140 watt one meant for plugging in something smallish like a cell. It had only one plug in. The shape of it, sort of reminded me of a bowling pin/torpedo (we nicknamed it that, because when I drove around the thing rolled all over the back of my car, making a loud THUD on every turn.) and HELLO, the worse part, the thing weighed 22 pounds. That is like carrying around three infants to keep a cell phone or a laptop juiced. Can't take that hiking! And if you wanted something really much bigger, for the appliances like my refrigerator,1200-3000watts minimum, they were close to 200 pounds. Now this may not be a big deal to some people, but that was a LOT of weight for me, a girl with a significant lack of upper body strength, to be hauling all over my house. The weight issue we encountered came from the fact that the solar energy stored as power, was stored in the internal batteries. The solar "generators" are simply put, are solar power stored in "batteries". You charge them up from the sun(wall and car charges can also be used to keep them charged too when you still have power) and it is all stored inside the internal battery systems, which are enclosed in some sort of an outer case with plug outlets available on the pretty exterior where you can draw the power out again. THE WEIGHT was coming from the typical lead acid battery most companies use that is stored inside.

In girls terms that means, the typical solar system uses same types of batteries inside that are used in like RVs or cars or boats, in one varying degree or another, are on the inside.

That brought about the other problem. What happens to your car or boat or RV or other types of deep cycle batteries if you don't drive your vehicles for months, like over the winter? Batteries Die. Sometimes unable to even take a charge again come spring, if you go too long. Even when we drive our cars every day, most of us have to replace our car batteries every 4-5 years. This led me to discover this ONE FACT, all solar systems, home or otherwise, the weakest part of their system, that will eventually need to be replaced, is the BATTERIES.

I met women and men who bought these types of back up solar power systems, who didn't know they had to trickle charge them periodically. A car gets a charge while it is being driven. Their solar generators(batteries) they bought failed because they had just unknowingly put them in their garage or storage shed a couple years ago, and didn't charge them up periodically. When they went to go get it, when the power finally went out. It was dead. But when they went to plug it in to their solar panel... it also no longer was able to be recharged even. They had left the lead acid battery sit too long uncharged and now it was dead forever. Wow I didn't want that! I guess I needed a chemistry lesson after all. Which I secretly hated and avoided. So I steered away from making any more major purchases until I could figure out a better Plan B.

and I went away for a couple years, but still keeping my eyes open, hoping I could find a system that made more sense to me. Then I meet a smart man that didn't talk down to me or in the familiar 'solar science brainiac language'. His name was James. He had lived overseas in remote locations and had out of necessity developed a battery system to store the energy from the sun, and he told me all about how he made a new solar generator system and he said it was lightweight. Light enough my kids could handle them.