so, i got my generator for camp and whatnot.
i figured i would use it about once a year at burningman, at the regional burn or maybe at a party, really about twice a year --and maybe someday... sooomedaaay, the power would go out, i'd use it then. also, i took it to the playa in july assuming would use it --not realizing our camp had a nice 25kW gennie provided by bmorg. no need to run mine. so, mildly disappointed (since i just got my new toy and all)...i just left it packed up. still happy with the purchase, knew it's time would come.
25kWatt diesel, power plant
turns out, no one was really watching the gauge on the 25kW, and we ran out of gas! i was away at the time, but a good friend knew i had a honda eu2000i and hooked it all up. my little honda came to the rescue to keep the lights and a few computers on!
for a testimonial of how quiet it was, i didn't even know it was running until i was practically standing on it, and heard it purring along...
so that was the first real use, on the playa, and in july no less... yea!
plus, i used the generator later that year at burningman, of course. worked like a champ. powered my lights, my sound system. let me be independent from camp --and from our camp's power problems. once again...third year running, our resident expert had something, or several things go wrong. he wound up using the little yamaha 1kW i sold him (which was always the backup plan). so that whole deal worked out, and i'm glad for that.
anyway. i brought my little honda home, still dusty, been thinking i need to deal with the gas left over and all (going stale). still not unpacked really. when rather a wallop of a wind storm hit here. knocked some trees down. my power didn't even flicker, but other folks had downed lines, knocked the power out for more than a week. was kinda odd, everything seemed fine, you wouldn't even know there was a problem -till you went down the wrong street.
turns out, my friends that run an isp, lost power. my business web server hosted there, was down. they also had one big-wig customer down (not yet set up with redundant site downtown, like most everyone else). so, the storm had knocked their office, my server, and one import client offline. right towards the height of the xmas season. ouch.
i can't complain much since i get free hosting really, but still --my site was down... they had mulled over getting a generator from time to time, just kept passing on it... and a day after the storm --there were pretty much *no* generators in any stores at all around the city! typical, right?
being my friends, and being 'family' really --of course i offered my generator, get key systems back online till the power came on. so rather than have to rent one, they used my little honda. got the main systems back up, enough to get the most important servers up and running.
the sys-admin was naturally a little nervous about using my generator. but the honda offers a near perfect, totally clean power. we went through power conditioners anyway, still, it's nice to know you can run any type of electronics you want straight from generator, no problem!
in fact my friends commented, they were grateful i had done my homework, it was such a nice solution. pulling about 1200 watts steady powering everything, the honda hummed along for 5 days straight ('till the power came back up).
they've since installed a gennie since then --but i got to save the day.
hasn't even been one year.... ya just never know.
generator part 1, backstory.
generator part 2, external fuel tank.
follow-up's :
generator external fuel tank v2.
generator external fuel tank v2+.