Every Monday, Paula Light, with her The Monday Peeve prompt, gives us an opportunity to vent or rant about something that pisses us off. Today’s peeve is about equipment failure.
When my wife and I moved to the East Bay from San Francisco two and a half years ago, we knew three things. (1) It gets very, very hot in the East Bay. (2) There often are rolling blackouts due to the demand for electricity to power air conditioning units. (3) The area is prone to wildfires. But, we would be closer to our grandchildren, so….
After dealing with four or five power outages in the summer of 2020 in which the air conditioning went off during 100° temperatures and all the food in our freezer thawed, we decided install a whole house generator that automatically kicks in when there is a power failure and keeps everything — including air conditioning and the refrigerator-freezer — going until the power is restored.
The generator was installed in September 2020. We had four power outages last summer and the generator kicked in and worked like a champ last year. It was well worth the investment for us.
Yesterday morning at around 8:15, our power went out. The generator kicked on almost instantly and it was all good…until at around 8:30, when the generator sputtered and stalled. It tried to restart three times before just crapping out altogether. Fortunately, power was restored by around noon, just before it started to get unbearably hot.
A few hours ago a technician came out to troubleshoot the generator. The guy futzed around for a few hours and then informed me that the main generator control board (like the motherboard in a computer), had failed and he needs to order and install a new control board. He said it should be in within a week.
The good news is that the part and labor are covered under the warranty. So there will be no out-of-pocket cost to me to fix the generator. Now I’m keeping my fingers crossed that there will be no power outages between now and when the new control board is installed.
This, That, and the Other 
Always something! Grrrr 😡. Glad it wasn’t worse!
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Yeah, that’s frustrating. I’m sure glad it was covered under the warrantee, though!
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I wish we could afford one. It always seemed like an important issue that should be addressed.
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We’ve had two overnight outages in the last month — apparently they are upgrading the local grid to accommodate charging stations for Teslas etc. Without an external generator, my biggest concern was that the backup battery in the smoke alarm would not cover the total of 12 hours or so of outage, and the alarm would start to chirp in the middle of the night. Fortunately it lasted well, and a friend changed the backup battery the next morning! First world issues!
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Definitely first world issues! 😉
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‘There often are rolling blackouts due to the demand for electricity to power air conditioning units’
Also increased thousands of EV’s charging at night when solar panels don’t work. I’m a bearer of good-news boy Fan…..
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I think my electric vehicle charger uses a lot less electricity than my AC unit, which, unless it’s an unusual hot and humid night, is not running.
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I’m yet to be convinced on EV’s. They are heralded as being kinder to the environment because they’re fueled by clean electricity and not polluting gas. True, but the electricity is produced by burning fossil fuels. It’s just shifting the problem from the car to the source. And the majority of America’s electricity still comes from fossil fuels. So it is misguided thinking using electricity over gas is ‘saving the planet’. Renewable energy is the way forward…..
General observations. Nothing directed at you…….
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You make a good point, but it doesn’t take a lot of electricity to charge my car overnight one night a week (much less than what it takes to cool my house with central air conditioning during these 90+° days), and my car doesn’t spew pollutants into the air when I drive it. Plus, on a personal note, I’m saving a boatload of money by not having to fill my gas tank at $6+ per gallon each week!
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While the car doesn’t spew pollutants into the air (which is good) the source manufacturer of it’s electricity does in it’s place. This is just shifting the problem…….The saving in gas would be a big bonus
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Oh boy! Lets hope there arent any outages between now and then!
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Yes, let’s hope!
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They do go, hubby was telling me the other day they need regular maintenance
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My problem with those generators is they’re soooo noisy. My neighbor’s is located right under my bedroom window.
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Yes, they are quite loud.
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I hope you survived and have you generator back up and ready.
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The part is not yet in. 😠
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Parts delays are so bad right now. Hope it is there soon!
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How does this works ? I mean what it takes to generate the electricity ?
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It’s a natural gas generator that kicks on when the electricity fails, the generator powers up and gets the electric devices in our home up and running again for the duration of the electrical outage. t least that’s what is supposed to happen.
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