It boils down to ensuring that the power is available when it’s needed, which doesn’t always align with the times it is being produced. Also having several different energy sources can be valuable. Thank you for watching and taking the time to write.
@@cfldrivenyes my disaster recovery plan includes some small solar panels, a battery pack, and a small generator plus six tanks of propane. Propane means lower maintenance on the generator and propane fuel lasts forever.
We didn't go nearly as long without power, but I agree with all of your assessments. We had to drive to Greeneville SC, an hour away, to get fuel for the generators. I consolidated everything into our larger refrigerator/freezer and ran a 3500 watt genny for a few hours every 6 hours to keep things frozen. We would have burned through our gas in just 4 or 5 days if we were trapped and couldn't get more. Paying for anything became very difficult, people were writing checks for cash if you could find someone willing to do that. And definitely have $5s and $10s. Our biggest win was my wife's idea to put a hand pump on our well. Running a 10 KW genny for water burns fuel like crazy and often you just need a few gallons. That hand pump can do that in a few minutes easily. Our neighbors used hand pumped water for toilets when they ran out. Also rain water barrels are good for flushing toilets, it was hilarious that water was a problem after 2 foot of rain in 3 days. Great prep insight thank you!
Walt, we accidentally left the wheel barrel and a few buckets outside and indeed the water they captured came in handy. Even though we are on city water, I love the idea of a hand pump for the old well. Unfortunately there is no record of the buried well head location and my efforts to locate it have failed. I just bartered for a new used Helene Firman dual fuel inverter which I plan to run only on propane as that is easier to manage. It won't replace the Prius but will augment when we need to do laundry and/or heat a room in the winter. Thanks for watching and sharing your story and tips.
Cool idea, thanks for sharing. Also, you can go to your neighbor with PV on roof and charge car there. Just 2500watt charging for 8 hours is 100 miles of range (+- electric loses). That is why PV, electric houses, cars are so awesome to me. 👍
PV with power banks would be a great solution, but NC is not solar friendly which is a shame. We live in a forested area so unobstructed view of sun is hard to come by, although Helene did let in a bit more light.
@@cfldriventhese days you can generate about 880 watts per day with 16 ft square feet of sun for a cost of about $250. Worth considering as an addition to your overall disaster plan.
@cfldriven yes I saw a lot of sunlight in your videos. I'm not recommending a permanent installation. Just one set of layout panels that plug into a solar "generator". However if you double the panels to $500 worth you could probably generate about 1,700 watts per day. That's enough to run your refrigerator for about 10 hours.
Great to see you were prepared with your Prius power source and through wall plug. Minor edit, the power crews were from New Brunswick.. (The province is next to Maine.) After a hurricane knocked out our power a while back, cash was an issue too, so since then, we've kept $200 in $5 bills on hand in the house so we can buy stuff without worrying about the store needing to make change with big bills.... But since we're on a well, we need 240V power for the pump, so we bought a dual fuel (propane/gas) geny for that, but I still want to get a battery backup for smaller loads overnight like the fridge and pellet stove, then charge it up with the geny in the morning.
Thank you for the correction on New Brunswick. I just acquired duel fuel inverter and am exploring how using various power sources (car, battery, geni) could help us during a winter outage. Thanks for sharing.
Good video ! I'am happy we have only underground powerlines in our country. We get only a power outage once every 15 or 20 years, because of a stupid excavator driver digging somewhere, and those power interruptions are mostly solved within one or two hours.
We are looking at bypassing the electrical mast and going under ground from the service panel to the utility pole. I have already replace the mast three times. Thank you for sharing your story.
@@cfldrivenand that's because it's a high frequency inverter, made with chipsets, and they do not last long, and when they fry, they create a fire, so be carefull with that in the trunk. Best bet, get a real inverter that's made using low frequency, transformer based just like the world's electric grid. A bit heavier, and more expensive, but it will last a very long time, and is much safer. That goes for that small China made one you had in the house also, but hey, if it works for ya! You do you
The motor,gas side is made off the Atkinson cycle premise. The 1.5 litre and the later 1.8, both ran Atkinson cycle. You would not believe but both engines had high compression pistons, yet they are not high compression motors, and able to run on regular unleaded gas. It's all due to the timing of opening and closing off the valves. The piston fires, travels down and 1/2 way back up the cylinder before the valve closes to only trap low compression allowing much free travel in the engine utilizing way less energy and much less gas, and being assisted by an electric motor to bring power much higher. Atkinson cycle was used way back in 1900, and the Japanese improved on it. The US prius got 45- 50 mpg, the Japanese model got 78 mpg, just by changing the timing
@@allanegleston4931 I have a bad childhood memory of a milk strike and mom using powdered milk. It just didn't have the same taste. We were so happy when the dairy strike was over.
Great to see a real life plan come together. Thanks for sharing!
It certainly made the situation more bearable. Thanks for watching.
I also have an inverter on my Prius and an e-golf! Great video
It is a shame VW stopped selling small EV in the US. The e-Golf is my fave car, fun to drive and easy on the pocket book.
Nice. Good lesson that even if you have a generator of some kind, it's best to use the generator to recharge batteries instead of using it directly.
It boils down to ensuring that the power is available when it’s needed, which doesn’t always align with the times it is being produced. Also having several different energy sources can be valuable. Thank you for watching and taking the time to write.
@@cfldrivenyes my disaster recovery plan includes some small solar panels, a battery pack, and a small generator plus six tanks of propane.
Propane means lower maintenance on the generator and propane fuel lasts forever.
We didn't go nearly as long without power, but I agree with all of your assessments. We had to drive to Greeneville SC, an hour away, to get fuel for the generators. I consolidated everything into our larger refrigerator/freezer and ran a 3500 watt genny for a few hours every 6 hours to keep things frozen. We would have burned through our gas in just 4 or 5 days if we were trapped and couldn't get more. Paying for anything became very difficult, people were writing checks for cash if you could find someone willing to do that. And definitely have $5s and $10s. Our biggest win was my wife's idea to put a hand pump on our well. Running a 10 KW genny for water burns fuel like crazy and often you just need a few gallons. That hand pump can do that in a few minutes easily. Our neighbors used hand pumped water for toilets when they ran out. Also rain water barrels are good for flushing toilets, it was hilarious that water was a problem after 2 foot of rain in 3 days. Great prep insight thank you!
Walt, we accidentally left the wheel barrel and a few buckets outside and indeed the water they captured came in handy. Even though we are on city water, I love the idea of a hand pump for the old well. Unfortunately there is no record of the buried well head location and my efforts to locate it have failed.
I just bartered for a new used Helene Firman dual fuel inverter which I plan to run only on propane as that is easier to manage. It won't replace the Prius but will augment when we need to do laundry and/or heat a room in the winter.
Thanks for watching and sharing your story and tips.
Cool idea, thanks for sharing.
Also, you can go to your neighbor with PV on roof and charge car there. Just 2500watt charging for 8 hours is 100 miles of range (+- electric loses). That is why PV, electric houses, cars are so awesome to me. 👍
PV with power banks would be a great solution, but NC is not solar friendly which is a shame. We live in a forested area so unobstructed view of sun is hard to come by, although Helene did let in a bit more light.
@@cfldriventhese days you can generate about 880 watts per day with 16 ft square feet of sun for a cost of about $250.
Worth considering as an addition to your overall disaster plan.
@@macmcleod1188 Now with a few less trees in the way it might be time to research regular solar panels vs the portables that I have. Thank you.
@cfldriven yes I saw a lot of sunlight in your videos. I'm not recommending a permanent installation. Just one set of layout panels that plug into a solar "generator". However if you double the panels to $500 worth you could probably generate about 1,700 watts per day. That's enough to run your refrigerator for about 10 hours.
Neat to see how well the Prius did! Regarding cash, keep it in small bills only so you can give correct change.
Thank you for the feedback. You are right smaller denomination will work best and will be appreciated by businesses.
Great to see you were prepared with your Prius power source and through wall plug. Minor edit, the power crews were from New Brunswick.. (The province is next to Maine.) After a hurricane knocked out our power a while back, cash was an issue too, so since then, we've kept $200 in $5 bills on hand in the house so we can buy stuff without worrying about the store needing to make change with big bills.... But since we're on a well, we need 240V power for the pump, so we bought a dual fuel (propane/gas) geny for that, but I still want to get a battery backup for smaller loads overnight like the fridge and pellet stove, then charge it up with the geny in the morning.
Thank you for the correction on New Brunswick. I just acquired duel fuel inverter and am exploring how using various power sources (car, battery, geni) could help us during a winter outage. Thanks for sharing.
great vid. thanks
Thank you for watching and writing in.
Good video ! I'am happy we have only underground powerlines in our country. We get only a power outage once every 15 or 20 years, because of a stupid excavator driver digging somewhere, and those power interruptions are mostly solved within one or two hours.
We are looking at bypassing the electrical mast and going under ground from the service panel to the utility pole. I have already replace the mast three times. Thank you for sharing your story.
80 watts was causing your inverter to get hot?
I didn't say that, it was always very warm regardless of load.
@@cfldrivenand that's because it's a high frequency inverter, made with chipsets, and they do not last long, and when they fry, they create a fire, so be carefull with that in the trunk. Best bet, get a real inverter that's made using low frequency, transformer based just like the world's electric grid. A bit heavier, and more expensive, but it will last a very long time, and is much safer. That goes for that small China made one you had in the house also, but hey, if it works for ya! You do you
@@dustydawson8977 Thanks for sharing the info. What are some low frequency inverter brands that we should be considering?
A Prius is a Hybrid, Electric, and Gas?
It is a hybrid using a gas engine and traction battery to drive the vehicle. The system maximizes the flow of energy to achieve highest MPG.
The motor,gas side is made off the Atkinson cycle premise. The 1.5 litre and the later 1.8, both ran Atkinson cycle. You would not believe but both engines had high compression pistons, yet they are not high compression motors, and able to run on regular unleaded gas. It's all due to the timing of opening and closing off the valves. The piston fires, travels down and 1/2 way back up the cylinder before the valve closes to only trap low compression allowing much free travel in the engine utilizing way less energy and much less gas, and being assisted by an electric motor to bring power much higher. Atkinson cycle was used way back in 1900, and the Japanese improved on it. The US prius got 45- 50 mpg, the Japanese model got 78 mpg, just by changing the timing
@@dustydawson8977 Thank you for sharing so much info.
dont forget powderd milk.
Powdered milk is a great option along with the ready to drink UHT or 'long-life' milk which typically lasts six to nine months in the pantry unopened.
@@cfldriven i have those too also. got them from meals on wheels . learned the powdered milk trick from my mom. :)
@@allanegleston4931 I have a bad childhood memory of a milk strike and mom using powdered milk. It just didn't have the same taste. We were so happy when the dairy strike was over.