One of my preparations for Year 2000 was to purchase a four stroke gasoline electrical generator. There was no guarantee that there would be no electric power interruptions at the start of the year 2000 and I wanted a reliable power supply, just to be ready. The generator I chose was a reliable four stroke Honda engine. The generator had a large gas tank so it could run on one tank for about four hours depending on how heavy the electrical load I was using.



Buying the generator was only the first step to ensuring a reliable power supply, however, as generators need fuel. I needed to acquire an adequate supply of gasoline and oil to run it for as long as required. I went to a oil company bulk plant and purchased three 45 gallon drums one by one over the span of a few weeks. Every few days I filled up 4 - 5 gallon jerry cans full of gasoline, at various gas stations in the area. When storing gasoline for a period of time it is a good idea to ad a gasoline stabilization chemical to keep the gas from breaking down. An oil company or hardware store should be able to tell you, where to buy such a chemical.

I had the generator, the fuel, and the oil to run it. What was left to do was to have the power supply wired to my home electrical system. I obtained an estimate from a local electrician. It was not going to be cheap. One of the parts, a switching box, cost $500.00. It would switch between the hydro electricity line and my generator cable. I dug a ditch from my generator shack to the house. The cable would be buried in the ground.

The electrician came and made the changes to the wiring. The way it worked was, I would switch over to the generator cable. Then I would start the generator. When it was running up to speed making adequate household power, I would plug in the cable to the generator's output plug. That was it. The house had its own power supply.

There was maintenance to do on the generator, since it was brand new. Every new engine needs its oil changed when breaking it in. After the first few hours of running, the dirty oil, full of metal bits from the break-in time, needs to be drained. This was not difficult to do. Just unscrew a bolt and let the oil drain into a shallow container. Once the dirty oil was removed, and the drain bolt tightened in place, clean fresh oil was poured into the oil reservoir.

Even though nothing serious occurred in my area during Y2K, there have been a few power outages, throughout the years and it has been handy to have a back up power supply. Once each month I start up the generator and run it, plugged into an electric heater. I let it run for about 5 minutes. The electric heater is providing the electrical load, needed to safely run the generator. The generator could be electrically damaged if run with nothing using the power it produces. Using this system has ensured trouble free use of this power supply for over seven years.