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PANDEMIC ALERT LEVEL
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Fridge/freezer question....
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NawtyBits View Drop Down
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    Posted: May 17 2006 at 7:10pm
For those of you who have had experience with lenghty power outages and have generators.  I have a gen and some gas, and I can hook it up to my house system, no problem.  I don't need the electricty except to power fridge and freezer.  From your experience, how long would I need to run a freezer a day to keep the food frozen.  The power company says that an unopened freezer should keep the food frozen for about 24 hours.  If I ran my gen for a 1/2 hour in the am, and 1/2 hour in the pm is that enough?  Over kill?  My freezer is in the basement, and average temp is about 60 in the basement.  If it's winter, I have no issue as I can put stuff outside, as we are below freezing 4 or 5 months out of the year...

Expert advice welcome and needed...

Thanks
\nawty

p.s.  I am supposed to be able to get about 8 hours of run time off this gen.. I don't know if that's true, I usually run it an hour or 2 at a time, and fill it up every time I use it...  I understand that each unit is different, but my question is does your gen perform reasonably as advertised run-time wise.
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2ifbyC View Drop Down
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Points: 533 		Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote 2ifbyC Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: May 17 2006 at 7:43pm

I filled enough 2 liter bottles with room for ice expansion to cover the bottom of my chest freezer. I placed them upright and cut a sheet of 1/8" paneling to fit on top of the bottles. This was to provide a heat sink in case of power outages. Works fantastically!

We've had numerous outages up to a week long and by running my gen set for three hours three times a day we never lost any food to spoilage. Granted we did use some items that were on top of everything else to play it safe but never saw any spoilage. We did toss some items that started to thaw just to be safe.

 

A side benefit is that you can have ice/ice water on hand for a long time after the lights go out. After a week long outage the freezer bottles did show thawing but still was at least half ice. Remember to absolutely minimize how often you open the freezer. A chest freezer will not lose as much cold air as will an upright.

 

For any outage over a week all bets are off. If in doubt, throw it out! 

 
ETA Yes my gen sets run close to advertized hr/gal.

 
Survival does have an 'I'!

Dodging 'canes on Florida's central Gulf Coast
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pugmom View Drop Down
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Points: 415 		Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote pugmom Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: May 18 2006 at 7:48pm
I asked this very same question of how long to run my generator to keep freezer ok several months ago.  I got several responses, each of which said about 2 hours/day.  This is less than the above post, so am not sure.  I really like the idea of the heat-sink with ice in the bottom.  Thanx!
jpc
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2ifbyC View Drop Down
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Points: 533 		Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote 2ifbyC Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: May 18 2006 at 8:01pm
The main reason I run the gen set for three hours at a time is that we do raid the fridge several times a day. I want to make sure that the perishables last as long as possible. Plus it takes that long for me to insure my 12 VDC batts are fully charged. You might could get by with shorter times, not sure. I just know what works for my situation.
 
If the SHTF hard, I might have to trim down my times to extend my fuel. Keep in mind that our longest outage was about ten days and the gas stations were open after a day or two.
 
You might want to run a 48 hour evaluation test to eliminate doubt. This is a good idea for any of your preps that you haven't exercised! Eliminate the unkowns.
Survival does have an 'I'!

Dodging 'canes on Florida's central Gulf Coast
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NawtyBits View Drop Down
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Points: 430 		Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote NawtyBits Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: May 18 2006 at 8:57pm
I could test, but the thought of losing  a freezer full of food is something I choose not to risk.  I will just have to make do, and figure it  out on the fly.  Not a good practice, but practical in this instance.  I wonder what 100 pounds of spoiled bacon smells like??

Besides, I suspect if it gets so bad the power goes off, it will be several weeks in to my SIP, and my freezer will be much lighter.

Thanks for your answers folks.  I suspect I will run it an hour in the AM, noonish, and PM.  I will definitely use the bottled water idea to increase cooling storage.

Thanks folks.

nawty
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