Power-grid down

Briefly caught he WX for up there

This year is not done yet

Stay tuned...
No Virginia !!! I do NOT believe in Man Made Global warming...

But I do see, in my brief 62 years, a trend to some extremes in change

Insurance is a good thing
Go bag is a good thing
A proactive plan is a good thing
More insurance is a better thing

Waiting for the National Guard to pluck you off your roof top is STUPID!...IMNSHO

We just had a tropical storm and cold front in the same day, first for me!! Finally some cooler, dryer air after a lllooooong hot summer.


Hope you get power soon, you don't realize how much you rely on it till its gone. After this summer I'm thinking of a whole house system, the more powerful portables are too heavy for me now.

I heard about the power outage on the radio earlier today. Hope it comes back on for you soon.

Make sure you keep the car running or at least start the car every so often if you have a power inverter hooked up.

When the power would go out (which it used to at least a few times a year), my grandpa used to keep a deep cycle marine battery charged so that he could bring it in the house and hook a lamp up to it with the bulb swapped out with a 12v 50w medium base bulb. The whole neighborhood with be pitch black at night except for our house LOL.

Now I have since accumulated 4 generators which I try to run once every 2 weeks or so. Except for maybe a short 2 second outage that is enough to mess up all my clocks and timers, I don't think the power has gone out are here for at least 2 years now.

Did this storm catch the weather dweebs with their pants down? I didn't see it forecast at all.

Thanks guys, The power was restored to our street this morning around 10:00am. A smaller culdesac just before ours was still without power tonight. Let me tell you.. it's nice to have running water again.. especially HOT water for a shower!!!

I sure wish we had fuel cells for affordable power. Then every house could have it's own power pack in the yard right next to the gaspack. Wouldnt that be nice.

I don't recall ever losing power during our four years living in Tiverton roddie, but I do remember one snowy cold morning getting ready to leave for Memphis when the Riveria dumped it's oil all over the driveway and me on my back in the snow trying to find out why. With time slipping away I took the La Sabre and left the wife the more dependable Mustang. Ran out of snow somewhere in NY city.

Losing power is a given here in WV, couple of times a winter on average. All electric home here and on a well is no fun. Nearest Mickey Dee's is some 25 miles away, but we do have a small restaurant in town about 10 miles East. They are usually without power too. (If you can get to them)

November 1st, if I could give away the next four months I would. Memories of Florida in shorts in January slip in.

Bob

RknRusty wrote:I sure  wish we had fuel cells for affordable power. Then every house could have it's own power pack in the yard right next to the gaspack. Wouldnt that be nice.

I don’t wanna get all political, but will just say that’s a wonderful idea. BUT, the power companies (energy industry) won’t let that become reality. They still want to (and will) own  and control power generation and distribution. Baah, I’m getting down off the soapbox now before my blood pressure goes up.      

Conspiracy theory for your consideration: just how did a small 3 person corporation get a $300million contract to rebuild the power system on that island?  

Ok, I’m going back to playing with engines and airplanes now.

rsv1cox wrote:I don't recall ever losing power during our four years living in Tiverton roddie, but I do remember one snowy cold morning getting ready to leave for Memphis when the Riveria dumped it's oil all over the driveway and me on my back in the snow trying to find out why.  With time slipping away I took the La Sabre and left the wife the more dependable Mustang.  Ran out of snow somewhere in NY city.

Losing power is a given here in WV, couple of times a winter on average.  All electric home here and on a well is no fun.  Nearest Mickey Dee's is some 25 miles away, but we do have a small restaurant in town about 10 miles East.  They are usually without power too. (If you can get to them)  

November 1st, if I could give away the next four months I would.  Memories of Florida in shorts in January slip in.  

Bob

You know Bob.. my wife mentioned that, "in the seven years that we've lived in N. Smithfield.. we've lost power three times for several days" ............ She's wanted to buy a generator since the first time it happened. I explained the law of averages to her.. in that; "should we go to the expense of sourcing a generator.. and the necessary connection via transfer-switch to our electrical panel for operation of the hard-wired oil-burner and well-pump... that we'd probably not see another loss of power for at least another seven years". ............. she doesn't buy that theory though. I'll admit; I "do" worry about not having heat for several days due to a Winter storm.. . I thought about rigging-up a treadmill to an alternator for charging a bank of storage batteries to power an inverter. That way; she could "stay in shape" while providing electricity for the house... or at least enough for me to run the power-tools in my workshop. (just kidding..) She's my "best friend".. and the love of my life!

My dad had a LeSabre.. 1967; bought used probably in 1971.. and loved it! He was not mechanically inclined or "maintenance-minded" though. He drove it for a few years and sold it privately sometime in 1973. A fella came to look at it one evening.. and with a flashlight; noticed drops of water coming from one side of the engine-block. It had a cracked-block.. and he offered my dad a lot less $$ for the car.. which my dad accepted. The man drove the car for years afterward, without any problems. That man probably poured some "Porter-Seal" into the radiator.. and never looked back.

RknRusty wrote:I sure  wish we had fuel cells for affordable power. Then every house could have it's own power pack in the yard right next to the gaspack. Wouldnt that be nice.

I don't know about other areas outside of my region... but I'm seeing widespread use of "solar-panels" in my locale. Some are merely roof-top arrays.. but I'm also seeing "farms" of significant acreage. Land once used for crops.. and also land that has been cleared solely for the purpose of installing MASSIVE solar-arrays. This concerns me.. because I don't see solar-technology as being that much more advanced than it was when it was first introduced. How much more efficient is it.. actually? The panels are obtrusive.. and certainly must have a lifespan. Are they constructed from materials that are recyclable when they reach their "end of life" service? I'm not a "tree-hugger" by any means.... but I do tend to lean toward "green" when it comes down to alternative power sources.

roddie wrote:

RknRusty wrote:I sure  wish we had fuel cells for affordable power. Then every house could have it's own power pack in the yard right next to the gaspack. Wouldnt that be nice.

...because I don't see solar-technology as being that much more advanced than it was when it was first introduced. How much more efficient is it.. actually? The panels are obtrusive.. and certainly must have a lifespan. Are they constructed from materials that are recyclable when they reach their "end of life" service? I'm not a "tree-hugger" by any means.... but I do tend to lean toward "green" when it comes down to alternative power sources.

I damn sure am Green in that way too. I don't know about any leaps in efficiency either, but aluminum and glass are recyclable and that's about all solar panels are, so it seems okay that way. I don't see why they can't reduce the footprint by building tall spires unless cooling is an insurmountable problem. They absolutely don't work if overheated. There are some "bright idea" gimmicks with rotating cylinders or pyramids of solar collectors that Do Not pass muster when the math is proofed by an engineer, so don't get sucked in by the many scammy solar pitches. Anything will have a sunny side with a tracking system and need a way to evacuate heat, maybe with coolant circulated by convection. The price rises with the complexity of the system.

By coincidence, my Le Sabre was a 1967 also.  A gift from my father in law, a crusty old Naval Officer that served in WW2 aboard the first USS Piro and USS Utah BB31.  He "sold" it to us for a dollar, and being the dweeb that I am I actually paid him.  I'm surprised that he didn't conk me at the time.  

That Buick took us from the White Mountains in NH to Disney World in Florida and many points in between. Probably our most traveled vehicle. It was a wonderful road cruiser.  



Not to long ago I watched a feature on PBS about a retired engineer living in one of the Carolina's, South I believe that built a house completely off the grid.  Solar panels and heat storage units with hundreds of feet of plastic piping in circular containers buried under ground.

Glad you got the power pack Roddie, Talking about solar panels , there's a house up the road that has one in yard bout the size of their home and it rotates as the sun moves ! Of course they own the golf course across the road that is for sale now for 1.6 mil. and have a tennis court in the backyard So go figure !?!? Yeah there's some those panes in a field (biG) down the road other way I sure Duke Energy our power source owns them but , the bills keep coming in as large as they were before . I got behind a few times over the years in paying them and they threw a 399.00rider on me till i can start paying on time Rant Rant Rant

rsv1cox wrote:By coincidence, my Le Sabre was a 1967 also.  A gift from my father in law, a crusty old Naval Officer that served in WW2 aboard the first USS Piro and USS Utah BB31.  He "sold" it to us for a dollar, and being the dweeb that I am I actually paid him.  I'm surprised that he didn't conk me at the time.  

That Buick took us from the White Mountains in NH to Disney World in Florida and many points in between.  Probably our most traveled vehicle.  It was a wonderful road cruiser.     

Funny.. I remember when we first got the car; my dad showing me how effortless the PS was, by turning the wheel while parked using one finger. "It steers like a baby" he said.

Ours was a coupe.. and looking at your photo; might have been the same maroon/burgundy color.

It looked exactly like this one that I found on the web..



IIRC.. I think dad sold it that night to the guy for $300 We would see it around town occasionally for years after. Dad paid more attention to having his cars Winterized after that...

You got me thinking roddie.  If I just didn't have that MG Midget I may be driving this beauty.  Or, probably not.  

1967 Buick Skylark.