Power Outage Over Thanksgiving

[TromboneAl]

The power went out last the Tuesday before Thanksgiving during the big storm (it was really big). It's still out.

Expecting the power to go out, we bought a Butterball pre-cooked turkey. We heated it up on the stove in a Dutch oven.

The only problem was that the turkey didn't taste that good. Other than that, the meal was okay. It would have been better to just cut some meat off the raw turkey (the one we had to throw out), and cook it.

At least it wasn't PG&E's fault this time.

 

[calmloki]

Sux Al. You read the thread on using generators or solar as a backup? Think NW-Bound had a thread for a ~$2000 basic solar system that would power a stove and a few peripherals for a few days. If you are propane then the only electricity you would have needed was a tiny amount to keep the stove happy enough to allow the ignitor to operate on the oven. Maybe an inverter from the Leaf direct to the stove 110v? We are looking at stoves and some have a "sabbath" option - not sure if it would do you any good, but maybe if you do have a gas range.
https://www.whirlpool.com/blog/kitchen/what-is-sabbath-mode.html

We have a @ $25 1950ish gas stove in the kitchen up north - pilot lights on the burners, and kitchen match to light the oven - keeps us cooking and heated in a non-fireplace room if we lose electricicle.

 

[TromboneAl]

We ran things off the Leaf, but the inverter didn't have enough juice for running the oven (I assumed).

We used an inverter off the 12-volt, and put the car in ready-to-drive mode. It recharged the 12V from the drive battery. The charge level went down maybe two miles worth of charge per hour. Just used it for the electronics part of the gas on-demand water heater, the fan for the woodstove, and charging devices.

I tried hard to buy a gas range that didn't need electricity for the oven, but it wasn't feasible.

If it weren't for our low-carb lifestyle, we would have gone out for a full Thanksgiving dinner.

Can't really complain.

 

[Walt34]

We have a @ $25 1950ish gas stove in the kitchen up north - pilot lights on the burners, and kitchen match to light the oven - keeps us cooking and heated in a non-fireplace room if we lose electricicle.

I grew up with one of those, in the 1950's of course. It was replaced by an electric that my father bought, and he was the only one who thought it was an improvement. He worked for the power company and they had some huge discount program going on for electric appliances.

I tried hard to buy a gas range that didn't need electricity for the oven, but it wasn't feasible.

I suspect either Craigslist or a used appliance dealer is the only place you'll find one of those now. Those old gas stoves were pretty indestructible though, at least all the ones I saw, so they're probably still around.

 

[Another Reader]

Propane grill for back up??

I have cooked whole chickens in my $140 no-name grill from Lowes many times. A small turkey should work as well.

 

[RobbieB]

I put a 7 pound turkey breast brined overnite in the big green egg for 2 hours at 300F. Delicious. Powered by charcoal, lit with propane torch. Fed 10 people well, no leftovers.

 

[NW-Bound]

Sux Al. You read the thread on using generators or solar as a backup? Think NW-Bound had a thread for a ~$2000 basic solar system that would power a stove and a few peripherals for a few days. If you are propane then the only electricity you would have needed was a tiny amount to keep the stove happy enough to allow the ignitor to operate on the oven...

No, it takes a lot of power to run an electric burner or an electric oven. The system I described will mainly keep the fridge going over night, plus LED lights and some minimal electronics for entertainment.

During the day when the sun is shining, you will be able to run a microwave, an induction cooktop, or a single portable burner. Whatever that runs off a 115V outlet is limited to 1500W maximum, and that you can run with the 2400W inverter that I described. And that is not for prolonged periods, as you will run out of precious battery juice.

 

[calmloki]

I grew up with one of those, in the 1950's of course. It was replaced by an electric that my father bought, and he was the only one who thought it was an improvement. He worked for the power company and they had some huge discount program going on for electric appliances.



I suspect either Craigslist or a used appliance dealer is the only place you'll find one of those now. Those old gas stoves were pretty indestructible though, at least all the ones I saw, so they're probably still around.

We bought ours at a church sale 20 years ago and installed it in our new kitchen. Has a griddle in the middle between the 4 burners and a 120v electric broiler element in the oven. Heavy, stout sheet metal, torches off with a satisfying kaWHOOMPHF! if you dawdle with the oven kitchen match application. Does everything we want and the pilots only blow out now and then..
Wish our new stove search down in La Quinta would turn up something as satisfactory.

 

[Walt34]

Heavy, stout sheet metal, torches off with a satisfying kaWHOOMPHF! if you dawdle with the oven kitchen match application.

Yup, that's the one!

 

[calmloki]

No, it takes a lot of power to run an electric burner or an electric oven. The system I described will mainly keep the fridge going over night, plus LED lights and some minimal electronics for entertainment.

During the day when the sun is shining, you will be able to run a microwave, an induction cooktop, or a single portable burner. Whatever that runs off a 115V outlet is limited to 1500W maximum, and that you can run with the 2400W inverter that I described. And that is not for prolonged periods, as you will run out of precious battery juice.

I was assuming Al had natural gas or propane to heat the oven and would just need electricity for the "ok to open" gas supply and ignitor for the oven and ignitors for the burners. I defer to you on things electrical though.

 

[OldShooter]

We saw burners like this many places when we were traveling in Asia:

https://www.coleman.com/butane-stove/2000020951.html

They were used inside and worked very well for cooking. Plenty hot to fry egg rolls that we made in a cooking school. The gas is in a small bottle contained inside the burner housing. We have gas stoves at home and at the lake but if we had the misfortune to have electric stove tops i'd buy one of these burners as a backup.

 

[W2R]

How awful, Al!!!! After all you have been through with the PG&E planned outages, an unplanned one must have been especially aggravating. Hope the big storm didn't cause any other damage in your neighborhood.

Good idea to have a pre-cooked turkey, even if it wasn't quite up to par. At least you had a plan so you didn't miss your Thanksgiving dinner.

I have nothing useful to say; just wanted to say I'm sorry this messed up your holiday!

 

[tmm99]

No power over Thanksgiving?? What a bummer!!!
What happened (the storm knocking out some trees and electric poles?)?Do you know when you will have power?

 

[NW-Bound]

I was assuming Al had natural gas or propane to heat the oven and would just need electricity for the "ok to open" gas supply and ignitor for the oven and ignitors for the burners...

The only gas appliances I had a long time ago had a pilot light, and did not need electricity to run the ignitor. They used a thermopile to generate the electricity to operate the valve for safety.

There's a certain satisfaction to having something so robust, similarly to having a hand-cranked diesel engine or a gas engine with a magneto ignition for emergency use.

 

[ncbill]

I suspect either Craigslist or a used appliance dealer is the only place you'll find one of those now. Those old gas stoves were pretty indestructible though, at least all the ones I saw, so they're probably still around.

There are plenty of new gas ranges sold that use a battery for the spark to ignite the top burners or the pilot light (instead of a glow bar) for the oven:

https://www.homedepot.com/b/Appliances-Ranges-Gas-Ranges/Battery-Pilot/N-5yc1vZc3oyZ1z0wptr

 

[Sunset]

I put a 7 pound turkey breast brined overnite in the big green egg for 2 hours at 300F. Delicious. Powered by charcoal, lit with propane torch. Fed 10 people well, no leftovers.

I have read about cooking a turkey on the BBQ. Here of course it would be pretty chilly so I haven't tried it.

 

[TromboneAl]

That storm was really wild. Many times it shook the house and it felt as if we were having an earthquake. I was positive that a big branch had fallen on the roof. I thought it was rolling around up there. I was surprised to see nothing like that. I guess the noise was from the garbage cans blowing around.

The windows are really dirty. I figure that water dripping from the trees was thrown against the glass.

 

[catii]

There are plenty of new gas ranges sold that use a battery for the spark to ignite the top burners or the pilot light (instead of a glow bar) for the oven:

Yup. Treated ourselves to a high-end Thermador when we rebuilt the kitchen, & the oven runs just fine with a long match to start it.

 

[calmloki]

That storm was really wild. Many times it shook the house and it felt as if we were having an earthquake. I was positive that a big branch had fallen on the roof. I thought it was rolling around up there. I was surprised to see nothing like that. I guess the noise was from the garbage cans blowing around.

The windows are really dirty. I figure that water dripping from the trees was thrown against the glass.

My brother lives about 20 miles south of Roseburg Oregon and said the big weather missed him in favor of southerly people - sounds like you two were among them! On the sunny side, it's good that the trees stayed put?

 

[ERD50]

We ran things off the Leaf, but the inverter didn't have enough juice for running the oven (I assumed). ....

I tried hard to buy a gas range that didn't need electricity for the oven, but it wasn't feasible.
....

Why would you assume that? As mentioned, a gas oven only uses a little electrical power for the controls and igniters, the old ones used zero electric power.

Unless you went for a combo - gas cooktop, electric oven? They make them (some prefer electric for the oven, and gas on the cooktop), but it's easier to find gas/gas. Or some convection ovens might supplement with electric heat (not sure those even use 220).

If it's a straight electric heated oven, it will have a big honking 220V plug. A gas heated oven will only have a 110 plug.

-ERD50

 

[TromboneAl]

Why would you assume that? As mentioned, a gas oven only uses a little electrical power for the controls and igniters, the old ones used zero electric power.

-ERD50

Maybe I'll put my Kill-a-watt on it, but that coil gets real hot real fast.

Some Googling suggests 450 Watts for the igniter, which is too much.

 

[ERD50]

Maybe I'll put my Kill-a-watt on it, but that coil gets real hot real fast.

Some Googling suggests 450 Watts for the igniter, which is too much.

OK, if it is one of those "heater/glow-plug" style igniters, that might be 450 watts, versus much less for the spark type.

But 450 watts is still a pretty light load for decent inverter. My 1250/2500 W inverter runs my sump pump (1/3 HP, ~ 300 watts running), and it barely registers on the display, it's just loafing. That's about 30 amps from the 12V battery, you need good cables/connections for that, but nothing too extreme. Handling the surge for the freezer starting up took some real attention to detail on each connection, the inrush current can be many times higher than the run current.

-ERD50

 

[TromboneAl]

I've learned that when you call, say, Starbucks, and ask if they have power, they treat you like an idiot. Like, "Duh. I answered the phone didn't I?"

 

[Souschef]

I am now the proud owned of a 3600 watt generator. Only had to use it once, and ran the fridge, freezer and icemaker. Had a 4th cord going to a power strip to charge our stuff.
Invited the neighbors over to charge their stuff. The one thing I did was to put a heavy duty 6 foot extension on the fridge plug so I would not have to pull it out. DW was concerned about hot water, and I told her the pilot generates the power to keep it going.
We could use out cook top by lighting the burners with a match.
Sweet neighbor did not realize you could light the stove burners until I told her. She was using her BBQ

 

[Ronstar]

We had a 4 hour power outage on Thanksgiving 5 am to 9 am. Generator kicked on and all was well. Ours is a Generac 16000 watt standby generator. Not a whole house generator, but provides power for 16 circuits. I had a decision to make when I installed it - provide backup for ac or the oven. I chose ac because we seldom use our oven. So our oven was out during the power outage - and luckily it came on in time for DW to cook Thanksgiving dinner before noon.