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Emergency powering home

CravinR1

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Oct 17, 2021
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So i have a gas generator and have a plug to my outside circuit box to power home when power is out.

I know you have to kick main breaker to use generator so as not to backfeed to the line.

I've seen some inverters will fry if connected to a home circuit breaker due to ground and neutral being tied together. Is there a way to test your inverter to see if safe for powering panel when power out instead of dragging out the generator

My setup will be giandel 3000w purse sine and a 24v battery bank.
 
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So if you have to flick the main breaker or you will back feed the line, your setup is wired wrong and dangerous and should be fixed ASAP.
 
Did you contact Giandel to find out first if the Neutral can be tied to safety ground or not?
 
So if you have to flick the main breaker or you will back feed the line, your setup is wired wrong and dangerous and should be fixed ASAP.
No you have to kick main breaker to move lockout to turn on generator breaker. It's a manual lockout and completely to code. Thanks for answering the question and not being a incorrect know it all. Oh wait.....
 
For testing connect a neutral inline 5A fuse in the event of a 60V short. Load it to 500W and if the fuse survives you are good to bond the inverter neutral. I always have my inverter grounded & bonded before powering it on.
 
What is the model of the Inveter?
You can check the Voltage between Ground and Neutral, Ground and Hot, but it will not tell you if you can tie Neutral to Ground or not since meter may be showing stray Voltage between Ground and Neutral or Ground and Hot due to Y capacitor in the circuit.
The output circuit of the Inverter may be full bridge type which mean you cannot tie one side to ground, we do not know what topology it uses.
You can try using 7W night light between Ground and Neutral to see if it has enough current to drive the lamp or not, if it can then you cannot tie Neutral to Ground.
 
No you have to kick main breaker to move lockout to turn on generator breaker. It's a manual lockout and completely to code. Thanks for answering the question and not being a incorrect know it all. Oh wait.....

So if it works as you indicated then it is impossible to backfeed the line. You indicated that it was possible to backfeed the line if you did not flip the breaker. You did not use the proper terms like generator interlock. Just, the thing you flip so you don't kill someone.

As someone who has watched 2 houses burn to the ground (not mine) due to improper emergency generator use, I was trying to point out you have a dangerous situation if it works as you explained. Sorry I cared about you.
 
For testing connect a neutral inline 5A fuse in the event of a 60V short. Load it to 500W and if the fuse survives you are good to bond the inverter neutral. I always have my inverter grounded & bonded before powering it on.
What do you do to ground and bond

You mean a 5 Amp fuse on the front 3 pole neutral out? Load without connecting to breaker box?
 
So if it works as you indicated then it is impossible to backfeed the line. You indicated that it was possible to backfeed the line if you did not flip the breaker. You did not use the proper terms like generator interlock. Just, the thing you flip so you don't kill someone.

As someone who has watched 2 houses burn to the ground (not mine) due to improper emergency generator use, I was trying to point out you have a dangerous situation if it works as you explained. Sorry I cared about you.
I know you have to turn off main breaker to use generator because it has a interlock and I understand why it's there. I was making the point that I'd like to use my inverter for short term outages without dragging the generator out.

Instead of answering my question you tried to point a fault which is annoying
 
What do you do to ground and bond
I backfeed my inverter into the house distribution panel via a pair of dedicated 20A breakers (feed 120V power to each busbar). All the 240V breakers are off included the interlocked main breaker.

The neutral wire from the inverter is connected to the panel neutral bar, which is bonded to ground in the panel. The ground wire from the inverter is connected to the panel ground bar.

Test neutral 5A fuse was inline between the inverter and neutral bar.
 
I backfeed my inverter into the house distribution panel via a pair of dedicated 20A breakers (feed 120V power to each busbar). All the 240V breakers are off included the interlocked main breaker.

The neutral wire from the inverter is connected to the panel neutral bar, which is bonded to ground in the panel. The ground wire from the inverter is connected to the panel ground bar.

Test neutral 5A fuse was inline between the inverter and neutral bar.
So you do this with a 5a fuse on the neutral and if fuse blows your inverter is safe if it doesn't you don't need the fuse and can backfeed?
 
What is the model of the Inveter?
You can check the Voltage between Ground and Neutral, Ground and Hot, but it will not tell you if you can tie Neutral to Ground or not since meter may be showing stray Voltage between Ground and Neutral or Ground and Hot due to Y capacitor in the circuit.
The output circuit of the Inverter may be full bridge type which mean you cannot tie one side to ground, we do not know what topology it uses.
You can try using 7W night light between Ground and Neutral to see if it has enough current to drive the lamp or not, if it can then you cannot tie Neutral to Ground.
Giandel 3000w pure sine 24v
 
So you do this with a 5a fuse on the neutral and if fuse blows your inverter is safe if it doesn't you don't need the fuse and can backfeed?
If the 5A fuse blows then the inverter is definitely not capable of being neutral bonded.

If the 5A fuse does not blow when loaded to 500W then you "should" be good to remove the fuse and bond the inverter neutral. Then again, just because my Reliable WZRELB did not meltdown is not a guarantee your Giandel will be OK.
 
If the 5A fuse blows then the inverter is definitely not capable of being neutral bonded.

If the 5A fuse does not blow when loaded to 500W then you "should" be good to remove the fuse and bond the inverter neutral. Then again, just because my Reliable WZRELB did not meltdown is not a guarantee your Giandel will be OK.
So u connect to breaker with fuse and if it blows don't try without
 
Thanks for answering the question and not being a incorrect know it all. Oh wait.....
I think you're being a bit hard on Porch.

The way your initial post was worded (as well by omission of key detail) does indicate a potentially dangerous set up. Your subsequent information cleared that up but based on the initial post, Porch's concern was reasonable and valid and I think you should be grateful there are people on here looking out for such things.

Hopefully you've found the answer about how to test if your inverter can be connected without causing issue. Good luck with it. I too went for an inverter / battery backup supply replacing my generator but we have a different electrical set up to yours (ground and neutral are never bonded here).
 
I think you're being a bit hard on Porch.

The way your initial post was worded (as well by omission of key detail) does indicate a potentially dangerous set up. Your subsequent information cleared that up but based on the initial post, Porch's concern was reasonable and valid and I think you should be grateful there are people on here looking out for such things.

Hopefully you've found the answer about how to test if your inverter can be connected without causing issue. Good luck with it. I too went for an inverter / battery backup supply replacing my generator but we have a different electrical set up to yours (ground and neutral are never bonded here).
I didn't elaborate on my generator setup as it wasn't really relevant to the question I was asking.
 
I didn't elaborate on my generator setup as it wasn't really relevant to the question I was asking.
That's not at all obvious from your post however.

For instance, I use the exact same connection to my main circuit board for my backup generator as I do for my inverter.

But if the information on the generator set up wasn't relevant, why include it at all?
 
That's not at all obvious from your post however.

For instance, I use the exact same connection to my main circuit board for my backup generator as I do for my inverter.

But if the information on the generator set up wasn't relevant, why include it at all?
Because annoying people like you first thing said is "can't backfeed the line" was trying to avoid this annoying side comments but guys like you find a way.
 
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