Generator Fuel Question

ReneeG wrote:
For those of you that have dual or tri-fuel generators, what has been your experience between gasoline and propane and/or natural gas regarding power and running time length? I read an article today that summarized that running a generator on gasoline provides more power whereas running on propane is cleaner (understandably). Was it worth the extra expense investing in a multi-fuel generator? Thinking of converting our gasoline to propane or tri-fuel using the Hutch Mountain conversion kits for Honda eu2000i.

with the engine designed to run on gasoline max power output in order
1) gasoline
2) propane
3) NG

as far a clen burning and oil contamination
1) propane or NG
2) gasoline


I've converted my honda 2200 and 2000 to tri fuel from hutch mountain.
Why??

In the case of power outage assuming NG is still at the house I can run forever on NG, and I usually have 25 gallons of propane for various house stuff (firepit, heater, etc.) along with 30 gallons of propane for the trailer, but usually only about 5 gallons of easily available gasoline. (yes I could syphon from the cars)

BTW I never use propane out camping, seldom need more than a full tank of fuel in the generator so that's enough for the campout.

the only reason I did the conversion is for use as backup power for the house.

ReneeG wrote:
Was it worth the extra expense investing in a multi-fuel generator?

During an extended power outage, being able to run your generator on an almost limitless supply of natural gas is priceless.

During the Texas "rolling blackouts" in February of last year, I was without power for around a week. It didn't even faze the local natural gas supply, so I stayed warm while most of my neighbors froze - They couldn't run their NG furnaces without electricity.

Propane right now is $3/gallon near me or just over 30k BTU/$.
Gasoline is $3.90/gallon or just over 30k BTU/$

So not a lot of difference in cost at the moment, a month ago gasoline was 25% worse.

Propane use is much greater, considering costs, than gasoline. A 20 lb tank of propane is 20$ while a 5 gal can of gas will last much longer

It's just physics, propane has a much lower thermal content than an equal weight of gasoline.