New You Tube Harbor Freight Inverter Generator noise Test

edatlanta wrote:

lakelivr wrote:

Lynnmor wrote:

edatlanta wrote:
I hope he had a transfer switch at his home that he turned off to isolate his home from the incoming utility power before setting up the generator on the front porch. Otherwise I'm glad I wasn't a lineman working in the area. Dangerous stuff.?

Do you really think that tiny generator will power up the entire neighborhood?

Perhaps he was intelligent enough to turn off the main breaker if he connected to the house wiring.

The generator won’t power up the entire neighborhood but it will backfeed high voltage into the system. The transformer feeding your house typically takes 8000-20000 volts and ‘transforms’ it to 120/240V that you use in your home. The same transformer will happily take a 120V input and convert it backwards to thousands of volts which can energize the powerlines for a long distance. Modern safety work practices will normally protect a utility lineman. It’s probably more dangerous for the unsuspecting public who assume a downed line is dead because the lights are out in the neighborhood.

Exactly!

You do understand that the generator will immediately go into overload and trip its breakers if connected to external power lines? While I do know better than to allow this to happen, it is mostly an old wives tale.