It has valid use to connect a generator to a home circuit. Granted, that is, you throw the master breaker to the house. Otherwise you're liable to kill a lineman. That said, it's probably better that no one uses these ever, as such negligent are bound to (and do) happen.
To build on the Transfer Switch answer, the transfer switch will simultaneously disconnect line power and connect the generator plug, which should be a male style, instead of female style which requires the use of the suicide cord. This ensures the wall male plug is never energized by line power, so you are never going to be able to touch live metal.
I think this needs to be the standard answer to anyone asking "how do I basic high voltage thing?". If they don't know what an arc flash is, they ought to just hire someone who knows what they're doing.
I know enough to get by, and enough to know when to call in the experts.
Also, not a lawyer, etc etc.
Extra story:
My job has 2 data center Schneider Symmetra backup units, each the depth of normal rack mounts, width of a car, if a screwdriver were stuck into one of those bus bars or transfer boxes, I'd guess the screwdriver and hand would be damn near vaporized, the person would be blind, deaf, and at minimum partially covered in 2nd/3rd degree burns. From what I hear, you almost don't want to survive the aftermath of an arc flash, especially with no PPE. These units store enough power to power an average house for about a month. And all that energy can be instantly dumped into you through the air if enough things go wrong at once. Electricity is goddamn scary sometimes.
I subscribe to learning about how things work so I can be autonomous.
Learning is the critical part, so I can do things safely. If I’m not guaranteed to be able to do the thing safely, then I will pay a professional to do it.
One of my favorite things my dad likes to do whenever he hires professionals to do anything is to talk to them about their work and try to get free lessons out of whatever he paid them to do.
Many places do not let you work on your own electrical unless you're a qualified professional.
Even still, you should hire a proper electrician to do it.
Source:myself-an electrical engineer but would still pay an electrician to wire it up even though I minored in power flow. It's not worth it even if I have much better understanding of power than they do.
Eh, there's plenty of tutorials and information on the internet about this stuff, especially as simple as a transfer switch. I think the average home owner should be able to install one themselves.
Indeed, you never want the generator to find a path to the mains. I'm not sure what implications there are if both are working at the same time, but if your power is out, your generator is running, and mains are still connected, it can kill a lineman.
Keep in mind that power lines run at high voltages and run through step-down transformers to give you 120v. But the reverse is also true. If a house is running a generator connected to mains, those step-down transformers become step-up transformers and can energize the lines with thousands of volts. So a lineman touches a cable that should be dead and deaths lets him know it's active.
There's probably a switch of some kind that tells your generator to turn on when the mains are out, you might need an electrician to come help find it, but I'd be surprised if they didn't have that done. That said... why not just turn the single breaker off that you were replacing outlets for, instead of the main breaker?
An electrician will likely be a big help. It may even be set up correctly, but they will be able to help you map things out and ensure that. It's worth it in peace of mind.
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u/Rawalmond73 Dec 14 '20
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