UPS and generator interaction?

Mon Mar 29 19:09:33 UTC 2004

At 01:53 PM 3/29/2004, Mike Lewinski wrote:

>Brian (nanog-list) wrote:
>
>>Does anyone know of a way to get a UPS to trigger a generator to start, and
>>to switch over to the generator power automatically or does this type of
>>thing just not exist?
>
>What Patrick said.

An additional note: some of the small to mid-sized propane/natural gas 
units come as packaged systems with a generator and transfer switch. These 
can be a good value and work well too. Do some shopping.

>But, on a minor note that probably won't affect your Symmetra but I'm 
>posting in case anyone else here can shed light on.... we had a power 
>event this AM. The transfer switch did it's magic and all was good... 
>Except for two new APC1400's- they failed once the batteries drained. I 
>triple-checked that they were on the right panel, played with sensitivity, 
>even tried daisy-chaining one off a good working 2200. Nothing I did would 
>convince the two 1400s they had power. Once the house power was restored 
>they came back to life and look normal. I later learned that two of our 
>colo customers with APC1400s had the same problem :( Other models (even a 
>couple non-essential lower-end, dumb APC 450s and 650s) didn't blink at 
>the generator power.

The Winco 8KW unit I use to protect my home is designed to output 62.5Hz 
when unloaded, so that motor starts (well, furnace) don't pull it below 
60Hz. Devices all seem quite happy with this setup. We use a bunch of APC 
SmartUPS units because these have sensitivity adjustments. We need to knock 
them back to the medium sensitivity or they freak out with the 62Hz, and 
keep switching on and off battery. We find the lower-end units (BackUps) 
won't work at all, since they just freak.