Well Water, Need Generator?

I am getting ready to settle on a house. Never had well water in my life so I am really unfamiliar with how it works.
I do understand that you need electricity to pump water from the well or else no water, no flushing the toilet, no shower.
Here's my big question...
Do I need a generator for the well pump? If so, how big should I go for (I've looked at generators and some are a little pricey)? I have no idea about watts, amps or any of that. It's a small house, 1100 sq ft, just me so it's not like I have a whole family to manage.
Here's my other question, if I get a generator, should it cover some major appliances? Fridge, stove/microwave (right now I have an electric stove), certain lights/outlets?
Advice would be helpful so if I do buy one, I don't go too small for even my well or too large and end up wasting my money.

How often and for long do you have power outages?
Your pump should have a pressure tank as part of the system. that will give a bit of water while the pump is off. The size of the tank will determine if you get two flushes or 20 flushes.
If you want a generator for the pump only then you need to know the size and voltage of the pump.

Do you know that you will need a generator or are you asking us? Do you have any reason to think your buying a home without power?

If so, you are going to need a large gas tank too.

I'm asking. Power outages in this area are very few and far between, however, historically they happen with the worst storms where when power goes out, you're out for between two days to a week or more. Hence the reason I'm not sure how much I would need or if I should even bother with a big one since outages are very infrequent. My biggest concern is that my power lines are above ground, right up to the house. Bad wind and rain could be damaging but ice in the winter could be worse.
I have looked at Home Depot and Lowes for generators and found the smallest of the small for a few hundred $ or the largest at several thousand $. I don't even know where to start as far as generators are concerned and how much wattage is appropriate and how much is overkill.
I always like to be over-prepared but overkill really could cost me a lot of unnecessary $. I don't know if I would just need a generator for the well or if I should include the heat/AC, water heater, refrigerator, microwave, stove, a circuit of outlets? I don't know what they typically recommend but I'd hate to get talked into something that's too small and be in deep for a long outage but something too big could waste a lot of money.
Is there an algorithm for determining how much wattage you need? Or do you just add up the max watt usage of all the appliances? Guessing is all I have...I'd rather not do that since I know absolutely NOTHING about home electricity or generators.
Thanks!

During the Florida Hurricanes several years back (4 of them) we were without power several times and once for 4 days. I used a 5KW Honda generator that I bought back in the mid 80's to power the well. I used 2400 watt inverter powered by my tractor battery with the tractor idling to keep it charged. That kept two refrigerators cold and one TV working plus a couple lights. We got along just fine that way. To me spending upwards of $10,000 plus for a whole house generator was overkill.

Thanks for the advice. I appreciate the input!

Generators are for survival mode. Well pump, sump pump, a light and heat & fridge. Get or measure the ratings on these devices and do the math to get the total wattage or amperage. Buy a generator that is 20% more that what you need.

Another thing to keep in mind. It takes at least 3 times the amperage to start a pump motor as it takes to keep it running. So if you have a 1hp submersible pump, the motor will pull close to ten amps on 230 volts which means you need 30 amps to start it. Cheap generators generally don't have this built in feature. 30 amps X 230 volts = 6900 watts. My 5000 watt Honda Generator will start a 2hp motor with no problem. A three horse motor will instantly stall the generator.

I can’t add much to what others have said other than it greatly depends on where you live and how much money you have to spend on a system and what level of comfort you demand. Where I live winter would be the time we most fear and being without heat would be a bigger fear than water. If I can keep my house above 40f I can go stay in a motel for a day or two if I had to. That’s the reason I’m adding a heat source that will use my gas but not require electric.

If you buy a small gen that can run a few things you have to be able to hook it up in a storm and keep it running. The big units tie into the house wiring and disconnect from the line and then power up the whole house or selective circuits. Some are totally automatic and switch back after power comes back. If I had the money sure I would love a system like that but don’t so I do the best I can.

If you are going to go in survival mode you don’t need to run everything at once. You could have a couple lights and the fridge and furnace on line and when shower time comes switch over to your water pump. Like mentioned you will get a couple flushes from the pressure in your tank and then when it comes time to flush again switch some cords around and pump the water tank back up. You have to be careful to keep your loads under the max for the gen. if you get a small gen use it once in a while during the summer just to make sure it’s working well even if you just start it up to do a job away from the house or something.

Most of us just back feed the breaker panel with a small generator until the power comes back on.
I went through my breaker panel and made sure all my necessities are on one leg and then just back feed a 20amp, dedicated outlet to the panel.

Is there a way to get a generator that runs on a natural gas line? I have natural gas in the house. I was going to look into changing my stove and my grill to natural gas in the future. The gas company says if I add a generator I may need a bigger meter but is this what they mean?

The large units do run on natural gas if you have it. Those units even self test once a month. You can get most engines to run on NG


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kok328 said:

Most of us just back feed the breaker panel with a small generator until the power comes back on.
I went through my breaker panel and made sure all my necessities are on one leg and then just back feed a 20amp, dedicated outlet to the panel.

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This is NOT legal to do and is dangerous to utility people. If tied into the mains it needs to be on a transfer switch.

I new a guy that did that. He tripped the main breaker, hooked up the generator, then flipped the main back on. It instantly stalled the generator as he was trying to power the entire grid through his drop.

"I am getting ready to settle on a house. Never had well water in my life so I am really unfamiliar with how it works."

In winter water freezes! You might need heating cables and things like this to keep your water flowing.

If you can find a old prius battery it suppose to be good for outages.

I also agree you need a foolproof method of isolating the two power sources. The high tech transfer switches look for power loss and then switch and restore power from a NG gen or similar. Some people break up the circuits so each room has a light and have the main items on circuits that will get power. Like in the kitchen maybe the fridge and microwave will have power but not the electric range. Others have a unit that will power the whole house. But you are talking $10 k or more quite a few years ago when I looked at them. Most people don’t have that kind of money for something that may be only needed every 10 years. The next best would be a manual transfer switch and manual gen. and the low tech way is with a portable gen and running orange cords around the house. Most of those will need a few 5 gallon cans of gas to keep them going. Around here people set them just inside the garage door with the door partly up or up.

Water pumps may be in the house or may be in the well. They may be 110v or 220v. mine is in the basement and has a 110 line cord plugging it into the wall so it’s easy to unplug and plug into a gen. the furnace is set up similar and the fridge you just unplug.

Having set out a power outage in zero temps for 6 days once keeping the house barely alive with stinky kerosene heat at about 40F. Its not any fun. My neighbor being better prepared had heat water and TV and was kind enough to invite us over to shower and watch tv in the evenings. Another thing that can save your life in a storm most people don’t think about is the back yard grill. We cooked on that for a week.

I'm sure he switches the main off... Works first time every time 60% of the time.

We've been on a well for many (many) years. The first summer in the house, we lost power for a few hours several times, and we thought a generator was a necessity, but we stalled because of money. Power has been pretty reliable since then, and we haven't installed a generator.
Most times, when a storm is predicted, we fill a couple of buckets with water, sometimes we fill the bathtub. that would be for flushing toilets and general washing if needed. We also keep a couple gallons of Poland Springs in the house for drinking. We don't often have to use any of it. But that is our precaution against losing power to the well.

A lot of my friends & neighbors have installed gens after Hurricane Sandy (ok, so it was a 'superstorm' and not a hurricane; who cares?) You have to get something pretty hefty to run the well. And you have to keep gasoline on hand. Or go through the expense of getting a gas or propane hookup. If you go that route, might as well get something big enough for the whole house, cuz you're not talking about the dinky ones at the big box store.

costelme said:

I do understand that you need electricity to pump water from the well or else no water, no flushing the toilet, no shower.

If so, how big should I go

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At 12 GPM and 200' head at 50% (0.5) pump/motor efficiency you need 12 x 200 x (1/0.50)/(3956) = 1.2 hp = at least 1.2 x 746= 900 volt amps = 900/240 = 4A at 240 volts.

For watthours and fuel consumption start with 100 gallons per person per day and do some really tedious calculations.

Get some CO detectors and have the gen at least 15' away from your house to avoid CO poisoning.

HF gens cost about $100/kw, installed price for others is about one kilobuck per kilowatt.

This may help.
http://www.aapower.com/pdfs/SIZING GUIDE.pdf