nanog mailing list archives

Re: Reminder: Never connect a generator to home wiring without transfer switch


From: Mark Tinka <mark@tinka.africa>
Date: Thu, 26 Aug 2021 06:55:32 +0200



On 8/25/21 21:09, Warren Kumari wrote:


... and my "funny" story.

We used to live in San Jose. There was a large heat-wave, and much of SJC lost power because of A/C load, etc. Anyway, my wife and I go and camp in one of the office conference rooms for a few days because the office still has power and A/C. Eventually PG&E claims that power is back on our street, so we drive back to San Jose and... no power. I flag down a passing PG&E truck and ask if they know when it will *really* be back. Lineman says that it is. I say it isn't. He says it is. I say it isn't. He gets annoyed, opens up the pedestal box and sticks a meter in it, and agrees that I have no power. He then sticks the meter across the 800A fuse, and discovers that the fuse blew. "Ah. I can fix that fer you..." he says, and goes to the back of the truck... "Doh. I'm out of 800A fuses. Um.... er.... well, here is a 6,000A fuse, that'll do..."

I briefly question the logic of this (presumably the lines in the ground are sized somewhere around 800-1,200A), but he says that this'll do, and he'll come back in the next few days to replace it. I lived there for another 8 or so months, and it was never replaced, but, well,... not my wires, so, um ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ I guess...

You annoyed him enough to give you a larger fuse, and be done with you :-).

Obviously, a safety hazard all on its own.

Mark.

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