Blog posts of '2021' 'May'

What do you do when the lights go out? OK, in this country we have mains electric power, and we don’t have power outages too often, although they can and do occur. However, when the mains power does go down it can often stay down for several days if it is due to a storm and power lines have come down. This happened in the Great Storm of 1987 when some homes were without electricity for two weeks.

It is one thing if the power goes down at home, and quite another if your factory comes to a grinding halt and you have to stop production. That can finish up costing you a lot of money, and it could also lose you, customers. This is why more people today are investing in emergency standby generators that can take over if power outages occur. At Blades Power Generation we have both new and used generators for sale in the UK.

There are basically two types of emergency generators, either standby generators or portable generators. Both provide a supply of electricity off-grid and can provide enough power just to keep the lights on or to run your factory or office. Standby generators are permanently installed outside by a professional such as ourselves, while a portable generator can be stored inside if required, but must be taken outside in order to operate. Standby generators can run on petrol, propane, or natural gas, while portable generators run on petrol.

A standby generator can power everything in the home and can be triggered automatically when a power outage occurs. It will require regular maintenance and will need to be run for 15 minutes every week to keep everything ticking over.

Portable generators do not usually provide as much power, but they can keep the fridge and TV going, and keep the lights on while enabling you to charge your mobile phone and run your laptop. Of course, they need to be moved outside in the event of an outage (unless permanently stored outside) and started manually, so you need to be at home.

At Blades Power Generation we have used generators for sale in the UK and the stock that we have is obviously constantly changing. If you think that investing in a generator is a good idea for your home or business, give us a call to discuss your requirements.

At Blades Power Generation we are a group of experts who understand that you need to be able to rely on electric power at all times, whether that is in your home, at your office, on your farm, in your garage, or anywhere else. We supply automatic transfer switches that can be either mains to mains or mains to the generator as required.

However, we also understand that you may not need a super-fast transfer to your generator when there is a mains power failure, so we can also supply you with a manual changeover switch if you prefer. We have a range of different manual transfer switches which you can use instead of an ATS. This means that when a power failure occurs, you simply have to throw a lever-like switch to transfer from mains to generator power.

These changeover switches can range from 63 to 3,150 amps and we stock them in different models from manufacturers such as ABB, Bespoke, and Lovato. ABB switches are of compact design and this means that they don’t take up very much space. They have a three-position rotary handle from mains, to off, to the generator. There are also optional extras if you need them, and these are with a rated plug and sockets fitted, LED lights for the main indication, and LED lights for generator indication.

We can also supply a manual transfer switch instead of a manual changeover switch if you wish. A manual changeover switch is wired into your electrical distribution board and allows either all or selected electrical appliances to be powered when there is a power failure. On the other hand, a manual transfer switch is installed next to the electrical panel and can be connected to the circuit as you require.

At Blades Power Generation we can build and install your control panel to any particular design that you need. Every control panel that we design and build adheres strictly to British Standards and incorporates your individual requirements and specification. We use the very latest computer technology to assist in the design and planning.

When we install your control panel it comes with an inspection report and also has an electronic project folder which will ensure that all emails, together with the relative documents and certification are easily traceable in future years.

Many people never think about electricity. It is just something that is there when we turn the lights on or want to turn up the heating, and we never give it any further consideration.

Nonetheless, according to a report on January 6th, the UK market is “showing signs of strain”. It stated that for the fourth time this winter just past, National Grid warned that the buffer needed to keep the lights on and ensure continuity of supply was too small. The report continued that, as on Wednesday that week, when the wind didn’t blow and cold weather boosted demand at the same time that several nuclear plants were offline, the grid operator was scrambling to avoid blackouts.

Furthermore, things are only likely to get worse. The government is planning to quadruple the amount of offshore wind capacity in the next nine years. And when the winds don’t blow, those turbines will produce nothing. Certainly, there are backup systems in place, but National Grid needs to get better at balancing the system when the renewables are not functioning.

According to Weijie Mak, project leader at Aurora Energy Research Ltd, “As the U.K. continues to rely on intermittent renewables, you need to have more and more backup capacities in place. You get into this issue where it’s harder and harder to manage the system.”

This all seems to indicate that power outages are going to become more common rather than less. Sure, if the power goes down for an hour or two while you are watching Corrie, it can be frustrating, but it is hardly life-changing. You can always catch up with it later.

However, if you run a business and the power goes down in the middle of a manufacturing process it can at the least cost you lost hours of work, and at the worst may cost thousands if the product you are creating is not able to be finished and you have to start all over with a fresh set of materials.

The answer is to have a standby generator or two and if you want to buy new generators in the UK you need to talk to Blades Power Generation. As specialists in the sale and supply of generators, we have a full range of generators that will do everything from keeping Corrie running to keeping a full factory running – many with ATS (Automatic Transfer switch) so that you will be back to full power within seconds of the utility going down. Talk to us if you want to buy new generators in the UK.

Not everyone will remember the Great Storm of October 15th/16th 1987, but this writer remembers it only too well. At the time I had a flourishing business that operated nationally and managed to achieve what is many people’s dream – the big house in the country.

I lived in a small village (pop. 2,000) in Kent in a large Victorian house built in 1882 surrounded by fields and woodland. In the summer the fields were full of young bullocks and in the winter full of sheep. I remember the Great Storm vividly because trees were felled all over the village and we couldn’t get out to drive to work. My wife and son were away in our seaside apartment.

The bad news was that all our power went down. There were not enough electricians to carry out all the repairs, so after three or four days, many were shipped over from Northern Ireland to help out. The freezer was full of food, but that all had to be thrown away very quickly. But never mind, we were promised that power would be restored soon.

Gradually, homes from the outside of the village on my road running into the village centre got power back on. So did homes running from the village centre down towards mine. But there were about ten of us still with no power.

And so it was for thirteen days! The nights were drawing in and we were sitting in the dark. No TV. No washing machine. No electric cooker (fortunately we had an Aga as well).

If I had only known about – or even thought about – getting an emergency power source in the UK. But it never occurred to me. Certainly, we did get occasional power outages from time to time, but only for a few hours, so nothing too serious. But thirteen days!

It turned out that the electricians working from the village centre towards the other lot working from outside the village had somehow between them missed out our ten houses in the middle!

Speaking from experience, I wouldn’t recommend anyone to be without an emergency power source in the UK. At Blades Power Generation you can find a generator that will kick in automatically when your power goes down, and there are also other models that need to be started manually. But don’t find yourself stuck out in the sticks with no power for nearly two weeks!