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Harnessing Power: The Ultimate Guide to Choosing the Best Prepper Generator

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In our modern lives, electricity has become an indispensable part of our daily existence. While ancient civilizations thrived without it, today, it stands as one of life’s basic necessities. From vital surgical procedures to homeland security and ATM cash withdrawals, electricity plays a crucial role in numerous aspects of our lives. As a prepper, ensuring a steady power supply in times of emergencies is essential, and that’s where a prepper generator comes into play.

When faced with power failures or grid outages, a reliable prepper generator serves as an invaluable alternate power source. In this article, we will guide you through the process of choosing the best prepper generator to suit your specific needs.

Our buyer’s ultimate guide will provide you with comprehensive details on the key features to consider before making your purchase. We understand the importance of finding a generator that aligns with your requirements and ensures a seamless power supply during challenging times.

To further assist you in your quest, we have curated a list of the top 5 prepper generators available in the market. With this guide in hand, you can confidently navigate through the options and make an informed decision that best meets your power needs. Embrace the power of preparedness with the perfect prepper generator, ensuring you’re equipped for any situation that may come your way.

Why do you need to have a generator as a Prepper?

As I have discussed earlier that electricity has become one of the most needed things besides water and air. If you talk about ancient people they used to live even without electricity. The reason behind this is that at that time humans were not used to the facilities that we enjoy nowadays. So, electricity is required for a lot of things.

Normally we don`t feel tensed but in the event of a power failure, we feel it the most. A prepper generator is an extremely useful source of electricity for us even if we have a complete blackout around us.

  • A lot of us now use refrigerators for preserving food and fruits. Meat can go through degenerative changes, especially during summer if your refrigerator is not functioning. So, in the absence of electricity, you can turn your prepper generator on for refrigeration.
  • Some medicines like ENT drops, injections, and insulin require refrigeration. Insulin supply is extremely necessary for diabetic people. Diabetes is itself a deadly disease if it is not controlled properly via insulin shots. When you purchase insulin even from the corner of the street, your pharmacist will give you ice cubes with it. This is because insulin can get spoiled in absence of refrigeration.
  • Operation and ICUs are very critical activities inside hospitals where the life of the patient is at stake for a lot of reasons including anesthesia, coma, heart failure, or any other medical complications. The only means for monitoring a patient`s condition are a good number of instruments like ECGs, monitors, and ventilators. All these instruments need electricity to work. In case of power out or other emergencies, a prepper generator becomes handy.
  • In the event of extreme cold, you don`t have sufficient gas or wood supplies for heating purposes. The option that remains is the use of the electrical heater. The absence of electricity adds insult to injury. In such a case you will be using a prepper generator to light up your heater.
  • On any of your adventurous campaigns like camping, you are out in the areas where there is no electrical power. With a prepper generator, you can easily set up your camp and get desired electricity.

Features to consider for selecting the best prepper generator

In this section, I will discuss some important features that you should look for before buying the best prepper generator. You may not be able to find all the features in one package. But you should for a prepper generator offering you the maximum of these features.

Generator Type

The first thing you should consider for buying a prepper is the type of generator. Not every type of generator is suitable for every purpose. So, you should be looking for the type that best suits your purpose. According to Amazon, there are three types of generators:

  1. An automatic Standby Generator is an in-place generator for your home or office. This generator is normally of high power suitable enough to light up your house and office floors. It automatically switches on when the light goes out. An automatic standby generator is not portable at all.
  2. A Portable generator is not that much powerful as an automatic standby generator. But the main thing is that it is portable and useful for outdoor activities. These generators mostly run on fuel. These generators come with rolling wheels.
  3. An Inverter generator is the least powerful generator. These generators are extremely useful for camping adventures. Inverter generators offer a lot of benefits when compared to traditional generators. These generators are smaller, lightweight, soundproof, and efficient in energy.

Budget & Cost

Each generator type offers a different power output. Generators generating more power are more costly as compared to lower power output generators. This feature is critical for your budget expenditure. Buying a too-high output generator will require a lot of budgets. A low-power output generator, though cheap, might not fulfill your electricity needs. The best prepper generator is the one that suits your requirements.

So, I suggest that before purchasing a generator you should first carefully estimate your power requirements. After estimating of power consumption of existing electrical devices, add some extra power wattages to it. This will assist you in fulfilling your future needs.

  1. A large in-place generator offers 10,000 or more watts. You can use various high-end devices like washing machines, air conditioners, and refrigerators with these.
  2. A large Portable generator can provide 8,000 to 10,000 watts. It is comfortable to use a few air conditioners with these generators.
  3. You can get 5,000 to 8,000 watts from a medium-sized portable generator. Although you can use electric heaters and computers on these generators. But you can`t use air conditioners on a mid-sized generator.
  4. A small portable generator assists you by providing 3,000 to 4,000 watts for outdoor use. You can use an electric stove, light, television, and a small refrigerator.
  5. An inverter generator can provide 1,000 to 2,000 watts for small appliances like lights, stoves, lamps,s and computers.

Additional Safety Features

In looking for the best prepper generator you must find out whether the generator has safety features or not. These safety features are really useful. These features keep your generator safe.

  • For example, some generators come with engine oil gauges. From this, you can monitor the quantity of fuel inside your generator. A generator running on low engine oil is always dangerous. Low engine oil can cause a lot of friction in generator components. If it is kept running for a large time then its engine may cease.
  • Modern generators have an automatic shut-off switch in place of a gauge. This automatic shut-off switch turns the generator off automatically whenever it is on low engine oil.

Environmental Friendliness

Generators release certain hazardous agents like carbon and lead into the environment. All of these agents are harmful to the environment and atmosphere. California Air Resource Board (CARB) and Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) have issued guidelines for generator manufacturers to reduce emissions of these harmful elements in the environment.

So, you should be looking for environmentally friendly generators. It is not only good for you but in the long run, it is good for saving our planet`s environment and atmosphere.

Backup Time

Whenever we buy a laptop or mobile phone, we always ask the vendor regarding backup time. The backup time of a battery-powered device measures the amount of time your device will run after it is fully charged. For example, if you have a fully charged laptop and it successfully runs for 2 hours before getting off then its backup time is 2 hours.

In the case of gas-powered generators, you can refer to backup time as the number of hours the generator kept on providing electricity with a tank full of fuel. Alternatively, you can term it as fuel consumption. The greater the fuel consumption greater the operational cost. You can only say that a generator is the best prepper generator if it is fuel efficient.

List of 5 Best Prepper Generators

In this section, I am providing you a list of the top 5 best prepper generators.

1. Duromax XP4400E Gas Powered Portable Prepper Generator

Meet the Duromax XP4400E Gas Powered Portable Generator.

It is one of the top-rated prepper generators on Amazon. It has a 7 HP powerful Duramax engine for providing 4400 watts of power. With this powerful generator, you can run heaters, refrigerators, air-conditioners, and light sources. With this generator, you now do not need to worry about power output. It has two options in terms of power generation i.e. 120V and 240V.

As a safety feature, the company has provided a built-in surge-arrester to keep this safe from over-voltage fluctuations. With a 3.9-gallon fuel tank duromax XP4440E can serve you up to 10 hours per full tank. Being highly reliable, its operations are problem free. Moreover, its maintenance cost is low compared to other similar generators.

It is shipped with a toolkit containing: DC cables, a toolset, an oil funnel, a wheel kit, a spark plug wrench, and a user manual.

2. WEN 56475 4750-Watt Gasoline Powered Portable Prepper Generator

The WEN 56475 Gasoline Powered Portable Generator is next on our list. With a huge 4-gallon capacity fuel tank it can provide you uninterruptible power supply for about 11 hours. Its powerful 223cc OHV engine can provide up to 3750 watts of power. 

This power outage is enough to power your refrigerator, TV, and lights. It offers a 30 amp 120 V power output.

A powerful spark-arrestor is provided as a safety feature. For portability, it comes with wheels and handles. 

Another plus point of this generator is the keyless start button. Now you don`t need to turn the key on or off. All you need to do is just push a button. However, it is shipped with an engine oil funnel and battery. It is completely EPA and CARB-compliant.

3. Westinghouse WGen3600v Portable Generator

Westinghouse WGen3600v Portable Generator is a highly fuel-efficient generator that comes with a 4-gallon tank. Once you have a full fuel tank, this generator can facilitate up to 18 hours of electricity. Being lightweight it is one of the best choices for campers. With its 212cc (4-stroke) engine, it has three output options for you. You can use either 120V with 30 amp or 120V with 20 amp.

For peak watts, it can provide 4650 watts. However, normal running watts for this generator are 3600. You can use a variety of electrical appliances using this prepper generator. If you are looking for the best prepper generator for camping then this might serve you the best. As a safety feature, automatic shut-off is provided for low engine oil. With the dual fuel option, you can either use it with gas or propane.

4. Champion 3500-Watt Dual Fuel Prepper Generator

It is one of the best dual-fuel prepper generators. It can operate on propane or gas. On propane, it can provide 3950 starting watts and 3150 running watts. While on gasoline it offers 4375 and 3500 watts for starting and running respectively.

So, you have multiple power options on different fuels. The automatic engine shut-off feature turns the generator off on low fuel.

With a push start button, you can use it in an outdoor environment. Being lightweight it is easily RV-ready. You can easily start it even in cold weather. However, it provides only 120V with either 20 amp or 30 amp output. It has a powerful 224 engine. But it is not fuel efficient. With a full tank, its backup time on gasoline is about 9 hours as its tank has a 3.4-gallon capacity.

5. DuroStar DS4000S Gas Powered 4000 Watt Portable Generator

The DuroStar DS4000S is a gasoline-powered generator. With its powerful air-cooled OHV engine, it provides 4000 starting and 3500 running watts. It comes with a total of three outlets. Each outlet gives 120V with two 20amp outlets and one 30 amp outlet. With 3.96 gallon tank, it can provide continuous supply for about 8 hours.

It comes with surge-arrest and low oil shut-off technologies. These features make it quite safe to use. Although it is not that fuel efficient but it can assist you in times of electricity failures.

Conclusion

A good prepper generator is an extremely useful invention for serving a lot of purposes. Not every generator is best for everyone. However, the best prepper generator is the one that suits your requirements and provides value-added features.

I have tried my level best to provide you with a detailed buyer`s guide with a list of the 5 best prepper generators. I hope that you have liked this. Please provide your valuable feedback.

Should I Get a Generator for Prepping?

If you are asking yourself if you should get a generator for prepping then chances are you have been thinking about it the advances of being able to power up in an emergency, you should have a secondary source of power in case of outages.

Top Picks:

  • Duromax XP4400E Gas Powerered
  • WEN 56475 4750-Watt
  • Westinghouse WGen3600v Portable
  • Champion 4500-Watt Duel Fuel
  • DuroStar DS4000S Gas Powered

You may also be interested in reading:
Champion Digital Hybrid Generator Reviews

Do you know what size generator you need? Use our Generator Calculator to determine the amount of wattage you need to run your house.

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