Porter-Cable BSI550-W 5,500 Watt Generator with 10 HP Engine

Product Review

As an engineer, I'm obsessed with numbers and choosing a generator presents the excellent opportunity to play with them. I won't bother you with a lot of technical details, but this is the generator I chose right after 4 months of deep, deep researching. Very first criteria: my needs. I wanted to power a 3 bedroom residence with a finished basement through the harsh winters in Maine. Here are the devices I setup as an absolute necessity to power up throughout an emergency: 1) Water nicely pump, 2) Furnace blower, three) Basement Sump Pump, and 4) Refrigerator. Here are the "good-to-haves": 5) lights within the kitchen and primary living room, 6) pellet stove, 7) oven range. And, lastly, just the "nice-to-haves": 8) Television, 9) microwave oven, 10) laptop or computer. And here's what gets excluded: all of the 2nd floor inside the property, garage door opener, bedroom lights, almost everything else not listed above. (More...)