Why Bother with Smart Management Modules (SMMs) for Generac Standby Generators?
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- Опубліковано 9 бер 2023
- At ABR Electric, we are a factory-authorized Collin County generator dealer www.generac.com/distributor-l....
When you choose us to install your generator, you become our customer for life. We offer maintenance, repairs, and support over the phone to keep your generator running smoothly. Contact us today to schedule an appointment or visit abrelectric.com for more information on our automatic and portable generators and installations. Don't wait until the next power outage, rest easy knowing you'll never be without power again with ABR Electric.
As a homeowner, power outages can be a major inconvenience and even pose a safety risk. Without power, you may be left without heating or cooling systems, lighting, refrigeration, or even medical equipment, depending on the severity of the outage. This can be particularly stressful for families with young children, elderly relatives, or those with medical conditions that require continuous power.
The problem with traditional generators is that they can be expensive and inefficient, requiring a larger generator size to meet all of your power needs. This can lead to high installation costs and increased fuel consumption, making it a less cost-effective solution in the long run.
This is where Smart Management Modules (SMMs) come in. SMMs allow you to install up to eight modules that manage power loads and reduce the necessary size of your generator. This means you can still have the power you need during an outage without breaking the bank. Additionally, SMMs automatically supply power where it's needed, ensuring that your essential appliances and devices remain functional during a power outage.
Smart Management Modules (SMMs) are an essential component of standby generators, and they play a vital role in managing power loads during an outage. SMMs are wire-free and work with your Generac transfer switch to monitor each selected circuit and automatically supply power where needed. They allow you to install up to eight modules to manage power loads and reduce the necessary size of your generator for a more cost-effective solution.
Investing in SMMs for your standby generator can provide peace of mind during power outages. You can trust that your family's essential needs will be met, and you won't have to worry about the financial burden of purchasing and maintaining a larger generator. With ABR Electric's professional installation and support, you can be confident that you have a reliable power source when you need it most.
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I live in American Fork, Utah. I grew up in St. George, Utah. Compared to St. Gerorge Municipal Power (remnant of the 1930s REA) my current power company (Rocky Mountain Power), my electric power is extraordinary stable. The joke in St. George when I was a sarcastic teenager was if a bird landed on a power line and pooped, the power went down. In fairness, the system was growing so quickly, the city had a hard time keeping up. I turned 10 in 1965-the population was around 3,500. When I graduated from Dixie High School at age 18 in 1974, the population was pushing 12,00-14,000. Where I live now, we experience an outage perhaps once a year-if that. Average outage is 5-10 minutes. The longest outage I remember was about three hours. St. George had several 12-24 hour outages when I lived there-but again not much you can do at the end of a several hundred mile transmission line if that line is taken out by a small plane crash or a forest or brush fire. If I still lived in St. George, I’d consider a generator. In American Fork, I’m not too sure I need one. Though my wife is agitating now and again for one. So, I am kicking it around. We’re both 67. If either of us ended up on oxygen as we continue to age, a generator would become a necessity. What holds me back is I would need to take on much of the work to keep costs down. The wiring and gas plumbing are pretty straightforward. Service entrance is about 15-16’ from the gas meter. No underground utilities between them. AC compressor is between them on the same side of the house. Do you have any suggestions on where I could learn how to properly size a generator? Could I calculate my average daily usage from my most expensive electric bill (summertime A/C use) and use that as my basis?
I would size the generator based on your priority load during an outage. For an extreme example, if you really only needed power for two oxygen machines, you could simply get a small, quiet inverter style generator (3kw) and simply run a few extension cords for the duration.
Going the other way, prioritize the large loads: AC condenser, electric water heater, electric oven, etc. The more large loads you need the larger your generator will be. Your generic lights and plugs use very little power.
My parents lived near St. George for a bit in the early 2000s. Pretty country.
Hey I a m a Florida electrical contractor. Great video. Although generators are not my primary line of work, I do install them on occasion, I also had a service call were a smm went bad and cut power to a clients dryer for 2 days until I could get there. that's the only concern I have with them. Just like anything else is something more that could break, and in my case caused the customer an inconvenient even though she never had an outage. the SSM just simply went out. Other than that. It's a grate and budget friendly attentive to a full house back up generator as far as cost.
I agree. I worry about the same issues with AC condensers in the summer.
Exactly same problem with these. 3 of mine have gone out. The contactor needs to be redesigned so that street power does not go through it all the time. When these things fail, it kills the power to the device even when the generator is not running. These are usually key appliances like AC units. Not going to have a generator control my everyday life.
I back up my whole house with a 10kw generator. My large loads are 2 water heaters, central air, clothes dryer, and a well pump. I put soft starters on the central air and well pump. The two water heaters and central air are allowed to run 20 minutes each during any given hour. The dryer is disabled. If I want to run the dryer i press an "override" switch which allows it to run for one hour, the water heaters and central air are disabled during that time.
The generator and transfer switch are controlled by a PLC. I used normally open contactors for everything except the central air. The 24Vac that from the thermostat is routed through a relay output on the PLC.
If the generator frequency drops below 55 hz all managed loads are disconnected for 20 minutes. If it drops below 55 hz during that 20 minute period the generator shuts down.
Sounds like a good setup
Great video, thank you, James! I am definitely one of the electricians that just tells my client to use their head and lets back out the whole house. I do like the idea of using a large contactor to isolate some of the non-critical loads to eliminate some of the possible challenges you mentioned. I have thought about somebody being away from home when the power goes out. Thank you as usual for getting me to think about things that don’t cross my mind sometimes!
Sounds like you're an awesome electrician and take care of people
and yes. great video..thank u
Great video. Thanks for sharing your experience.
I have installed SMMs on most of the generac whole home systems in my area.
Great way to power a 37kW load with a 22kw gen for example.
Have seen quite a few modules fail 2-3 years after installation. So plan for a call back if you use them.
Yes, thank you. I've had several people recommend the PSP load shed module instead. Have you heard of that brand?
@@abrelectric I have two of the PSP SAK 60s in my house to shed about 20kW of load (double oven and an HVAC system w/ heat strips). Haven't actually overloaded things to see what happens with the generator running, but can confirm that they work great as far as delaying the loads coming back online after a power loss. It seems to be a very well built piece of hardware/software with lots of configuration options. Here's a pic of one of mine: ua-cam.com/users/postUgkxJPesuqTlTrnFxLFuX4PTRft6Xmn2emHu Here's a link to the install manual also: www.pspproducts.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/12/SAK60Install5.5x8.5V112320.pdf
@@waterboy74 thank you!
Informative content. It only makes sense to design a whole house standby system with load shedding capability. The thought of wondering whether or not one feels a need to pacify an inspector should be a moot point. It's more of a concern to get the the load analysis, system sizing, location and installation properly completed by licensed professionals. A smooth inspection should follow.
Great video, We just upgraded to new furnace and a/c also updated new electrical panel. The home came with a Generac 8kw generator so this will not power ac or hot water tank so we installed one SMM on hot water tank and I am going to order SMM for a/c.
Looking for a generator, I’m mostly concerned about the startup surge when we’re home, since you only have 10 seconds to turn things off before startup. When we’re away, the only big loads are the 3 and 4 ton ACs and a few lights, so nothing much to worry about. We were thinking about putting one or both ACs on LCMs and a Kohler dealer says their 20 kW gen has great surge capacity so the LCMs aren’t necessary, while another dealer who sells Generac and Kohler says we should have them, especially with a Generac. All opinions on the need for LCMs with a 22 KW Generac or 20 kW Kohler are very welcome!
Great explanation. Thanks. I have one of these on my dryer. It’s a vacation home. The dryer stopped working after a recent power outage where we were not at the home. By process of elimination I determined that the switch was at fault. I disconnected and wire-nutted load and line wires. The dryer now works. I’m not sure I even need the switch. It was here when we purchased the home. Can I leave it bypassed and is there a better way to connect the wires? Also wondering if test button is also the reset button.
Anybody know how the modules communicate to follow the priority settings?
That's such a huge box! They need to make a smaller package
The manage your loads yourself plan works great until it's your wife or kids that have to do it.
There you go.
How do you size the load shed box for each device, like A/c stove ect ect.
Hi.
Where to connect a diy contactor setup to the ats to do loading shedding.
We were sold a 8kw about 12 yrs ago for our cottage which became our home. We have an ATS with h the usual dedicated switches. Our main consumers in the switch are a heatline for drawing lakewater in the winter/ jet pump and sewage pump/furnace AC 1 freezer 2 fridges various lighting circuits. We’ve since installed a 240 volt small hot tub. Would one of these devices help? The hot tub is not on the ATS and my worry is that the tub may freeze while we are away
I have 16KW and a new 5 ton AC that is very efficient. But as mentioned others in the house are no so aware of the potential to overload the generator. My transfer switch has load shed terminals. So if I can use one of these SMM on my AC unit that would give me peace of mind. I assume I can just run this in series between the breaker and the AC unit. Then run the load shed leads to the transfer switch?
You would wire the SMM in series between the breaker and the disconnect. The SMM senses the change in frequency when the generator lugs down and opens the contactor.
You can use the load shed terminals in the ATS by running the low voltage t stat wires in series through them.
@@abrelectric Thanks for responding!! If I run the the low voltage t stat wire to the load shed terminals do I even need the SMM?
@@floydadcockrealtor nope
How do you minimize the HUMM from the unit?
Is there a video to bypass these after installed? My mom purchased a house not long ago that has these installed. One went bad and not looking to buy a new one and have installed due to cost right now... however, AC is off and with her in her 70s and in Texas, I needed to get this AC up and running now. I am not having luck on how to bypass this for now safely. She has a 3000 sqft house and 22KW Generac so ample power
You can make sure the Lock Out Disabled switch is all the way to the right. You can shut off that breaker, and splice the 2 hots together to bypass the relay.
Do the load shed devices turn back on (closed) once the un-shed load goes back down?
Yes, depending on how you set them. The Generac SMMs has a slide switch to set that.
Great video! all about politics here, the generator was sized to power everything in the house and then some. The inspector said "I don't care I require the modules" the electrician who installed the generator thought it was ridiculous but nodded and said yes sir and installed them. They're garbage, needing to be replaced every two-three years at best as some others have mentioned here. I mean come on Generac be better, or they know exactly what they're doing because when you look around this issue has been going on for years now.
Not an electrician, an mech. engineer. I was wondering if the PSP basic contactors would be a more robust solution? Voltage VS frequency controlled and no wireless which I know saves time wiring but adds an element of potential failure. I am looking at an 18kw and 26KW derated to 24KW due to natural gas) would power my whole house.
If a manual transfer switch is used is load shedding still required by code? On the fence.
I am hearing that PSP is a far better solution. I have yet to try them myself.
If you're using a portable generator, the those particular Cide requirements don't apply.
You could just use a soft start on your ac unit
My generac load shedding module kicks in and out all day. How can I fix this?
I don't know. Anything obvious in the troubleshooting section of the instructions?
Any loose connections at the coil on the contactor?
If it is doing that while the generator is off, it’s either faulty or you have a something upstream going on. Do your lights flicker?
it's a back up, you don't need to put the whole house on it.
I got a Generac 24kw installed a few weeks back and on my test run I had both my ACs( 3 and 4 ton) running, washing machine, my office computer equipment and my electric oven, two small window ac units running and the generator never missed a beat. I even ran up and down the garage door a few times and tuned on all 3 tvs in the house. I honestly couldn't think of anything else to even turn on to test and the electrician was like "don't worry about it, you are not going to overrun this generator"...he was right. I ran two hours test and life as normal in house didnt make it break a sweat. I probably could have gone with a 18 to 20kw on my house but buying up to 24kw keeps me from needing the SMMs. 4k square foot home and boat house all powered easily from the 24kw. The installer did have the gas company come out and put a much bigger valve on my meter to increase flow. The meter itself is an Intelis Gen 5 250 BTU and I figured they would have upgraded it, but the gas man told me a dirty little secret, most of these new residential meters will easily push over 500k BTU as long as you have the right valve and Pipe size allowing the flow from the street. They upgraded mine and said I would never have to turn anything off gas wise to keep the generator running.
That is awesome!
150 bucks each
Need 3
Plus install = home owners claim
It’s a pain in the ass to be honest
And when them smm’s go bad they snap and click and sound like transistor box for electric fence
Kind of intimidating
I agree. The alternative is to hardwire the control coil wiring to all the load shed NC contactors. It just adds a large layer of cost.
wait a minute. you forgot 1 other way.
Have a 22k generator. I'm not home most of the time. Seems like a waste replacing the module every two years. Tops my heat pump and dryer might be on simultaneously when I am home. It trips my hotwater tank. Ridiculous. Feel like it's a con job for more service calls
Keep spares of these units on hand. These are a terrible design and they don't last long, year tops, and then you get to replace them
Terrible Product.. I have 3.. one was replaced under the 1yr warranty.. yr 3, 2 more went (including the new one)... Just got the quote from the electrician to replace 2...$1200. this person services my generac... I mean rip off?? so fired ...I spoke with Generac and they do not care... I purchased 2 new modules for ~$300. replacing myself. I agree we can self manage but if we are away etc it could be a problem.. so the pool one stays but do I really need a module on a steam room?? it does not automatically go back on and barely used... poor planning on original install ...
These things suck. We use PSP’s stuff and have never had an issue with them
Thank you - who is PSP?
Just looked them up - very interesting