Power outage, lessons learned

[juicejunky]

My power just returned after 3 days without ECF, heat, or electricity. The perfect storm occurred with our late fall in NJ mixed with an exceptionally early snow storm. 200 foot high tree canopies are not meant to hold 1 foot of wet snow and for 8 hours we had the sounds of cracking and popping as huge branches fell from the sky. Our neighborhoods look like someone bombed just the deciduous trees, some spit all the way to the ground as the heavy branches ripped the tree apart. Normally by Halloween our leaves would have changed over and mostly be on the ground. This year they were mostly still green or just barely yellow. Most schools and some roads are still closed, but we finally have power at least on my street.


I managed to vape through the entire 3 days without hitting my emergency old eGos, but it was getting close. A 3.0 HH.357 atty was what saved my battery supply. A 3.7 18650 or 14500s lasts much. much longer at 3.0 than with my usual 1.5 ohm atty. I decided early on vaping at 1.5 was a luxury I could no longer afford. BWB Casablanca doesn't taste half bad that cool. So aside from keeping a good supply of batteries, I recommend a high resistant atty or two for rationing.

While friends with power and charging in the car as you drive might seem like a good option, it really isn't that practical with these ecig mod batteries. They take too long and they are too risky to just leave in others' homes unwatched. Places like Starbucks and Barnes and Noble might have free internet access, but with half of everyone in the area without power they look like refuge camps and getting a plug is close to impossible.

When you have no heat or power, vaping is pure heaven. Did you know an atty makes a nice hand warmer?

 

[frosting]

It's insanity even now. Driving around is Russian Roulette. I'm avoiding certain roads due to down trees. Bringing a friend home in a neighboring town last night it looked like a ghost town. No streets lights, a lot of traffic lights where out, so many wires down! Good thing it was about 1 AM so it wasn't a worry of traffic around swerving to safely maneuver around the down wires. There's a tree down in my back yard on top of the shed! Then another deeper in the backyard that looks to be split in two. My family got very lucky we only lost power for a moment and I'm very thankful for that. I kept thinking of my usb charger for my car I had "At least I have that, just in case". It really is just insanity even still. My whole street looks terrible.

Glad you have your power back on and managed to get though those 3 days!

 

[ThatJoeGuy]

Welcome back! Sorry you have to deal with all that devastation. I'm out in the middle of a desert where it's still 74*.

 

[zoiDman]

The power doesn’t go out much where I live. But this little item comes in very handy when the power is out or you’re away from power outlets.

It's a 9,800mAh External Laptop Battery. Since it has USB power out it will charge both e-Cigs or a Cell Phone.

 

[juicejunky]

I have two old KR808 passthrus, I had been thinking about sticking in the treasure chest. Now I am going to keep them because at the very least I could sit in the car and vape. I am moving them to the glove compartment right now. When your house has no heat, the car outside isn't all that bad of a place to hang out.

 

[juicejunky]

The power doesn’t go out much where I live. But this little item comes in very handy when the power is out or you’re away from power outlets.

It's a 9,800mAh External Laptop Battery. Since it has USB power out it will charge both e-Cigs or a Cell Phone.

I want one of those. I have a Tripp-lite battery protector for my computers that is about 9800mah but I had two computers plus the screen on and attached to it when the power went down. By the time I got to the office to shut it down, it was almost dead.

That external battery would be great for leaving somewhere to charge and going back to pick it up hours later. I just never got desperate enough to carry a pile of ecig batteries over to the town hall for charging. I think I may have started sipping the ejuice first. That external battery would be perfect.

 

[swedishfish]

Boy that really sucks. Three days is a loooong time. We didn't thankfully but I heard many in NJ did.

 

[7less7]

We got hit with a storm here in Colorado and we didnt have power for a day. (I did find it cool to see transformers popping like bright fireworks) I too was lucky enough to be ok, the power was only out for a day. But you bring up some great suggestions!

My power just returned after 3 days without ECF, heat, or electricity. The perfect storm occurred with our late fall in NJ mixed with an exceptionally early snow storm. 200 foot high tree canopies are not meant to hold 1 foot of wet snow and for 8 hours we had the sounds of cracking and popping as huge branches fell from the sky. Our neighborhoods look like someone bombed just the deciduous trees, some spit all the way to the ground as the heavy branches ripped the tree apart. Normally by Halloween our leaves would have changed over and mostly be on the ground. This year they were mostly still green or just barely yellow. Most schools and some roads are still closed, but we finally have power at least on my street.


I managed to vape through the entire 3 days without hitting my emergency old eGos, but it was getting close. A 3.0 HH.357 atty was what saved my battery supply. A 3.7 18650 or 14500s lasts much. much longer at 3.0 than with my usual 1.5 ohm atty. I decided early on vaping at 1.5 was a luxury I could no longer afford. BWB Casablanca doesn't taste half bad that cool. So aside from keeping a good supply of batteries, I recommend a high resistant atty or two for rationing.

While friends with power and charging in the car as you drive might seem like a good option, it really isn't that practical with these ecig mod batteries. They take too long and they are too risky to just leave in others' homes unwatched. Places like Starbucks and Barnes and Noble might have free internet access, but with half of everyone in the area without power they look like refuge camps and getting a plug is close to impossible.

When you have no heat or power, vaping is pure heaven. Did you know an atty makes a nice hand warmer?

 

[jj2]

Been wondering where you been! Glad you got electricity again!!!

 

[zoiDman]

I want one of those. I have a Tripp-lite battery protector for my computers that is about 9800mah but I had two computers plus the screen on and attached to it when the power went down. By the time I got to the office to shut it down, it was almost dead.

That external battery would be great for leaving somewhere to charge and going back to pick it up hours later. I just never got desperate enough to carry a pile of ecig batteries over to the town hall for charging. I think I may have started sipping the ejuice first. That external battery would be perfect.

I got it for a camping trip I went on awhile back. Worked like a charm. Charged my eGo a couple of times and my friends cell phone. Was about 1/2 full when I came back.

There are many different types out there. Just do a amazon search for something like "External Battery USB" and read the user reviews. Just make sure what ever you look at has 5v USB output at 500mAh or so.

I got this one on e-Bay NIB for $25.

 

[sachavaca]

i hear ya, my power goes out a lot. worst was 6 days so i baught a generator. well worth the cost.

 

[juicejunky]

i hear ya, my power goes out a lot. worst was 6 days so i baught a generator. well worth the cost.

Our power almost never goes out, so we got lazy. We are looking into a generator, not for ecigs, but to run the sump pumps. We have about 4 inches of water in the basement that is getting kind of musty smelling. We had a marine pump with battery backup, but it really can't keep up and burns out long before it runs out of battery juice. Seems the time you need the sump pumps the most is when you lose power from a storm.

I hope everyone without power gets it back soon. No power while not life threatening at 32-47 degrees, sure is a drag. People that camp are much better prepared than the average non-camping folks like us.

 

[rothenbj]

I was down for over 2 days and I hear you on the no heat, no water issue, but where I live we've lost power before so I bought a 10,000 watt generator so I was good to go with a space heater in the bedroom for some limited heating and light, running two computers an ipod, recharging cell phones and PV batteries and HD TV so I could watch the Eagles and Cowboys.

After all, you need to get your priorities straight.

 

[base234]

While friends with power and charging in the car as you drive might seem like a good option, it really isn't that practical with these ecig mod batteries.

You can get a 100 watt inverter from Walmart that plugs into your cigarette lighter. I use one to charge my laptop so it will definately charge your PV batteries. About $10.