Connecticut Electric EmerGen Transfer Switch

Update for Sept 2020: Transfer switch has been working well when I have outages. Needed to use it the other day for a 30 hour outage. One of the rocker switches was not working. I contacted Connecticut Electric and they are sending me a new switch under warranty. Can't complain about that. It would be better if had not broken. I also bought an extra one. You can get replacements here on Amazon (https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B01LYCWB8P/ref=ox_sc_act_title_1?smid=ATVPDKIKX0DER&psc=1). Did some reading that indicates these switches are prone to failure. I hope that's not the case. If you need to replace 10 of them that's almost the cost of a new transfer switch. I bought 2 new ones so I have have a spare. Leaving this at 5 stars. Losing 1 switch out of 10 after 5 years does not seem like a big issue. Original review below: Overall a very nice transfer switch that works as expected. As others have noted, it seems to be more solidly built than most others and less expensive. Installation is fairly straightforward and not difficult if you have basic wiring understanding or experience. It’s a matter of being comfortable getting into your electrical panel or not. If not, this would be very easy for an electrician. The instructions are good and made the electrical work go quickly. You need to have some basic home maintenance skills to install the box and generator inlet (finding a place to put the switch, mounting it, mounting the inlet box and wiring it up, etc.). This switch feels substantial and is well thought out. A couple of things could be done better - see my comments below. But I would use this one again relative to the others I looked at (Reliance, Generac, etc.). Mounting the transfer switch and running the wires into my panel were by far the hardest part of this. My electrical panel is flush mounted in a wall so I had to cut drywall and hole-cut some studs to get the wires run. Not too difficult, but took some effort and I had to do some drywall patching when I was done. Several people have complained about the short generator power inlet leads. These aren’t meant to connect to the generator power inlet. The instructions make it clear that they expect you to run those to a junction box and then run that to the inlet. There’s no way for the manufacturer to know where your inlet will be relative to the panel – it could be 6" away or 60'. They'd couldn't possibly include the materials needed to make the inlet work for everybody (Romex, conduit, junction boxes, or whatever a specific installation may need). One trip to the hardware store does not seem unreasonable to get this thing wired up. One complaint I have is that the generator inlet box is meant for external use only. The documentation makes it clear that the box is not meant for indoor use. I’m not sure why this would be, or if this means it should not be used in a garage. Given that mine is in the garage I ordered a new inlet. It worked out better because I didn’t want to deal with a downward facing connection when the power is out. But not clear at all why the provided inlet is meant for external use only. One big improvement (for my use) would be an option to move the generator inlet into the switch box itself. I installed my switch in the garage near the power panel. It would have been far more convenient for me to have the inlet on the front or side of the switch. (For example, look at the Reliance Controls 310 CRK. It has an external inlet box but also has a cutout for the inlet to be mounted in the transfer switch.) This is a minor issue and it cost me $35 to get another inlet and put it in a box next to the transfer switch. Just something to consider if they ever update this product. This box connected well and works as expected. It could not be much easier to install and works with my 7500W generator perfectly. I printed out instructions and attached them to my generator handle so anybody in the house reliably and safely get the house on generator power when needed. This switch is well priced and easy to install. It's a much better and safer option than using a suicide cord or powering your entire panel and dealing with power management issues. EDIT: Did some reading. I suspect one reason they don't have an option for the inlet on the box is that they don't want people putting the inlet indoors or in the garage due to the potential for carbon monoxide poisoning if a door or window has to be left open to run the inlet cable. This is a real concern and has me reconsidering my setup where I put my generator in the garage with the door open. I'm now adding two CO detectors in the garage so I'll know if CO ever builds up in there.

I bought this to use with our new shed, which I'm currently powering from a generator. I'm very impressed with the quality - it is well made and comes with a lot of parts. It is bigger than I need now, but I plan to build a treehouse of sorts over the shed someday and I will use the other half of the circuits for the treehouse. FYI, I used 6 of the 12 circuits for my shed: two outdoor outlets, two indoor outlets, lights, and a (future) air conditioning unit. The instructions are pretty clear if you know a little about wiring. I did have to swap the wire outputs from the right side of the box to the left side, but that really wasn't a problem and the instructions are clear how to do that. So far it is watertight and performing flawlessly. It is really nice that it comes with the generator cable and the waterproof inlet plug. I installed this box and the inlet plug on the outside of the shed and routed the wires to the inside of the shed through PVC electrical pipe. Inside I connected it into a circuit panel I installed there, following the instructions in the manual. I did have to buy a few extra parts: the included generator cable has a 30Amp plug on it and I had to buy a 20Amp-to-30Amp adapter to use it with my generator (this was cheaper than buying a 20Amp cable). I also had to buy a short length of PVC electrical pipe to route the wires into the shed, a 90-degree plastic turn, and another straight-line plastic connector to feed the wires into the indoor circuit panel. As I said above, the quality of the box is exceptional. It should last for decades. It's also very heavy to hold up while installing! My only complaint is that both plastic connectors provided were cracked on the inside cylinder. I replaced the smaller one and used the larger one since it wasn't cracked too too bad. The picture is misleading a little - the inlet box is resting in the door of the box in the picture, but it doesn't actually go there. It is installed in a separate location near the box. I installed it directly below the box so I could use a straight piece of PVC pipe to connect them together. I'm very happy with the quality of this device. As a bonus, the instructions were very clear. I will probably buy another one in the future to use with my house since the previous owner did not use a transfer switch when wiring the house generator circuit.

I got it for like $283.95 free shipping....but needed a way to hook up easily my whole house with selections of what circuits to use.... After having my installation certified by a local electrician, and a generator test to the box, only a week and a half our power went out for 11 hours and we got to use the box and we were excited how easy it was to just flip switches to select what we wanted to use in the house. We actually ran everything we needed..all our plugins and refrigerators....a ceiling fan..the 50 " tv...our internet, charge up our kindles and laptop. This product is built tough as nails. Set up was easy...andusing it was even easier..we had to clap and laugh at how easy it was to operate. and when the power came back on....we simply shut down the generator outside and unplugged it from the house.. went into the basement and flipped the switches back from Gen to Line..and didn't miss a peat..and didnt have to reset any of our clocks. I did not realize our 5700 watt generator ran everything in our small home except the two refrigerators on the same side of the breaker.. so i will rewire them to the left side of the EmerGen box so the load on the generator will be even. You have to balance the load of the generator left and right side of the EmerGen box within 1000 watts of each other so you don't tax the one side of the generator because that can ruin your generator useless. We can run the furnace in the winter...but have to watch again the load on either side of the EmerGen box within 1000 watts. so you may have to shut off some switches on the same side so there is not alot of load on the furnace side..etc. I would not suggest you run the A/C units.. because unless you have a very big wattage generator. . . you may not be able to balance the loads on the left and right wattage meters and possibly damage the generator. So you will have to either fix this by wiring some heavier usage units on one side only...or shut off other switches on that same side so the bigger users can operate and you can balance the load on the wattage meters on the EmerGen box. I can only wish I was knowledgeable earlier years ago and wasnt so scared to do this install. Earlier we just ran the generator and ran extention cords all over the house..and ran the two refrigerators each two hours then unplugged it and plugged it into the other refrigerator..what a pain. We had power to operate our microwave. .. our gas stove with electric start..make oatmeal..coffee...toast...then go watch the morning news..while surfing the internet..and have the living room ceiling fan on(because i did not wire the A/c into the box.). The next thing we need to do is build a sound proof box to put around the loud generator..we had to wait untill 5:30 in the morning so we wouldn't wake up the neighbors.. by that time.. our refrigerators were in serious need to be ran.. and after setting up the generator..it was quick and easy... This EmerGen Box is perfect if you have a portable generator already.. and don't want the expense of a natural gas unit set up next to your house permanently. Buy one today. We purchased our on www.amazon.com free shipping ..new in box...i installed it myself.....electrician came to certify it..and i sent a copy of the certification to my home insurance provider... made my life most livable after knowing it works like a charm and easy to understand. comes with instructions and a generator start up proceedure sheet laminated with a chain to hang on or near the box. WONDERFUL PRODUCT!

This is a well made product. It prevents backfeeding your power company, or visa versa, and having your generator explode. The rocker switches, however, are not as smooth as another model I have seen. These take some force to switch between the positions, whereas, a competitors model switch moved effortlessly and smoothly...however, the competitors model had other things I didn't like, regarding the metal conduit provided. This unit came with flexible non-metalic conduit, and was much easier to work with. The most challenging aspect of installation is designing, and implementing, positioning of the unit, along with the various other hardware you need to make that all happen. You can see in the photo, I mounted it on the inside garage wall, because my panel is directly outside from there. Each home is unique...you may need to mount everything outside. I had to customize a metal box with 1 1/4" knock outs, to accommodate getting the bundle of wires into the panel on the other side of the wall. I also needed a smaller box to run the connector wires to the (included) generator plug receptacle, as you see below the main breaker box in the photo. Measuring and mounting all the hardware, then running wires thru, took me quite a few hours. I *did* have to spend about $20 on a couple connectors and boxes. Once the wires were pulled thru to the panel, making the connections took about an hour. However, it took me some design time to decide which circuits I wanted attached for transfer in a power outage. There was additional time sorting out how much power I needed, and making sure the generator I selected was compatible with this transfer switch. That was fairly easy, as well as making sure the generator cable connector matched the plug receptacle for the switch. Anyway, if you're handy with electrical wiring, etc., it's a DIY project, however, most people I know, do not have the skills to install this safely.

Much study was put into the purchase of this switch and the other components of my emergency preparedness system. As my main electrical panel is located outdoors, I required a panel that was watertight, and this was one of the only ones that met this criteria; Fortunately, this is also one of the most modestly priced switches available - it rivals the cost of the leading manufacturers indoor unit. For me, the switch kit contained all of the components needed to complete the installation with the exception of anchor bolts, wire nuts and elbow/conduit for the connection between the switch box and the power inlet box. For this I used the ('Southwire 55189407 1/2-Inch 6-Feet') Conduit kit with elbow which I also bought here on Amazon. The wiring was the easiest part - the mounting of the box on masonry - not so much. There are many YouTube videos on how to wire these up. If you have any electrical skills and are not overly worried about working in a live panel box (the main leads leading from the grid into the panel remain live), then you most likely can do this yourself. Best check with you local building inspection authority first to see if this is allowed or if you are required to hire a licensed professional. First thing I did was to determine the best way to balance the load between the two sides of the switch so that the power usage on each side is reasonably similar. I have an upper level which has it's own furnace, so I put a furnace on each side of the switch. I also split up receptacle areas that would most likely have similar usage. For example, I put the fridge/microwave on one side of the switch and the television/entertainment center on the other. Using this formula, I feel as if I did a reasonable job of equalizing the load between the two outputs of the generator which is important to the health thereof, even though Connecticut Electric says the switch itself has no problem with an unbalanced load. The physical installation took me about 3 hours with the mounting of the switch and inlet box taking the lions share of this. I did have to move the wires from the right hand side of the switch to the left to accommodate my panel, but this was an easy task. If you take your time and pay attention to what you are doing, it's a virtually foolproof procedure to wire this thing up.

High quality professional switch, with all wires labeled for ease of installation. Product can be rewired so each bank of breakers is fed from the same 120v source power and then all 10 circuits are usable at the same voltage (if not planning to feed a 240v circuit), but would suggest upgrading the gauge of wire for the incoming power.

Works fine so far. Used it twice in power outages with no issues. Connected to a 4,000 w generator.

I installed this switch on my parents house because they live in a rural area that is impacted by hurricanes and can have extended power outages. This switch is essential to safely and easily use a generator to power selected household circuits. The switch housing is heavy duty and looks like equipment you would find in a commercial building. The instructions are clear and well written. The kit comes with everything needed to install on a home and be ready for plugging a generator directly in to the weather proof outlet. The only thing I had to get is some 90 degree 1 1/4" conduit elbows to install this to code on a recessed panel. Getting the wires through the conduit was the most challenging part - if your panel is recessed you will need to get a few parts to make a clean install, but if your panel is accessible on the sides, you will be ok using the kit. I load tested it and it worked perfectly for running lights, fans, kitchen appliances, fridge and freezer, and emergency window units. The setup we use is the Connecticut transfer switch, a 30 foot twist lock cord, and a 7500 watt gasoline generator. The total investment is well worth the occasional use, where a whole-home automated generator is not necessary. --Jeff

Great quality and very easy to install. The only thing I would suggest is that you have to mount a junction box and then run a separate line to the provided plug outside. Overall good quality and works great.

Instuction are well explained Quality product Be carefull when making connection as wire are well labeled but easy to misinterpret some of the letters Laminated imstuction sheet for connection to generator when required

Un produit merveilleux, sécuritaire et qui permet de produire avec une génératrice, l'électricité de remplacement sur les circuits importants pour nous en évitant les extensions qui passent par les portes ou les fenêtres. Manuel d'instruction complet pour l'installation et des vidéos en ligne aussi wow!

Pas encore en fonction, à part que j'aimerais des disjoncteurs de 30 ampères au lieu de 20 ampères, ça me semble un bon panneau électrique

Good quality product. No problems with installation or functionality but fortunately haven’t had to use it much.