How do you choose a generator for a church?

Size for the full hall, not the average week

Sunday morning is the only number worth designing to.

A set that copes with a quiet Tuesday and struggles at a full service has failed at the one job it was bought for.

Sizing is done against your actual load, not a rule of thumb. Send us the list of what has to keep running and we will work out the rating.

Sound system

Amplifiers, mixing desk and radio microphones. Sensitive to voltage dips — this is the load that makes power quality worth paying attention to.

Lighting

Hall, stage and exterior. Steady and predictable, but it all comes on together.

Fans and cooling

Every ceiling fan in the hall at once. Motors, so they surge on starting — see the sizing note above.

Projection and screens

Small in draw, but visibly disrupted by an unstable supply.

The sound system is the fussiest load in the building

Undersize the set and the congregation is the first to hear it.

An unstable supply arrives as hum, as a dip when the fans start, or as an amplifier shutting itself down mid-service. A properly sized set with a well-regulated alternator holds voltage steady through those surges.

Noise during a service is the whole point

Acceptable in a factory yard is unacceptable thirty metres from a congregation.

An acoustic canopy is essential rather than optional, and placement matters just as much: distance from the hall, a wall in between, exhaust directed away from the congregation and away from the entrance people gather at.

Changeover: how long is the hall dark?

Manual changeover costs you a minute of darkness and one person leaving the service.

Automatic changeover removes both. The set starts, takes the load on its own, and hands back when the grid returns — worth the difference for a building whose whole point is a gathering that is not interrupted.