Crossover switch? Cutoff switch?

Ignoramus10705 fired this volley in news:2ZadnTBXNaqh2 snipped-for-privacy@giganews.com:
yeahbut... (My life is dedicated to the "Yeah, But!")
I live in a place and a space where linemen only ever come if you call. They do not touch our service without a call; hell, they don't even come when you call! (We're talking "deep rural" here).
The genset has its own breaker, and it will trip long before any damage can be done. I have not tried it on _this_ genset, but have done before on others.
My neighbors are all on different pole pigs.
And my 'folks' are all and well trained in the emergency procedure.
It is, after all, just one breaker off and one breaker on, before starting the generator. After that, if you don't cut off the other appropriate breakers, it'll just trip the one on the generator, or, if it's 'smart', it'll just quench, and not deliver.
Lloyd

on 14/11/2014, Lloyd E. Sponenburgh supposed : This dumb argumentative thread reocurs more often than the seasons change. :-[

If you go to powerlineman.com I think it is, they have an archive of accident reports. While a few can be attributed to equipment failure or external forces, most are the result of errors on the part of the lineman. I recall reading one particularly interesting case where a DWI driver plowed a pad mount transformer off the pad. The lineman showed up and looked over the scene of what was left of the pad before picking up one of the HV "elbow" connectors and starting to clean it with a rag. Needless to say he got something like a 13KV surprise. Clearly he didn't follow *any* of the safety procedures such as testing with a meter on a hot stick, disconnecting and grounding the other end, etc. The DWI driver may have setup the opportunity for the lineman to fry himself, but to claim the driver was somehow responsible for such egregious failures to follow safety procedures is absurd.

I only bought as much generator as I need to keep working, so I really only need (or want) to supply one or two circuits.
I could do a whole-panel switchover, but then I'd need to shut off everything but the office lights & plugs before I started up the generator.

Spend $60 on an interlock kit for your panel and $30 on an inlet box, or spend only a little less to rework those circuits to feed single receptacle boxes next to the panel and put plugs on the circuit conductors so you can unplug them from the panel feed and plug them into an extension cord from the generator. Don't forget to factor in the cost of the extension cords.
Basically, doing it half-ass will cost about $75 and doing it right will cost about $100 and give you the flexibility to power whatever circuits are needed at the time.

===================== try one of these @26.82$US w/free shipping.

Generally speaking I've found if doing it half-assed costs $100 , doing it right, if you can do it yourself like you do the half-assed job, can be done for $80

If you didn't have to satisfy an inspector, it would definitly do the job. One of those "doing it "right" costing less than half-assed" examples.

And then have to go all around the house changing the flashing 12:00 on clocks everywhere? That's painful.

Smallest I've seen for code-compliant installation in the US is 60 amps:

We installed one of these and a separate sub-panel to feed the essential circuits (computers, furnace, stove, refrigerator, freezer, etc.) for about $140 and worth every penny.
Prior to that we had a 50A range plug on the generator and a range plug fed from a 2-pole breaker in the main panel and a range cord feeding the sub-panel. Manually changing over was not a problem but the transfer switch makes it a 1/2 second task even in the dark.
Carla
If electricity comes from electrons, does morality come from morons?