Seroius Clearance Issues

Kinda looks like this place:

Casinos are about the same here in Reno. They all want about the same thing.

1) Get it done NOW. Forget about permits, codes and inspections. We're losing $XXXX per day because this isn't done.

2) What's the cheapest possible way to get this done?

3) Put it on emergency power. Whaddya mean the generators are already overloaded. They can't be. They're huge! This isn't much of a load anyway.

4) If it isn't done on time, doesn't work, or burns up, it's all your fault.


One of the local big casinos around here has 4 gens in the heat plant. All were around 500KVA. 2 Cats that were the same, and 2 Cummins that were different from each other. The 2 Cats are 4/5 pitch, one of the Cummins has a Marathon gen end, so it's 2/3 pitch, and I don't know about the other Cummins. There are about 15 xfer switches, any one of which will start all 4 gens, and (usually) synch them together. These gens really don't get along all that well, one of the Cummins tends to hog all the load, and if only one xfer switch is active, it will motor the other sets.

There are 2 utility feeds to this building. About 1/2 the emergency load is on either feed. Both feeds have never gone down at the same time. When either feed is dead, the load on the gens runs around 45-50%. There is a 150HP fire pump in the hotel tower basement that has its own xfer switch and starts across the lines.

I'd be willing to bet alot that if both utility feeds were dead, (the gens running around 90%), and the fire pump started, there'd be a big fight in the gen room, but not for long, then it'd be real quiet, and real dark!

When they built the parking garage, they installed a 750KVA unit out there, and ran an 800 amp feed to the hotel tower basement. Using a manual xfer switch, they can ease up the load on the 4 heat plant gens. One day we got a frantic call that the power was out, and the hotel tower had no emergency power. The parking garage gen was not running. It should have started.

A short investigation revealed that the block was stone cold, and the battery voltage was around 5. It was discovered that one of their energy saving ideas was to turn off the block heater, and battery charger!!! Unbelievable? No, more like normal for a casino.