Backup drives keep disappearing

the back up drives that I have associated with time machine keep disappearing. just drop off of finder and the desktop and even they are still hooked up, i cant get them back so I can access them. this includes rebooting, and turning off all of the electronics. they will randomly reappear. when they do, the time machine cannot complete the backup prior to disappearing again. I really need to back up

Hello,
This problem is rather difficult to diagnose without additional clues that would - fortunately - come from your system logs.
Try to look in your system logs (Console application) for lines starting like this:
.... kernel[0]: IOSCSIPeripheralDeviceType00::setPowerState (....) timed out after xxxxxx ms
Other questions:
- Are you external drives powered by the Mac or with their own power pack?
- Are you certain you didn't experienced "abnormalities" (spike, surge, drop-outs) in your house main?
If you do need your external drives to be up and mounted all the time - and they are on their own power supply - better to power them through an UPS (Uninterruptible Power Supply).
This is one lead to investigate on. It may not be the answer.
Rgds,
Thierry

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