Avoidance issues
I’m tryin’ like heck to stay away from the world mess. Apologies to all if you found my two small forays into the goings on, offensive. Believe me, there is so much more I could add to things, and my opinions aren’t exactly ‘nice’ towards certain groups,,, So I just shut my trap and watch as it all unfolds.
There may come a point in the future, where I just walk into the sunset and turn my back on things. I know what that point is, but currently, well, shit, NO ONE KNOWS what road we are going to trip and fall onto.
I want to talk about other things, self sufficient things, independent things, but finding the best approach without slapping you in the face with tons of information you can’t practically use in your situation. Thats not my style. I want you in a better situation than you are in, but I can’t isolate and expand on EVERY scenario. Like buiilding the rocket stove heater for homes. Every home and location is going to require different materials and designs, and I’m no expert on this stuff. For ‘experts’, you need to go to Permies and other outlets that are frequently experimenting. Dive deep and be willing to play with what you learn before you commit to it. More importantly, THINK outside the box of Regulations and Building Codes. Personally, I don’t think that much of that is going to be such an issue in the next 10 years. I could be wrong and sort of hope I am. Only sort of as I would like to see things getting a bit more relaxed, but not at the expense of the modern world collapsing.
Ok,,, follow along as you can or want. Lets talk about REALITY. There are certain things every one NEEDS. many things we desire, but the NEEDS are going to be the focus. Water, Heat, Shelter, Food. That order is not set in stone with the exception of water. That MUST be the priority in all situations, be it survival or just living a life. Clean water obviously, though if you have a steady source of clear questionable stuff, you have options. Collecting it into something where you can readily access it is your second concern Cisterns, holding tanks, water barrels, whatever, so long as you can access them, and keep them clean. Transporting the water may be buckets or plumbing, it all depends on you, your resources and TIME,,, Always that time thing,,,
Heat is more confusing,,, COMFORT might be the more apropo term here, and keeping that in mind, SHELTER takes second place with comfort drawing third. The Real point of shelter being DRY and out of the ELEMENTS. Comfort levels are going to be dependent on those two factors FIRST, heat (or staying cool) comes second. If you have a home already, look around at how its built and examine how it was made with ‘out of the elements’ FIRST, with comfort coming in second place. Look at our modern HVAC equipment that requires so much energy to maintain an internal environment. The world hasn’t shifted so much in 100 years, and people dealt with much the same conditions we deal with now, and were able to keep homes warm or cool without modern heatpumps: research those methods. And I’ll bet ya a steel penny that they are much cheaper and more reliable than that $8000 heat pump going on the fritz that requires hundreds of kilowatts to run. You might be able to incorporate them into existing structures (and likely skip the permit process so long as you keep your nose clean and mouth shut) Your milage will vary from mine in that regard. (I am already much closer to pre-industrial standards of living.)
But really, the biggest hurdle that anyone is going to face is “Lifestyle Change”. and it sounds so innocent, but believe me, if things get really strange, wyrd and sideways, that alone is going to kill more people than anything. Far too many won’t be able to get their heads around ‘that don’t work no more’ , and many many haven’t the wherewithal to adapt. Or adapt fast enough.
Probably not my readers though. I’ve had my head in the “world is on the cusp of a new dark ages” for near 20 years and thats really the touch stone of this here ‘shop’. Its why I taught myself oldskool machining skills and not CNC stuff. (besides, I didn’t have the means to buy the CNC stuff.) (and really, I have had my head in survival stuff since I was a kid, at least the really fingers in the earth type stuff, like ‘shirt on your back and a pocket knife’ survival ) Building my home using salvage materials and barebones pre-industrial level ‘climate control’ was expediant and educational. Going off-grid for power and water was just the natural evolution of the rest of it. And those of you that have been here for at least the last 10 years KNOW, I live what I preach. I don’t just quote passages from books I have read. I’ve done or I am doing. (or figuring if its worth doing.) I had my water source lined up and plumbed before I laid my foundation.
And I am always open to new or better ideas, and will admit when I have been wrong. I don’t know it all, but I know a lot, and the more I know, the more I realize, I’m still an ignorant bumpkin in the great wide world. Like Mike in Fla said in comments,(and I paraphrase here) ‘I gotta learn, I can do no other’ and the day I stop learning is likely the day they bury my carcass (but thats just the transition to even MORE learning, IMO)
But I digress,,,,
water, shelter, heat/cool,
FOOD.
This is my weak spot. I have stocks put away for if things get scarce, long storage stuff and not just MREs. But likely only enough for myself for 6 months or a month for a famliy. I have options to supplement that with foraging (knowledge base,) and hunting, but I am not the only one around here that will be taking that route. Things could get very lean if worse came to worser-er. But I have one peice of knowledge that can only be gained by experiance. FASTING. I know how long I can go without eating a bite without ill effects. I also know that with fasting, I felt better in short order than I have felt in YEARS, There really is truth to this meme.
(and I am going to take a World Stage bend for a second) Maybe the upcoming shortages are Gods Hand showing us, in a backhanded fashion, that we are NOT living right. (and those of you who read my spewings on faith know, when I say GOD, I mean Universe, not the God of the Old Testament.) Actually, much of what is going on in this world is taking on many biblical proportions and I am seeing more and more people reaching for Faiths to sort out the mess. Maybe this is part of the fourth turning,,, Dunno. (I am also seeing more and more question the old Ideologies and seeking better answers.)
What does all this mean to you, right here, right now? The quick take-away: start figuring out the old ways if you hadn’t already. That is what I meant in a recent post with “look to the past for the map to the future.” There is plenty of information out there to guide and teach you. Keep in mind, there is alot of junk information as well. Use your better judgement. Learn to THINK, then RESPOND,,, don’t just react,,, that’ll get you killed. Practice in your head worse case scenarios and plan on different responses depending on what you may or may not have with you. Do that while you have the luxury now, and when that luxury is no longer around, you will already have programmed responses into your thinking; you’ll be less likely to react badly, and respond in a positive and productive manner. Note, I said ‘less likely’ , I make no promises, but it should help .
LEARN
LIVE
LOVE
LAUGH
LOAD!!!
I don’t type those out every post for shits and giggles,,, Live them!!!
Hard sellin’ a hot idea
Talkin’ the rocket mass stoves here. I really think that this is going to be something of a feature in homes in the future. The downsides to it right now are that everything going into a new buildin , must be “approved” and Listed, as in UL listed or one of the other testing places. That is expensive and the real problem in getting RMH stoves tested being they are also rather ‘artsy’: each being built on site for the particular home they are going into. No one is going to build the stove then dismantle it to send it Underwriters laboratories for testing, to the tune of 25grand or more. Not each and every stove.
Luckily, there are states that are making exemptions to such things. (I don’t recall which ones, though I seem to remember one being New England: shocked I was!)
Permies has been doing research into different builds techniques and materials, and even does particulate testing on their stoves. Their stoves, again, not mass produced therefore untestable by a standards company, have been besting the EPA recommendations on orders of magnitude. EPA suggests .4% particulate matter on a running stove. Permies has been producing less than a 10th of that.
And they use 1/4 the fuel of a standard wood burner for the same result in house.
There are all sorts of reasons why some people want this style of stove. They may be buying into the Carbon Myth, wanting to reduce carbon and particulate emissions. They may be trying to do similar to me, going off grid and want as efficient as you can get. Or the other side of the coin, that I am on, wanting the heat, but no one makes a stove that fits my house. It either runs too hot, or won’t put out the heat I need and ends up creating soot issues and always ends up pumping more heat OUT of the house than what remains in.
And then there are those that just want to supplement what they already have in place to help reduce costs overall. IE A heat pump that works, but want to reduce its duty cycle and use less electricity.
https://youtu.be/QY4mnYc0Mgc?si=ZHUkt0GxPV6qlIjZ. (One the groups trying for a modular unit, no affiliation, but a good explanationof function.)
And the choices are growing fast thanks to the internet and curious kittehs like myself. Rocket style stoves (J-tube top feeding downdraft stoves) Batch style heaters (typical front loader like most accepted wood burners). Russian and Swedish styled ceramic tile stoves (similar concepts of re-routing hot gasses through a maze of brick to collect more heat for slow release)
The concept is simple. Capture as much heat as you can before it leaves the house. Thats the whole purpose of these stoves. The Rocket stoves produce incredible amounts of heat, running at peak efficiency reducing emissions to base components of CO2 and H2O with minimal particulates. They generate ash in the ash bin, and some fly ash that accumulates over time in the chambers (and why they have clean out ports.) Everything else is normal and IMO non-pollutants. (the CO2 was gathered by the trees, and will be again. Perfect circle!)
Imagine the actual fire pit being close to 2000F and by the time the exhaust gasses leave the building, they are around 100F and clear with no particulates (or nearly so). Thats 1900F thats been captured by the stove to release out over time. No need to run a fire in the stove 24-7 to keep a house almost warm. Radiant heat feels better than forced air heat (and yes, thats a subjective statement) that definitely lasts longer. Load the hopper once every 12 hours or so, burn hot and fast for a couple of hours and forget about it. Better than waking every couple of hours to feed a beast that only sort of does the trick.
So here I am, Not in consideration mode anymore, but active ‘I’m doin’ this’ mode. But I hit a snag, one I need to resolve. Do I cut out the floor and run the stone all the way to the ground instead of ‘pumping up my floor joists’, or just reinforce. It really doesn’t make a difference in the performance of the stove, but I am thinking longevity of the building. Were I to build again, I already know, Build the base for the stove FIRST, and sort of build the house around it. Much like they used to do hereabouts. I have found three old fallen down houses built back in the early 1900’s and ALL of them had a chimney dead center of the house that went to the ground and the house was built around that. Some had two fireplaces on opposing sides, but all went to the ground.
And despite the word on the nets, all of them were built with locally gathered sandstone and slate, and only one had any firebrick in it. That fire brick was the ‘floor’ of the fireplace, No lime mortar though,,, That I can see. They did use the refractory cement over mortar except on the outside where they went with the cheaper stuff. In one case, no mortar at all: they used Cobb, clay and sand mix. And thats cheap around here if you are willing to do a little digging or swinging a shovel. River sand is very clean after a flood and usually piled several feet deep before you hit the mud. Clay is readily found near any creek, and like in my case, my house sits on a clay formation thats almost 2 feet thick and several hundred feet wide.(and it’s only 2′ down to it.) For the record: I will be using fire brick in the main combustion chamber as the temperatures get quite a bit higher than a normal fireplace would see.
Really, not counting labor times, building one of these should be doable by even the poorest of people, and work 10 times better than a UL listed store bought EPA approved steel and brick monster.
Ah, but Dio,, that means less money flowing and the money has to flow to keep the economy together.
Yeah,, that’s true, but what happens when the economy is no longer functional, but people still need to keep warm? One summer of some hard work and little expenditure but a warm house for years after, and repairs can be done the same way it was built: locally furnished material.
By the way, this is a DEEP deep rabbit hole if you start digging. Some people building J-tube rockets that don’t feed a box, but run through tunnels under the house, venting on the opposite side. The original ‘floor heating’ arrangement. (and that idea is OLD! Korea had a system like it, as did the roman bath houses.). Seriously, if you are thinking of building, consider how you want to heat and cool the house before you ever lift hammer or push saw. That will make the rest of the build so much easier, unlike where I am, thinking about dismantling part of my floor.
Go, be creative, learn something new, and fly the birds of freedom at those that want us to buy systems that need replaced every 10 years or so. (but be advised, getting homeowners insurance might be tricky!)
LIVE
LEARN
LAUGH
LOVE
LOAD
BLoo update: Good tidings at that. took her for a run Sonday to the tune of 150 miles (152 to be exact) and did a fill up on return. 9.98 gallons. 15mpg on a 25 yo SBC? No, I ain’ta complainin’! (and roughly 40 of that was here in town the day prior so its likely closer to 13/16 town/highway. Still no complaints.
Ch-ch-ch-changes
LOL, one of Bowies all time best.
But face it, changes are really all we know now. Things have accelerated into the ‘blink and you’ll miss it’ stage years back, and the throttle is still wide open.
Even here, the changes keep coming; maybe at a slower pace, but happening even as you read this.
Y’all know I am never without a book in my possession, constantly “edumicatin’ ” myself, knowing I will never ‘know it all’ but never settling for ‘good enough ‘. Heck, just the recent project of” writing a how to manual “taught me, and reinforced some areas, and corrected fallacies in others. Its always a good thing when you can improve yourself and situation and the book did that before I ever hit the publish button. Maybe it will continue to do so afterwards.
One of the books I am reading right now is “life after Google” by George Gilder. George is something of a prophet in the tech worlds and when he speaks, many listen. You can find out more about him by reading the wiki about him. But his book, its gotmetathinkin’.
We live in fast times. Fast communication being the foundation to , almost the driving force behind it. Examples: nano second micro trades on wallstreet: where they are trading for percentages of growth several hundred times a second. Not at all possible without lightening quick comms. My writing and publishing a book with worldwide distribution in less then 3 weeks: not possible 20-30 years ago.
And if you think I’m harping against it, bear with me. Change is never comfortable, but change is all we know now.
Keep in mind what I am reading for a few as I change lanes. I’ll bring it all together at the rest stop.
For the past 12 years since just before Oblammy-o-boy lied on a bible, after the Fed started “QE to infinity and beyond”, people, myself included, have been going on and on and on about “that which can’t continue, won’t ” and yet, we see more and more propping up and the house of cards still stands. We see signs of unrest everywhere, especially in Europe, but even here in the States to a lesser degree, and it all stems from one point, out of control governments grasping at straws to maintain power.
Georges book talks about how certain powers are the dinosaur wrestling with the black tar of the pits. He even shows why they are in trouble and unsustainable.
They can’t evolve anymore; they are stuck in the paradigm they wrote for themselves and can’t see the trap under the dust covered surface of the tar.
I’m hearing more and more, 2020-2022 as the window when the hockey stick ‘growth’ of the markets hits correction (in a freefall manner from all descriptions)
Before you start to scoff look here for a second.
See that little ‘bump’ between 1920 and 1940? THAT was before the “Great Depression” . Contemplate the depth of that time for a moment. Consider the size of the bubble; then and now.
What happened? Why that upward curve to the moon? Two things: loss of a gold standard for one, which created the fiat currency we all take for granted. That opened the sluice gate. The other reason was government, out of control and losing all restraint as time went by.
So what does this have to do with ‘life after google’? Well, if George is right, and I see signs from other sources that he has the right heading programmed in, blockchain and cryptocurrency is the next step in our evolution. Blockchain is the area where you are going to want to start your learning curve because it will be the foundation of all that follows, like our high speed communications and endless information flows. I have reason to believe that when the house falls and the dust is settling, every major government is going to be tying its physical currencies to one of the several cryptocurrencies floating around out there. That will be the only way they will be able to hold the reins of power. If that happens, its only a short stop to when megaplexcorporations start to tumble. TBtF banks will be hard hit if not swallowed whole during the transition. Why?
Because blockchain puts all the control back into the hands of the holder. The holders will be everyone that uses them, IE every single one of us.
On my other page about PGP, you are introduced to crypto, that public key/private key is where blockchain starts. Your public key will hold a chain to everything about you and only YOU can decrypt that. (Heed the warnings I post on that page, they become even more important as this grows) ( a similar tech, but not the same application. Stay tuned for more) (I am even seeing efforts to make blockchain for voting and it even was used in a couple of states recently. This is not a gimmick, its very very real.)
Where does that put little guys like you and I? Heading upwards if you keep your wits about you. There will be so many changes coming so fast, no one can say where it will all go. What we have seen so far is going to look like a snail and slug race when this ball lets loose.
I know it seems out of line with my blog in general, but look at it as a prep. Information is king of the world right now, who controls that info is in essence king as well, that is currently Google. When this thing breaks loose, google is going to get knocked flat. Be ready because then the ball is in the air and
Ch-ch-ch-changes!!!!!
Dio's Workshop 