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Underground, no problem. Last few months Wal-Mart had solar powered driveway lights on sale. $10 for 7 and I have a few now (and then some!) Also they had long nozzle lighters (like used to light fireplaces) for $1 each. Also
have quite a few of them.
RobinI hate to say this but you do have to throw some stuff away. If you save or drag home everything you think could be useful you will need a warehouse to keep all of it stored. Plus finding the piece you need WHEN YOU NEED IT becomes more than a little challenging.
Who saves always has! I tell that to my wife every time that I fix something from parts I save in the garage.
+1 FRE!
I had all that stuff sorted, packaged and labeled, then I moved
Mostly still in storage
"ROGUE ELECTRICIAN" Hoping to be around to re-energize the New World.....
Cogito, ergo armatus sum
Great note, on Solar Lights! THANKS!
Those long lighters are also refillable, the last one momma bought was selected for that.
Now I need a few more, and start stacking the butane bottles. Like SELCO said, lighters and means of refilling was priceless!"ROGUE ELECTRICIAN" Hoping to be around to re-energize the New World.....
Cogito, ergo armatus sum
<div class=”d4p-bbp-quote-title”>74 wrote:</div>I hate to say this but you do have to throw some stuff away. If you save or drag home everything you think could be useful you will need a warehouse to keep all of it stored. Plus finding the piece you need WHEN YOU NEED IT becomes more than a little challenging.
Not knowing what it is we might need makes it hard sometimes knowing what to save vs toss. When we last moved after being in the same house for 22 years the necessity of getting the house ready to show and then moving caused me to toss or give away quite a bit of stuff. What otherwise keeps me in check is not being able to find stuff. That’ll prompt me to clean out & reorganize an area. It always involves some tossing.
Looks like this category has been ignored for a while, or perhaps some products/suggestions simply got folded into other topics. In any case, here are a couple of products you might want to use before TSHTF:
I know everybody on this forum takes superb care of weapons — no rust or corrosion on any pocketknife, dagger, machete, or pike, let alone firearms. But what about things that are sometimes less fun to use? Garden tools, human-powered carpentry tools, etc? And sometimes, at a garage sale,swap meet, or flea market, you may find tools at a bargain price, that would be useful, if only they hadn’t become rusted shut. What to do?
As useful as WD-40 and its competitors may be, they can’t undo the rust. the best they can manage is to lightly lubricate lightly rusted parts into some semblance of movement — often not enough to free badly rusted parts. Enter (a) Gibbs Lubricant, and (b) Evapo-Rust
I’ve used them both, on different tools, at different times, both with success that no amount of WD-40 could accomplish. Gibbs Lubricant is obviously solvent/petroleum based, and a light coat left on, will protect against rust. Evapo-Rust is water based, and provided it can get into the crevices and operating clearances of a mechanism (remove/dissolve heavy grease first), actually dissolves steel/iron rust, but must be rinsed/wiped off and the piece then lubed/protected after drying. No miracles here — just practical science. But they might help.
Smaller (or larger) quantities are available online from many sellers.
Cry, "Treason!"
Granddad used to keep a bucket of sand with used motor oil in it, in the corner.
Finished in the garden he’d use a putty knife and hose to remove the worst of it
Then half a dozen plunges into the bucket, ass quick wipe with a rag and back on the pegs.Collapsable funnels , water / fuel / etc. may be a precious commodity , spilling it while filling a container may be undesirable . The rubber ones collapse into nothing .
We have a collection of MSR mountain safety research stoves going back several decades. Good for burning petro fuels. My latest acquisition is a whisperlyte universal. It has an adapter for canisters which means it’s set up for canister but can still be converted back to the old style. Lots of interchangeable parts.
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This reply was modified 2 years ago by
Brulen.
Glad you mentioned the Whisperlite, I have had an International model for 20 years and I need to pick up a new seal kit.
Commercially produced fuel may not always be available. Of course, we all know how to build campfires, but even natural fuel may be scarce, or a regular campfire may be too easily detected by those not welcome. Here’s a stove that uses small amounts of natural fuel to cooking advantage: Solo Stove
It (and less expensive knockoffs) are available from the usual: Amazon, eBay. What makes them fairly efficient is the updraft of heated air which burns much of the volatile gases given off by the burning fuel, This also cuts down on smoke.There are even instructions for making such stoves from tin cans (search: “homemade wood gas stove”) or such. I’ve made a few, and they work, but the cans burn out after a while, and are prone to rust.
Cry, "Treason!"
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This reply was modified 2 years ago by
L Tecolote.
Teco, you mean a wood gasifier. It gives off hydrogen from burning charcoal. They seem to work better in a larger size. Used for buses tractors trucks in ww2. Even electric generators if they have carbs. This was the way they were going to power America after the nuclear war. I remember the civil defense book on building them. There were a bunch of variations to the design.
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This reply was modified 2 years ago by
Brulen, I know what you are describing, but I’m not advocating packing around a device big enough or complicated enough to power an internal combustion engine. The gases and smoke driven off from cooking wood to charcoal must be “scrubbed” in a water bath to remove particulate matter. Then the scrubbed gas can be burned in an engine — cumbersome for vehicles; easier in stationary power plants.
I guess it depends on the conditions and duration for which you need a portable stove. The gases and smoke produced by the initial burning in the kind of stoves I described, do get burned again at the top of the stove, which is why such (a) are fairly efficient with small amounts of fuel and (b) reduce the visible smoke. Depending on the number of people for which they need to cook, they can be fairly small and light.
Here is an example of a “knockoff” version.
Scroll down to the Product Description to see how it is intended to be used. To minimize visibility, a small alcohol stove (e.g., Trangia) could be used with it, in the same way they describe using fuel tabs, but you’d need to pack a can of denatured alcohol.Cry, "Treason!"
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