How to Live WELL "Off Grid" Without Power or Help
- SMITTY
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- Location: West-Central Mass
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I saw that story earlier today. Things are getting REALLY bad out there. All we need now is a financial collapse, and the war will begin.
- freetown fred
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WTF--dc, not being critical--BUT--kero lamps don't give enough light--well,duh--you'll never get it if your expectations are to maintain all your girly comforts & just surviving comfortably--they don't mix my friend----as for keeping food stuff--save a few TUFFY GLAD bags (big un's)--LOL--the creek running through my place is fed by mountain streams & it always stays cold-- Oh CRAP, warm martini's I DO empathize with the city/suburban folk if this need arises! Chances are if the SHTF you'll end up killing each other off! I'm not even gonna respond to the Indian humor How come there's no Native smiley's??????
- McGiever
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- Coal Size/Type: PEA,NUT,STOVE /ANTHRACITE
- Other Heating: Ground Source Heat Pump and some Solar
As for the solar fencer platform, you can do way better for same money just by buying componets a la carte and using your car or boat battery.waldo lemieux wrote:DC
I to find myself musing over this topic. For light alone(maybe more) a small solar array and led lights could be done for cheap . Maybe even using a solar fencer platform to build from? Led is the holy grail as far as light IMO, takes nothing to make crazy light. Nice thread I gotta believe the prepper group will have some valuable input here. RW?........
Waldo
This what I did/use to keep deer etc. out of the garden each year, added a quality 12 volt high joule rated fencer.
Solar fencers are way over priced for what you get.
- lowfog01
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I just added "Basic Butchering of Livestock and Game" to my personal library. I figured if I were able to bring an animal down to supplement my food storage program, I'd better know what to do with it. Lisa
-
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I have quite a few of those solar landscape lights that I bring in & place around for light, they work good enough & if the power stays off just recharge them the next day.
- wsherrick
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For light you need to get some Aladdin Mantle Lamps. They are the best kerosene lamps made. They produce light equivalent to about a 50 Watt light bulb. I use them all of the time.
Life without electricity requires a rhythm of being that works with how nature works. When the Sun comes up. You get up. You take advantage of the daylight. The evenings are spent in contemplation, reading or going to bed early.
It's the way things were done for 1000's of years. Your body is naturally set up to live like that.
My new Avatar is of one of my Aladdin Lamps working during Hurricane Sandy. Be smart get a couple of these. There are plenty of them on ebay and they still make part for them as well as entire new ones.
You can also buy refrigerators that run off of Kerosene or Propane. They work just as well as the electric ones do.
Life without electricity requires a rhythm of being that works with how nature works. When the Sun comes up. You get up. You take advantage of the daylight. The evenings are spent in contemplation, reading or going to bed early.
It's the way things were done for 1000's of years. Your body is naturally set up to live like that.
My new Avatar is of one of my Aladdin Lamps working during Hurricane Sandy. Be smart get a couple of these. There are plenty of them on ebay and they still make part for them as well as entire new ones.
You can also buy refrigerators that run off of Kerosene or Propane. They work just as well as the electric ones do.
- mmcoal
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When I re-wire my house I am going to put the lighting on a couple of their own breakers so I can hook just those breakers up to a transfer switch that will be connected to a small solar charged battery bank. I am going to have to look into it a bit more to make sure the whole thing is at least code compliant, but I am going to make sure the whole house is on LED lighting also. In the long run it probably won't be the most cost effect way for light, but it will be a convenient one. This year I am going to start pressure canning, especially my garden produce. After Sandy last year it really makes you realize how useless most things in our society are without electricity or gasoline. Standby back up generators are nice, but unless you have a life threatening need for electricity are they really worth the thousands?
Will, you have very good taste.. Wow, there very nice.get some Aladdin Mantle Lamps
http://www.aladdin-us.com/site/1627880/page/45029
- McGiever
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- Stoker Coal Boiler: AXEMAN-ANDERSON 130 "1959"
- Hand Fed Coal Boiler: BUCKET A DAY water heater
- Hand Fed Coal Stove: Warm Morning 414A
- Coal Size/Type: PEA,NUT,STOVE /ANTHRACITE
- Other Heating: Ground Source Heat Pump and some Solar
Ordinary No. 2 size kerosene “flat wick lamps” produce approximately the light of six (6) birthday cake candles, all burning at once, and the light is emitted from the wick flame. Aladdin magical mantle lamps, on the other hand, produce over forty (40) candlepower or more than six times as much light.
- Short Bus
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I like the propane lights, although you probably want something portable, and I've only dealt with the permanently affixed kind.
-
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Great light
- SMITTY
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- Coal Size/Type: Rice / Blaschak anthracite
- Other Heating: Oil fired Burnham boiler
Yep - Fred & William said it best. When the grid finally goes down for good, you just gotta make do with what God gave ya. Anything extra is a bonus. In other words, if you've got a lamp equivalent to a 10 watt bulb, be happy.
You can get used to anything. It's tough to imagine, but when faced with it, you will adapt ... because you have no choice! When I lost my job in '09, I went from the typical suburban-dwelling schmuck, throwing money around left and right on stupid crap .. to really cutting back - buying only what I needed, or what I anticipated needing, making old stuff work instead of tossing it in the trash, and just plain making due with less. Ain't all that bad, really. Gives you lots of time to reflect on life, step back, and see how trapped folks are in the rat race. People have no time for nuthin'! Precisely why our gov't has slowly grown into a fat, bloated beast with many, many tentacles ...
You can get used to anything. It's tough to imagine, but when faced with it, you will adapt ... because you have no choice! When I lost my job in '09, I went from the typical suburban-dwelling schmuck, throwing money around left and right on stupid crap .. to really cutting back - buying only what I needed, or what I anticipated needing, making old stuff work instead of tossing it in the trash, and just plain making due with less. Ain't all that bad, really. Gives you lots of time to reflect on life, step back, and see how trapped folks are in the rat race. People have no time for nuthin'! Precisely why our gov't has slowly grown into a fat, bloated beast with many, many tentacles ...
- wsherrick
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- Coal Size/Type: Chestnut, Stove Size
Yes, they are very good lights. These are pressure lamps and they make a lot of people nervous. Most of these lanterns are designed for the outside. The difference with an Aladdin Lamp is that it is not pressurized. You still have the bright mantle and it burns common kerosene.
Getting one with a shade is a must for me. A shade balances out the light and cuts down on the glare from the super bright mantle.
- wsherrick
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- Baseburners & Antiques: Crawford Base Heater, Glenwood, Stanley Argand
- Coal Size/Type: Chestnut, Stove Size
Another big part of living without electricity is PLANNING AHEAD. Also a keen awareness of the environment around you is also necessary. In the old fashioned, non pre-packaged, non instant world I was raised in everything had to be thought out ahead of time. Mother would be planning lunch during breakfast, for example. Laundry day took the entire day and you still had to make three meals too. Laundry is the hardest thing to do without a washing machine in my mind. It's a like a factory process that includes Mom and all available children forced into laundry servitude. You have to plan for all of that labor and manage your time wisely or things just don't get done, period. You don't have proper meals or clean clothes. If you don't manage the garden in the summer, sit on the porch and shuck corn, shell peas or pluck feathers. You have nothing to eat for the Winter.
When November comes it's hog killing time. You can't slaughter before a hard freeze. From the hog comes your soap, lard for cooking biscuits and making pie crusts, bacon and everything else that you will eat over the winter. If you forget to buy enough salt then you waste your effort and things go waste.
The greatest maxim of childhood which was beaten, scolded and disciplined into my psyche more than anything else was this: You waste nothing. Waste was a sin and an affront to almighty God. If you thoughtlessly wasted what you were blessed with, then you didn't deserve it.
When November comes it's hog killing time. You can't slaughter before a hard freeze. From the hog comes your soap, lard for cooking biscuits and making pie crusts, bacon and everything else that you will eat over the winter. If you forget to buy enough salt then you waste your effort and things go waste.
The greatest maxim of childhood which was beaten, scolded and disciplined into my psyche more than anything else was this: You waste nothing. Waste was a sin and an affront to almighty God. If you thoughtlessly wasted what you were blessed with, then you didn't deserve it.
- carlherrnstein
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I'll vote for the Aladdin mantle lamps. I picked up 2 of them a yard sale for cheep. You do have to watch them, they have their particularities, mainly the mantle breaks or gets carbon deposits on it.