Reason #27 why I love Amazon….radio remote fire control systems for $25. For launching your model rockets and fireworks remotely…yeah…thats the ticket. How do you see something like this for sale and not have the wheels in your head suddenly start spinning into overdrive?
ETA: And they make a party pack!
I found one of these while straightening up the other day. It’s an adapter that lets you fill the small 1# propane bottles from a larger tank. It seemed like a useful item to have since we have several devices here that run on those small bottles…most notable a small heater, a couple Coleman lanterns, and a camp stove.
Propane is great stuff, it’s just damn awkward. As someone pointed out to me, with a gas or diesel powered device I can borrow fuel from a neighbor if I have a five-gallon bucket. Borrowing propane from a neighbor is far trickier…can’t exactly tear off a piece of your 20# tank and say “Here, get it back to me when you can.”
Of course, an adapter like this lets you take your empty to your neighbors barbecue (or vice versa) and get some fuel that way.
I think that if I were going to live out in the sticks and have to have my own source of power, propane would be very attractive. The only thing I don’t like is that I’d have to have some guy drive his propane truck to my little hideaway once a year and fill the tanks. On the other hand, I suppose I could mount a tank on a small trailer, bring it into town to be filled, and then bring it back to my little hideaway and then hook it up, leaving the tank on the trailer year-round….probably violate a dozen DOT and zoing regs, but I like to think I’d be living somewhere where ‘zoning’ was a quaint notion that never really caught on locally.
Back in the Y2K runup I did wind up buying a few dozen 1# bottles of propane. I’ve probably only used one or two over the years, but as long as the bottles themselves are protected from rust and banging around they should last quite a while. It’s just another layer of redundancy…we’ve kerosene for lighting, heating, cooking in an emergency and also the option of propane for the same purposes. Add in the gas-fueled generator and we’re looking at around three different ways to skin the same cat. (And while I generally find Ragnar Benson’s books to be pretty lame, I will give him credit for bringing up “the rule of threes” in his ‘The Modern Survival Retreat‘ book.
Even though at the moment I’m living in town, I think it’d be nice to have a buried tank in the yard to run the generator and a few other goodies. Unfortunately, I doubt I can get a 500# tank past the city codes. On the other hand, a couple 100# tanks shouldn’t be a problem. (By the by, excellent graphic showing relative tank sizes.) My Honda EU2000 has some aftermarket kits to let it run propane, natural gas, or gasoline…..it’d be nice to have options.
It occurred to me, as I was talking to someone about the still-present situation regarding .22 ammo, that any lulls that we’ve experienced in the panic buying over the last year or so are going to be pretty much wiped out by the fact that next year is an election year.
The Clintons, Slick Willy or/and Hillary, are hardly friends of gun rights. They aren’t even friends of friends of gun rights. And as you hear Clintons name bandied about more and more as the nomination process approaches you’re going to see more and more panic buying going on.
Then, once the nomination process is on, it’ll continue as the election comes closer closer. Finally, depending on who is elected, it might start to calm down around March or April of 2017.
This stuff is actually highly predictable. The four stages of gun panics, as far as elections go, are:
Don’t take my word for it, your own life experiences should confirm what I’m telling you.
Now, I’m not nearly as stupid as I look (I couldn’t possibly be), but even I learned a long time ago to buy what I needed as soon as possible, as much as possible, so I could ignore this sort of thing.
“But, Zero”, I hear you cry, “I am a survivalist of limited resources. I can’t possibly get all my guns, ammo, and magazines before the election. I need both those kidneys!”
Well, that’s true. It’s a pretty intimidating list. That’s why you need to prioritize that mofo like no one’s business. Let’s look at it from a historical and hysterical standpoint – in the last, oh, say thirty years, what’s been regulated out of the realm of ownership by us simple peons? Chinese guns, Chinese ammo, steel core 5.54×39, steel core 7.62×39, imported rifle barrels for ‘assault weapons’, magazines that hold more than 10 rounds*, pistol grip stocks on semi-auto rifles*, bayonet lugs*, etc.
What else could come down the pike from the twisted gnomes in Washington? Well, almost certainly a magazine ban, assault weapons ban, and some restrictions on ammo. That whole wrist brace issue is living on borrowed time, IMHO. I expect there’ll be some fundamental changes to the DIY/80% receiver market and possibly some restrictions on mail ordering the other parts you need to complete your AR. (And before you say that ATF can’t regulate gun parts that aren’t serialized receivers, go try to import some AK barrels and let me know what happens.) And I fully expect there to be some restrictions on body armour coming along as well.
So, man of limited resources, where do you put your money to get the most bang for your buck in a world where political expediency directly challenges your ability to own thundertoys? Guns, mags, ammo, in that order. Since it is reasonable to expect that as we slide further and further down the timeline prices will go up and availability will go down, it would seem to make the most sense to purchase the most expensive and least available items first. Actual guns are outnumbered by magazines and ammo, so get the guns first. After that, get the magazines. After that, ammo. For every AR, there are probably hundred of AR mags, and thousands of rounds of .223….so get the guns first.
Stripped lowers? Sure, if you can’t afford the actual complete gun I’d grab as many stripped lowers as I can. I suspect that at some point the upper receivers and what not will be regulated as well but until that time you’ll at least have the serial numbered part sitting away waiting for you to complete it…or use it as trade for other stuff.
Magazines are simply a buy-as-many-as-you-can item. For those of us who remember the ’94-’04 ban, we can tell you youngsters stories about $750 BetaMags, $100 Glock mags, and $30 AR mags. It was a time of great chaos, and great(!) profit making. Even if you don’t have the gun, get the mags.
Unless you’re on fire or swimming, you can’t have too much ammo. Any surplus ammo still coming into the country, as well as the Russian stuff, is probably first in the crosshairs of those who would do evil to us. While we all have a magic number in our head about how much ammo is the recommended amount per gun, the truth is that you really can’t go wrong with buying as much as you can afford. If you don’t think so, look at the the folks who are sitting on thousands and thousands of rounds of .22LR right now. Or cases of old Chinese 7.62×39 when it was nine cents per round.
At this point I’m sure there is some genius hitting the comment button about to say something deeply profound like “It’s because of idiots like you encouraging all this hoarding that I can’t find .22LR ammo, and when I can find it it’s at ten cents a round!” Actually, it’s not because of me..it’s because of basic economics, laws of scarcity and demand, and federal asshattery. (How many ‘t’s in asshattery, anyway?)
Having been to this dance before, I’m pretty much immune to a bunch of it. I already have a goodly amount of guns and mags stashed away, and ammo is always on the shopping list anyway. But it is my opinion that if you’ve been waiting for prices to ‘return to normal’ or for ‘availability to return to normal’ you’re going to be left with a full wallet and empty shopping cart. As the political season heats up prices are going to go up, availability will go down, and today is going to be looked back upon as the day you’ll wish you had started shopping.
* = yes, that law sunset and we can now enjoy normal-capacity magazines and ‘evil features’. But do you really think they’re gonna make that mistake again?
So you guys saw this? Tesla Motors, as a development in their car-battery technology I am assuming, says they are going to be offering a ‘plug-n-play’ battery that will be suitable for home use. Now, you and I both know that ‘home use’ means a few lights, some entertainment devices, and other small-draw items, because you ain’t running your refrigerator, freezer, well-pump, furnace blower, and hot water heater off a battery small enough to hang on your wall. Oh, you could run a household like that off of batteries but it would be a battery (or battery-pack) the size of a cargo container.
Really, this is a brilliant move for Tesla if they pull it off. The car side of their business is obviously heavily invested in battery technology, so if they develop an uber-battery it would only make sense to put out out into other, non-auto markets as well. The market for $200K $100k electric cars is probably pretty small compared to the market for $3500 batteries that, ideally, work better than any existing backup battery or off-grid-cabin battery.
My own efforts as of late are still in the DIY/beginning-hobbyist stage. I’m planning out a small battery system to maintain a charge off of household current when the power is on, and to be used for DC applications (lights, radio, battery charging, security system) when the power goes out. But thats a much longer post (or, really, couple of posts).
In a happy little world, I’d have something like one of these batteries up at my very-attractive, yet heavily-reinforced concrete off-grid Beta Site. The world would convulse into spasms of chaos, I’d pack up and head to my little quiet bastion of security, and patiently wait for things to calm down…all the while enjoying LED lighting, radio communications, laptop, and security surveillance. Ah, the great American (survivalist’s) dream.
Go read some Heinlein sometime, or just Wiki it, and look up “Shipstone”. In the books, the shipstone was a revolutionary technology that greatly improved batteries. Or, as the book says, “To call a Shipstone an improved storage battery would be to call an atom bomb an improved firecracker.” In the book, shipstones didnt create power, they simply acted as containers for it. And you could stuff a lot of power into one. Every so often someone comes up with some ideas in battery technology that looks similar to Heinlein’s fictional supercapacitor. About eight years ago the big thing was ‘nanowire‘ technology that would, allegedly, increase a lithium-ion batteries output by 10x. Haven’t read much about it since then.
Anyway, if Tesla has made any strides in the battery arena, I think it would be a classic example of a business having a small branch or division that was ancillary to their main business become more profitable than the main business. Serendipity.
Wonderful post about the history of the jerrycan.
I’ve given up on anything other than the ‘NATO/Euro’ style cans for gasoline storage. They are more expensive, and sometimes hard to find, but I believe they are worth it.
ROGERSVILLE, Tenn. – Meat dating to the year of President Obama’s first inauguration was served to students in some Hawkins County, Tennessee schools last week.
Hawkins County Commissioner Michael Herrell was alerted after a cafeteria worker sent him a photo of the pork roast they used for school meals was from 2009.The 6-year-old meat had been frozen and then was thawed for meal preparation, according to WCYB.
Eating 6-year-old meat is not a big deal if it was stored properly. We routinely eat meat thats been sitting in the deep freeze for a year or two, and the oldest I’ve pulled out and consumed has been around five years old. As long as you packaged it well and kept it frozen, it’s usually just fine. There may be some spots of freezer burn if you didn’t get all the air out of the package, but those don’t affect the nutritional value or the safety of the food.
As an aside, if you’re really upset about the quality of the slop slapped onto your kids lunch tray, either pack ’em a lunch or give ’em five bucks to go get a slice of pizza and a Coke. It’s not .gov’s responsibility to feed your kid. Public government schools already do a crappy job of educating your kid, why would you think they’d do any better job of feeding them?
Took someone from CrossFit to the range the other day. Took abut a dozen different guns. Everything from .22 to .45. And, as always seems to be the case, what was the most flat-out enjoyment achieved with? The lowly, inexpensive, .22 LR.
We had been shooting the Remington Subsonic at 50 yards and it was okay, but I switched over to standard velocity CCI, which still managed to be subsonic, and groups tightened considerably. Me and my guest both managed to shoot five-shot groups you could cover with a dime.
The gun in question was the Savage FS-VR, a rifle I am developing a tremendous amount of enthusiasm for. However, while the AccuTrigger was awesome, the factory stock wasn’t even worthy of putting on an airgun. I swapped it out for the Boyds Tacticool (now called Pro Varmint) and slapped a Nikon P-22 w/ BDC reticle on top of the rail. So, yeah, I sank north of $400 onto a $200 rifle. (Almost a grand if you include the suppressor and paperwork). But, for five shots, we get this…
I need to back it out to 100-yd and see how it shoots. Problem with the subsonic stuff is you get these rainbow trajectories that can make things….tricky. Also, those suppressors really dirty up a barrel….seemed like there was more unburnt powder or debris in the barrel after shooting with the suppressor than without. Still, awesome fun.
Someday Im gonna have one of these.
1972 Toyota FJ 40 Landcruiser , orig. 6 cyl. , 3 speed manual trans. , new leaf springs and shocks with grease-able shackles front and rear , power steering , Warn hubs , new water pump , new thermostat , new master cyl. , rebuilt radiator , newer soft top in excellent condition ! Original toolkit and jack , new wheels with BFG All Terrain tires and spare , custom heavy duty front and rear bumpers , this is a very clean FJ 40 ! Also comes with a 4 speed manual trans. , orig. steering wheel , Summer top and a few other parts . Come and take a look , you wont be disappointed ! $ 13,500 obo – call
Stayed with the vehicle and survived. This is almost, but not always, the case. However, it is the outcome often enough that staying with the vehicle should be the preferred choice.
This post on arfcom caught my eye. Rather than buy a 12v lamp for use with a battery, this fella converted a regular household AC lamp to run an LED ‘bulb’ off his 12v battery.
This sort of thing intrigued me and I decided to try it. While we have several options for lighting around here, I’d like to have something that doesn’t look like the kind emergency lighting youd find in a stairwell. Something very subtle and ‘normal looking’.
A quick trip to Amazon for the necessary parts:
– converts a regular screw-in bulb socket to the bayonet-type.
– replaces two-prong AC plug with cigarette lighter plug
– LED light that goes into the screw-in-to-bayonet adapterThe next step was to pick up a lamp to experiment on. As it turns out, I found a lamp that already ran on DC (it used a transformer to run off AC house current) and was LED. Since that was 2/3 of the battle right there, I figured I’d start with that.
Reading the details on the made-in-China transformer said, if they can be believed, that power draw was something like .33 amps. 
Conveniently, they labeled the wires as to +/-. Simple matter to cut the transformer off and connect the wires for the cigarette plug to the lamp wires…keeping the polarity the same.
Once the transformer had been removed and replaced with the 12v plug, I plugged it into my old ConSci battery pack to test.
Unsurprisingly, it works. I’ll tuck it away with the battery box and leave it for the next time I need lighting when there’s no available electricity.
Of course, the bigger plan is to use it in conjunction with the larger battery backup system I’m planning. Nothing fancy..a couple big deep cycle batteries, a smart charger, and a bunch of outlets and wiring to allow me to run emergency lighting and communications for a week or so on battery power. Thats the bigger post Im working on. Gonna be a little while on it, though, since it’s going to take a while to scratch up the cash for the batteries. But…when it’s moved from ‘theory’ to ‘in progress’ there’ll be plenty of posting on it.
