Grid Down Laundry

Hello Everyone, Frank here.

We were recently visited by some old friends, and yes, we've known them for a long time, and they are getting older. So, I guess that truly does make them old friends. We were looking at some pictures of their new piece of property, and noticed that they had an interesting set up for doing laundry.

They were using the old rectangular galvanized washtubs. Two of them, with a hand crank wringer in between the two. When I asked about how it performed, they told us it works great. We've thought about and talked about many ways to do laundry over the years, and we have a pretty good stash of round galvanized washtubs. We plan on using regular household toilet plungers to facilitate the agitating. But, again, we've known these people for a long time, so we started doing a little research. 

We found numerous websites with hand crank wringers, but they were all the exact same wringer. The prices varied by $30.00 to $40.00, and guess the average was about $155.00. I was hoping for a little bit more selection. When looking for hand clothes wringers, we also ran across some sites that had complete kits, which included the rectangular washtubs, wringers, stands to set the washtubs on, and in one case even a stand for the wringer to attach to. All this is great, and it's doable. Then I got the idea, how about a double sink utility basin? Lowe's has a couple of them that they show. Most of them are a plastic type product, and one they show as a rigid composite. But, remember, these are online, and I'm not sure if attaching a wringer to the vertical partition between the two sinks would be strong enough.

Then I got this shebam idea! How about stainless steel restaurant type sinks? Better get ready for a price shock. Then I thought, you know, besides doing laundry, we could use this for butchering chickens, not the butchering part, but the clean up part; cleaning up garden vegetables; on the rare occasion, processing fish. So, it could be used for other things besides just laundry. Stainless steel is expensive. I didn't mention above, but all of these ideas about doing laundry will be outside and on the porch. I would feel comfortable attaching a hand wringer to the stainless steel sinks. 

 But then I could just get two single plastic utility sinks and put a homemade stand with the wringer on top of it, between the two sinks. That's not a bad idea.

So, here is where I need your help. I recently did a post about a propane cookstove that the ignitor uses a 9volt battery. After I did the post, a couple of folks sent comments about other brands that also have battery ignitors. By looking at the websites, they have more features than what my cookstove has, and appears to be a higher quality. But at the time, I didn't know they existed. Same thing happened with washing machines. I couldn't find one without all of the monitoring sensors. Well, after that post, I received comments from folks about Speed Queen washing machines, which are manufactured without all of the sensors. 

So, I'm going to try something different this time. For those of you out there that are either doing laundry by hand, or know someone that is doing laundry by hand, could you provide me with some information about what type of system they use? This is one of those times that I don't want to reinvent the wheel again. Now, I'm not interested in using a paddle to beat my clothes on the side of the stream on a rock. I used to watch the ladies overseas do that. All the women would meet at the same time everyday, some of them with babies strapped on their back or their front. They would bring their laundry down to the stream. That was an interesting trip.

If you can help me, share some information about how folks in real world America wash their clothes in an off grid situation. Your help would be deeply appreciated.

We'll talk more later. Frank

Why Did We Sell That Goat?

Ivory has now been renamed Abby by her new owners.

We sold a goat today. A goat in milk that is a trained, experienced milker. Two years old, good mom, has had two sets of healthy twins, good udder, easy to milk, responds well to our routine. So why did we sell her? It wasn't because we have too many goats. It was because her lungs and vocal cords get a good workout everyday any time she sees us. This goat yells. Some goats talk normal goat talk and that is good. Not this one. I don't think she has any volume besides an irritating, yelling, screaming, demanding bellow. I'm not sure of any other way to describe it.

But, the good news is we sold her to some old friends of ours that we haven't seen in years that are both deaf. Just kidding. Just wanted to see if you're paying attention. They're not deaf, but they did buy the goat. They had a tragic accident at their farm a while back. Their barn burned down, and all of their goats perished. So, they needed a milk goat, we had planned on selling her anyway, they knew the circumstances as to why we were selling her, they were okay with these conditions, so it was a good fit for both of us. And we had a great visit to boot.

Copper is still in milk, barely.

One Stripe

Now we have two adult does, both pregnant. One is in milk, but she is drying up, and the other one is not in milk. What this boils down to, is in a couple of weeks our source of fresh milk will dry up, literally. Somewhere around February 10th we will be back in fresh milk again.

Where will we get milk? For years we drank powdered milk, and it's okay, you can live on it. Other times we had neighbors that were milking a cow and had an abundance. But that source has since dried up also. We have tried freezing milk, which we still do, but it's only for emergency purposes, we just don't care much for the taste of thawed milk. We did try something this year with our frozen milk. This time we skimmed the cream off before we froze it, so we will give it a try again. But, if I were a betting man, I would bet our milk is going to be coming from the grocery store.

It's really nice to live in a country where I can go to the grocery store and have a choice of skim milk, 1%, 2% or what they call whole milk, that, of course, has been homoginized and pasturized. Seriously, it is nice to be able to buy just about any food item we want or need. As most of you are aware, this situation will someday change. Let's take advantage of the good times we have. We often write about the failures of our garden, because now we can afford to fail. But that may not be the case tomorrow, six months from now or six years from now.

Cricket & Lady Bug will miss their mom that left today.

Back to the goats and the milk. We have two adult does that will be giving us babies, which means we will start having fresh milk again. We have three young does that we will breed November 1st which will give us babies around April. Then we will be flowing in milk. We will have to train the three young ones to milk, and then make the decision who stays and who goes. If things go according to schedule, we will have about 8 to 10 babies. We will evaluate how the new mothers are doing, but will only keep four milkers at the most. This means we will sell one new trained milker, and we will probably have three to four young females to sell. All of the boys, except for the billy, will become next year's meat supply.

Penny is our third young doe.

So that is where we are on the goats right now. We are going to have a dry period with no fresh milk. Now that it is cooled down we need to butcher last year's wethers. And the cycle continues. The goats we keep fit into our scheme of things. The goats we sell, hopefully can benefit some family needing milk. This is what we do. I hope you find this interesting, and I hope you're preparing for what's coming.

We'll talk more later. Frank
 

The Nutrition of Okra & Other Lore

Okra is truly a southern vegetable. Not many people we have met from the north or in Alaska, have eaten okra. Some had not heard of it, and most didn't even know what it looks like. There are a variety of ways to fix okra. Some like it in gumbo, which we have not had, some like it fried and some like it pickled. Then there is okra and tomatoes, which Frank has eaten back in one of his last lives. Okra is a heat loving plant. It doesn't do well in cool, cloudy weather. Until it gets hot and sunny, okra doesn't grow well here in Zone 7. Historically speaking, more food is fried in the south than in the north, and fresh fried okra is one of our favorite summertime meals. We fry our okra in olive oil, which is the only type of oil we use.

 
One of the easiest ways to preserve okra is to freeze it. We like to wash, slice and coat it with cornmeal, fill up a quart size freezer bag and it's good to go. We have also canned okra for frying before. There are a lot of different opinions out there about the safest way to can okra so it is still good to fry. You will have to decide about that for yourself. But, as always, follow tested, recommended procedures.

By the way, our experiment with cutting back the okra plants when they get too tall to reach is going very well. The plants have bushed out at the bottom with numerous side branches. These lower branches are really starting to produce quite well, so I feel like we are getting a second harvest in the fall. It's very interesting, especially since it has been so successful. I put another three quarts of sliced okra in the freezer today.

The nutritional information I am going to provide is for raw okra. If you go to the website, you can search for okra and find the nutritional values for boiled but not fried. The nutrients included in 1 cup of raw okra are:

• calories 31
• carbohydrates 7.0g
• protein 2.9g
• vitamin A, C, K
  
• niacin
• folate
• choline
• calcium 
• magnesium
• potassium
• phosphorus
• phytosterols
• omega-6 fatty acids

I find it interesting to see how many vegetables contain vitamins A, C, & K; along with a fair amount of calcium, magnesium, potassium and phosphorus. When I finish this nutritional series, it will be interesting to see what combination of vegetables provide a fairly balanced daily vitamin and/or mineral source.

We have all grown up knowing that our vegetables are 'good for us'. How many times did we hear that as kids? Now that we are growing some of our own food, it means more to us to know what we are getting out of what we grow. Add that to growing open pollinated or heirloom varieties, without chemical additives and the nutritional content of each plant increases. How much, I don't know, but I know the dirt our vegetables grow in are full of worms, organic matter, wood ashes and barnyard. That in itself doesn't sound very appetizing, but the food it produces sure is. There was a very good casserole at our Sunday luncheon at church last month that had okra, squash, potatoes and onions in it. I'm not sure exactly how they cooked it or seasoned it, but I will find out and let you know, because it was very good. What is your favorite okra story? Please share with us in the comments below.

Until next time - Fern

Radio - GMRS, FRS & MURS - A Re-Post

Hi Everybody, Frank here.

We're going to do a re-post today about non-ham radios. I know some survivalist say that everybody needs to get their ham radio license, but in the real world, that's just not going to happen. I received a comment on the blog this last week or so, and I want to share it with you. This man and I have shared a couple of comments back and forth, dealing with the properties of 2-way radio communications. If you want to get your ham radio license, great. But, if you want to communicate with your cousin Billy Bob down the road, then there are other ways besides ham radio. 

The GMRS radios, made by a number of manufacturers, will all communicate with each other. Don't believe the advertisements about 36 miles or 24 miles. These are line of sight communication radios, but they work great for their intended purpose.

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Frank- first off, thanks so much for the time you and Fern put in to sharing good information and just real life results of learning homesteading skills.

My question is on repeaters. Our home is partially earth sheltered, with most of the main floor cut in to the hillside. And of course, the garden, barn, and workshop where I am most likely to be when my wife and I might want to communicate, is uphill, the barn with metal walls. So, I am thinking I may well need a repeater to make things work, but am very early in my research. If I were to get the Baofeng/Pofung radios in this post, or something similar, what type of repeater would I need, and are they very expensive? I would most likely buy the radios first, to see if I even need the repeater, but would like to know now what the hit might be if one is needed.

Are there different repeaters for different bandwidths, or are there some repeaters with features that might be of benefit if I decide to move on to ham or CB?

Thanks again for your efforts.

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Hello. Great questions, and I can see some thought has gone into the issue.

Number one. I would borrow a couple of GMRS radios and see if they will work from your house to your barn. This would be, beyond a doubt the cheapest way to go. An example. Our barn is metal, our house has a metal roof, the barn is about 500 feet from the house, and from inside the house, to inside the barn, we have absolutely no problems with intelligibility, or volume. There is a small rise between the house and the barn. I can see the upper half of the barn from the house.

Following this same theme, the corner of our property, from corner to corner is about 1500 feet. There is no line of sight, and that is due to a hill in between, not a big hill, but still, no line of sight. With this scenario the transmission has a little bit of noise, but is still intelligible.

Number two. If for some reason, number one does not work for you, an external antenna might be your answer. That means your radio will have to be connected to the antenna, which certainly limits your mobile factor. But, if you do use this type scenario with an external antenna, depending on your setup, you can talk for miles. If I were guessing, I would guess that number one will be your best answer.

Number three. A repeater. A true repeater can get expensive and complicated. It has to have a constant power supply. Now, there are ham radios and commercial radios that function as cross band repeaters. I have never attempted this technique. What cross band means is you have a two band transceiver, one channel is set on VHF, the other channel is set on UHF, and through internal programming, it will broadcast and receive on each of these frequencies. Again, I have never used this technique, but they advertise that it will work. You're looking at $350.00 for this dedicated radio, a power supply, an antenna, but according to the manual it will work.

I would either borrow or buy two real cheap GMRS radios, everybody has them. They may not know they have them, but the things their kids play with, that's what they are. An external antenna for your home is easy to make, and will extend your transmit/receive range sharply. In some of the other radio posts I talk about external antennas. Of course, I would like for you to read all of the posts. Try the two handhelds first. If you decide on the $40.00 radios, great. You will need a programming cable, unless you want to do it the old fashioned way by keypad entry, which can be done. I use the RT system and it works for me.

One last thing to consider. No matter what frequency you use, somebody can hear you. Hope this helps. Enjoyed your blog, by the way. Take care.

Frank

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Frank- I went ahead and got the Midland GXT 1050 radios you mention in the post on GMRS/FRS/MURS. Tried it out in the barn, other places, and excellent reception all around. I might even take one up in the tree stand this November and wear the ear piece.

Any comments on maximizing the NiMH battery life? For now, I plan to keep them in the recharge cradles unless we are using them, which may not be a lot till we develop the habit more.

As you and Fern say many times, until you have actually DONE something, you have no idea how it will really go down. In this case, it worked out fine, but we have many other tasks in front of us as we work to improve our self sufficiency. Thanks again for the time you two put in to sharing. After a couple more seasons on our small farm, maybe I will be able to share with the wider world what we have learned as well. 

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Hi. I'm glad that these worked for you. As far as maximizing the battery life. One, I would use the radios everyday, then they become part of your routine. It's kind of like putting your keys in your pocket, if you get in the habit, you will always take it with you.

Let the batteries drain before recharging. I know that this type of battery advertises it does not develop a memory, but it does. If you keep them fully charged all the time, then you will have much less battery life. If you're using the internal battery pack that came with the radio, you can remove it and put four AA rechargeable batteries in it that will charge in the cradle, and sharply extend the transmit and receive time. If you're going to be out all day, like sitting in a tree stand, charge the battery that came with the radio, take it out, put it in your pack and keep it as a back up.

My best advice is to not keep the radio in the charger all the time. For a long time I would always charge the radios on a Friday night. Then I would have well charged batteries that would last me a week.

Make sure you wear the ear piece when you are hunting. Because I, on more than one occasion, have listened to hunters chat between each other whispering. There is always some clown who will make a loud noise in the radio, like a duck or coyote call. Some people think that's funny.

No joke, though, don't keep your radio in the charger all the time. It will shorten your battery life tremendously. Hope all this helps, and I'm glad the radios worked out well for you.

Frank

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Next, I want to share with you an interesting and exciting comment I received this week from an individual that has gotten their Technician ham radio license. They purchased one of the $40.00 radios that I wrote about, and seem to be very realistic about their goals for ham radio. You see there is no magic secret to radio. For the most part, you turn the on/off switch to on, you push the little transmit button and speak into the microphone. Whether ham radio or GMRS, you can still communicate when you need to. And while you're doing your research, don't forget to check out the CB radio. Because with the right CB radio, not only can you communicate with Billy Bob down the road, but when the ionosphere is in the right position, you can also listen and talk around the globe. Do your research. Enjoy the read from the person that got their Technician license, and if you would like, please read the re-post about GMRS, FRS & MURS.

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Thanks so much for this review [this comment was on the post about manual grain grinders], I really needed an item like this. I also recently got my Technician ticket thanks to all of Frank's writings. I appreciate your blog!

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You're welcome for the review of the grinder, but please do your own research.

That being said, Congratulations! on your Technician ticket. I genuinely hope you enjoy the hobby, if you choose to use it as a hobby. As you are aware now, there is a whole world open to ham radio. And you are aware that I use it for survival purposes.

I would highly recommend that you go ahead and pursue your General license. Same number of questions, one more formula, and about the same level of difficulty. The General will open up the rest of ham radio to you. There isn't anything you can't do with the General, just a few places you can't go that the Extra will allow you.

Very few people ever comment on the radio posts, but on occasion I get a comment like yours, stating that an individual had received their Technician and sometimes also their General. Your comment is why I do this. Thank you again. Best of luck.

73s, Frank

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Frank, I do plan on getting my general. I am a mechanical engineer so the formulas and schematics aren't hard, it is the stuff you just have to memorize that slows me down. I wanted to get my tech before the pool questions changed. I joined the local ham club and the emergency comm group, which is a great way to learn. To me, having a tech is like a learners permit - I can legally practice and learn the culture and then get my general. 73 

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Fern was kind enough to indulge me when I was working to get my Technician and General. She also picked up her Technician and General. We use radios in our life everyday, and not always ham radio. Fern didn't have the interest in getting her license like I did, so she just memorized all of the answers. We took our Technician's and she did better on the test than I did. She missed one, I missed three. The funny part is, when we took our General test, I was surprised that the guys doing the testing remembered us. When I went up to get mine scored, the older gentleman said, "You missed one." Then kind of laughed and said, "And your wife still did better than you did!" I had a buddy that took his Technician and General on the same day, and he just memorized the answers. I, on the other hand, can't do that. Yes, there are a couple of them that I would never learn. So I found some cute little pattern to try to associate the numbers. But, I have to be able to see how things work in my head. So, that's our story.

I think you have a real good plan, and I really hope that you enjoy it. If you're going to do emergency comm work, check out the CA 2x4 SR. This antenna works outside of the ham bands and does a real good job. And if your area is like most, emergency comms fall in the lower 150's. And there is a ground plane kit for a stationary mount, a Tram 1460.

Take care and keep me up to date.

73s, Frank

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Frank, thanks for the recommendation. I will check them out. I am really excited by this hobby. I can't wait to get a setup that works for me. I have a baofeng HT and am researching what more I want. I enjoy seeing your shack. 

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Originally posted July 5, 2013

Radio - GMRS, FRS & MURS


Hello, Frank here.

Today we're going to talk about Subpart A, Subpart B and Subpart J. Okay, do you wonder if this guy has been out in the sun too long? Well, no ......... maybe. This is what we're going to talk about today.

Subpart A is GMRS, General Mobile Radio Service. Subpart B is FRS, Family Radio Service. Subpart J is MURS, Multi-Use Radio Service. All of this comes from CFR, Code of Federal Regulations, Title 47, Telecommunications, Part 95, Personal Radio Services. This is a little review of where Federal Regulations come from. Subpart A & B we are going to talk about together - that's GMRS and FRS.

These little walkie-talkie type two way radios that guys use during hunting season, and their kids play with out in the yard, are actually GMRS/FRS radios. Okay, what's the difference? 

GMRS has 23 channels that operate between 462 - 467 MHz (megahertz). For future reference, when we get into ham radios this is UHF (ultra high frequency) and the ham people call hand held radios HT's (handy talky). But for our purposes, we will call them two way radios. 

FRS shares GMRS channels one through seven. Channels eight through fourteen are only FRS. Channels fifteen through twenty-three are only GMRS. FRS has a maximum output of 500 milliwatts, or 1/2 watt. GMRS has an output of up to 5 watts.

Now here is the big difference. To operate on GMRS you are required to have an FCC license. Not a ham license, but an FCC license. For FRS there is no license required. So, channels 8 - 14 do not require a license. Channels 1 - 7 do not require a license if you operate on low power. Do most people have a license that operate on GMRS? Do most people drive 56 MPH in a 55 MPH zone? I have never met a person that actually has a GMRS FCC license. But if you do apply for one and receive it, then legally anyone in your family or circle of friends at your house can use your radios. 

So much for legal. From here on out, I am just going to refer to these radios as GMRS.

Cobra, Midland, Uniden and others all make two-way radios. All make claims of transmitting 10 miles, 20 miles or 36 miles, but remember this is under perfect conditions. An example: mountain top to mountain top, you can do much farther than 36 miles away. So, take 36 miles distance with a grain of salt. These are line of sight communication devices. If they are putting out four or five watts, the one that advertises 10 miles will go as far as the one advertising 36 miles. What's the difference? Features. Some have duck calls and coyote calls. Some have weather ability. Some have clocks. But if you want a basic radio and you don't care about duck calls, then just about any of these radios will meet your needs.

Most of these two-way radios have rechargeable batteries that can be recharged from the provided cradle and AC and DC power connections. Surprisingly, not all radios come with a charging system. Some only operate off of AA batteries. I would avoid these. Most of the radios come with a battery packet insert that can be easily removed and replaced with AA or AAA batteries, or rechargeable batteries. Some will recharge rechargeable batteries while they are in the charging cradle, but most won't. Here's my point. If you buy a certain type of radio, you can put rechargeable batteries in it, and you can recharge them in the cradle that came with the radio. Rechargeable batteries will last much longer than the battery packet that came with  the radio. Some manufacturers make radios that look almost identical and some will recharge rechargeable batteries in the cradle, but most will not. I learned this from simple trial and error. It's a lot more handy to come in at the end of the day, take off the radio, put it in the recharging cradle and the next morning you are ready to go. Or you can take off the radio, take the back off of the radio, take the batteries out, recharge the batteries, then put the batteries back in the radio and replace the cover. It's your choice.

I'm going to make a recommendation here. I use a Midland GXT 1050. The GXT 1000 is the exact same radio, one is black, one is camo and the black one costs about $10 - $20 less. When you buy this package, it comes with 

two radios, two battery packets, a charging cradle, AC and DC power supplies, and two earphone/microphone type headsets. I have never used the earphone/microphone accessory. I use a 12 volt system to charge all of my radios, which means that you can charge your radios in your car if you have the charging cradle with you. The reason I recommend this radio is you can remove the battery pack and insert four rechargeable AA batteries and they will charge in the charging cradle. They are advertised up to 36 miles if you live on top of a mountain. Just kidding. I have used this particular radio for a number of years. I have also bought some of the other Midland radios that look identical, but will not charge the rechargeable batteries while inside the radio. Prices vary greatly from dealer to dealer, some folks are a lot more proud of their stuff than others. 

Now I am going to switch over to MURS, Mult-Use Radio Service, for a minute. MURS operates from 151 - 154 MHz, which is in the VHF (very high frequency) range. MURS is also line-of-sight communication. Maximum output power is 2 watts. It does not require a license to operate. There are five channels. In the rural areas few to none use the MURS frequencies. I'm sure over time things will change, but things change slowly in rural areas. I became aware of MURS about five years ago when reading one of James Wesley, Rawles books. He is the author of SurvivalBlog.com. There is not much traffic on channels one through three. Channels 4 and 5 are old business channels, so around some larger cities there are businesses that still use these channels because they have not been phased out yet. 

I do not know of any manufacturers that produce an exclusive MURS radio. Most guys that use the MURS frequencies use a commercial radio. I will give you more information about MURS and how to operate on the five channels in the next post. Most of the people that operate on MURS frequencies use modified ham radios or commercial radios. Both of these techniques are questionable. Remember, driving 56 MPH in a 55 MPH zone is illegal. But if you are not bothering anyone else, then you will not attract attention. As always, it's your choice.

If you would like to start looking at hand held commercial radios, try this site. Some of their radios are strictly ham radios and some are commercial. It is legal to operate a commercial radio on ham frequencies if you are a licensed ham, but it is not legal to operate a ham radio on anything but ham frequencies. While at this site, check out their power pole connectors. They have tons of information and easy to understand diagrams and pictures. I have bought from these people and in the future I will buy from them again.

Next time I'll talk more about commercial radios and modified ham radios. This will introduce us into the first part of the ham radio series.  

We'll talk more later. 73, Frank

This View's For You

Even in the midst of concern and strife around the world, we are surrounded with the beauty that God provides. Look at, and listen to your surroundings. Here are a few pictures from around the homestead.

Bask in the freedoms you have been given; to live as you choose, work as you choose, and worship as you choose. Breathe in the fresh air and sunshine that you are blessed with every day. It will sustain you when darkness abounds.

Until next time - Fern