Bring your DYI ideas for garden and home .....

I work at a college which produces a huge amount of shredded paper. Easy to make fuel for the fire:
http://www.amazon.com/XtremePowerUS..._UL160_SR160,160_&refRID=1R6YDQ881Z4R10EWPA7E

Works good... need to do it in the summer because the logs take quite a while to dry through.

I am sure most have heard about planting potatoes in old tires... just keep piling the dirt up around the plant. New potatoes will come at the top. Best potatoes ever!

Noxot said:

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I wonder if you could collect these from restaurants? I imagine they have a ton of them every day.

yeah i'm sure some that people would not mind giving their trash away

Gotta be careful about leaving egg shells laying in the yard if you have chickens. They eat the shell and get a taste for it. Then may end up eating their own eggs.
Chickens are not bright.

FreeinChrist said:

That would be bad. We had decided to support our local chicken farmers and buy eggs from them.

I used a mix of vinegar, epsom salt and Dawn dish soap on grass growing in the walkways of my garden and it worked! It doesn't work on the big weeds in the driveway so well. We have raised beds and this bermuda grass keeps growing in. It is the dry season so we didn't plant anything and only have some herbs. The grass grew on the sides and walkways. Last thing I want to use is Roundup so I am glad this worked

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I have used a water/vinegar/dish soap. It will turn even greenbrier brown in a mater of hours. Have to spray until the huge tuber is dies.

Boiling water works wonders but is impossible for volume.

bugkiller

I want to do solar power + regular grid living. The idea being, you could run your own separate grid that is optionally rigged without having to follow electric code, so it is easily modifiable.

- Solar system, buy or build your own
- DC / AC converter
- Extension cords
- Cord Protectors affixed to walls, with extension cord "outlets"

All this for a garage area not affixed to the house, or even into the house through a house port. As far as I understand it, it would all be non-permanent wiring, not requiring electric code changes, since it doesn't hook to municipal power.

The idea here is not to have a huge house-grade system to run stoves or refrigerators on, but power simple things alternatively. Food dehydrators, electronics, garden water pumps, ect.

Razare said:

I want to do solar power + regular grid living. The idea being, you could run your own separate grid that is optionally rigged without having to follow electric code, so it is easily modifiable.

- Solar system, buy or build your own
- DC / AC converter
- Extension cords
- Cord Protectors affixed to walls, with extension cord "outlets"

All this for a garage area not affixed to the house, or even into the house through a house port. As far as I understand it, it would all be non-permanent wiring, not requiring electric code changes, since it doesn't hook to municipal power.

The idea here is not to have a huge house-grade system to run stoves or refrigerators on, but power simple things alternatively. Food dehydrators, electronics, garden water pumps, ect.

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And then you have to consider your home owners Ins.

I am currently working on two projects. One is a solar oven. No way I am paying 300 or more bucks for one. I bought some reflective material. About 19 bucks for 80 square feet. We can do plenty of experimentation. I am wondering if I should make something heavy/semi permanent or something more portable. We are not planning on ever "bugging out." We are getting up in age and trudging through the woods is not really an option. So the oven can be heavy and more sturdy than a cardboard box setup. So I am thinking some quarter inch plywood for the reflectors and a metal or wood box for the heating area. We live in SC so we can count on a lot of sun and heat. I will let you know what I come up with.
The other project... more of a testing, is a evaporator cooler. A filter assembly is saturated with water while air is pushed through it. The air is cooled by the process of evaporation. My test is just a box fan with the filter attached to the back. I got a small aquarium pump unit that will feed water into the filter. We did a test in our central room that we do not cool. The small 20 inch unit dropped the temperature by 5 degrees. Not to bad. I plan on a larger unit of a better design. In the event of a power outage, I believe a solar power set up will power the fan and the pump and will help us cool the place down while the rest of the world is sweltering. I have read reports of such units cooling a house down by as much as 20 degrees... from 90 down to 70. I will have to see that to believe it.

For an oven, your best bet would be a small cast iron wood fired cook stove. Food cooked all year round, and a source of heat in the winter. Good looking and good cooking.