Putting the final piece of tin on the roof sort of feels like the last piece of a marathon jig saw puzzle.


We recently upgraded the WaldenEffect blog camera from the Fuji Finepix S1000fd to a beefier Canon Power Shot SX20. I can already tell a difference, but will wait for more experimentation before I give a full report on how awesome it is.

Roland made a good safety point on my post yesterday that sent me back 25 years to Mr Beaver's woodshop class in High School. Yes...that was his real name.

The Pro-Tech 10" bench saw was a hand-me-down and already had the splitter removed. I think I've got it in the barn somewhere.

I decided to take Roland's advice and look into what it might take to replace the splitter, which is a piece of metal that prevents the cut wood from drifting back to the blade.

The above picture is from The Woodshop.com, a great website that has encountered this problem due to the original splitter/guard being too flimsy. They came up with a strudy do it yourself version that looks easy to replicate. The guard only functions to prevent scraps from being dropped onto the blade, but the splitter seems like it should work better than the original.

This 10 inch Pro-Tech bench saw has made some of the really hard cuts for our latest building project a breeze.

I would say it's a must have if you want to get clean and crisp cuts without wearing out your arms using a hand saw.

You can use a reciprocating saw to do most of these applications with a lot less accuracy and neatness. Once you get a taste of the table saw you'll feel like you can't live without one if you want to make the occasional building project painless and fun.

This is Golf Cart Gary. He's the guy to go to if you need help getting your golf cart fixed.

Gary came and picked her up, took her back to his lab, fixed a burned out wire, and delivered her back to a waiting Lucy for only 60 dollars.



I think I may need to consider modifying the golf cart under carriage to be more water proof to avoid another break down like this.

Have you ever wondered how far out your pet roams during the day and at night?

Thanks to a cat named Mr Lee it is now possible to track your animal on a plug and play level.

The low end gizmo records up to 30 hours of prowling and needs to be downloaded via USB cable. 44 dollars.



The high end version transmits live data through GMS cel phone technology.
125 dollars.

Both interface with Google maps and claim to be easy to use.

I could see this being handy for goats and sheep or just about any level of livestock bigger than a chicken.

It would be interesting to see where Lucy spends her time, but I predict Huckleberry's map would only consist of him going from the couch to the chair to his basket with multiple trips to his food dish.

The only thing the new wheel needs is a locking nut, which will have to wait for the next town trip.

I know the body is rusted and has holes, but this repair gives me a warm fuzzy feeling that a new wheelbarrow could never deliver.

The old wheel shaft rust was holding hard and required cutting.

The Harbor Freight tire was a tight squeeze with the spacer and washers.

I used a slightly smaller bolt to avoid making the holes on the wheel holder bigger.

I've been looking everywhere for a replacement wheel for this small wheelbarrow.

A bit of browsing at the Harbor Freight store yesterday lead me to this pneumatic wheel with heavy duty bracket for just 10 dollars.

Stay tuned for more pictures of the installation process.

Harbor Freight in Johnson City is an awesome store!

The manager was in a good mood and gave us the additional 2 year warranty on each solar power kit along with the portable power packs.

Stay tuned for more details as I unbox and set up this new technology.

The bad thing about procrastinating on mowing is once the "lawn" gets so high I can't run the mulch machine with the bag due to it bogging down.

It's much more powerful once you take the bag attachment off, but still has its limits.

It would be great if all the downed trees would fall like this one.

Being elevated off the ground makes it so much easier to cut and avoid letting the chain dip into the dirt, not to mention being safer.

I start at the far end and just let each log fall to the ground, and then let Anna load them up in the truck.

The BFR Mulch guy called this morning saying he could only deliver us 6 scoops of compost instead of the 9 that was mentioned last week due to the dump mechanism not being able to handle the extra weight.

I was thinking it was still a good deal that would save me from making 3 round trips to Norton. Add the travel time with the time to unload each load and it equals up to somewhere over a day's worth of labor. The delivery charge was going to be 75 dollars.

I was very clear on the phone that I needed them to cross a creek and requested the 4 wheel drive Mitsubishi Fuso dump truck by name.

They made it as far as our ford when they had to stop and give up. It seems like someone decided to add a snow plow attachment that shrinks the clearance down to a paltry 8 or 10 inchs!

I can see how they would want to take advantage of this 4 wheel drive beast in the winter by pushing snow, but why not install it so that you could unbolt it for the summer? It was welded on and the only obstacle to getting the load back to our garden.

I almost had them dump the load out by our parking area, but decided that would be even more work loading back on the truck and then unloading it at the garden.

The driver was a nice guy and apologetic about the handicapped truck.

"I guess most people don't live this far back in the woods anymore these days?" I asked the guy while we puzzled over the problem at the creek.

I felt bad about sending him back with the full load, but even felt worse over the wasted morning with nothing to show for it. This still seems to be a good option for mulch and compost delivery, just don't expect them to go up any sort of hill or over a big bump.

When we first started off clearing away the driveway we were using a very small pruning chainsaw because we didn't know any better and funds were limited.

We finally realized the limitations and decided to splurge for a bigger saw. We found a good deal on a much bigger chainsaw through E-bay, and used it to finish clearing the path.

It's a Stihl 039, or what they call a 390 these days. A fine machine, but after it's all said and done I think we would have been better off with a smaller one. It gets real heavy real fast, especially after you've been cutting for a while.

Once the parts Festiva blazed a trail through the now mostly dry flood plain I decided it was ready for the big truck.

It made it with no problems once I added a few buckets of gravel in a few key spots saving us hours of labor compared to hauling with the golf cart.

The new NcSTAR red/green laser is now mounted and ready for action.

It was easy to move the laser dot to a desired location with just 2 adjustment screws.

The hard part will be learning how to work within the limitations of the laser. I can already tell you need to be lined up pretty straight otherwise the laser tends to drift the further you tilt the angle up or down. There's also an 8mm difference in the point of impact at 20 yards when you switch from green to red, with the difference increasing as you increase the distance. I think that can be solved by just using the green all the time.

With a little practice I think this laser aid can help to improve our accuracy under certain conditions, but I think we should also be ready to take a shot without the laser when the angle needs to be tilted beyond its range of effective use.

This seems to be the best do it yourself solar dryer design out there.

You can thank the good folks of Appalachian State University for the design and testing.

We plan on building one in anticipation of our upcoming tomato harvest.

ASU has put this thing through many testing situations with documented data available as a PDF download.

One way to improve shooting accuracy is with a targeting laser.

This one can be switched from red to green depending on lighting conditions.

Stay tuned for a full report once we get it installed and run it around the block.

When Anna and I target practice with the Highpoint rifle we usually take turns shooting 4 shots each and then check the results.

There's room for improvement, but we're getting better.

The K9 electric pet barrier continues to keep Lucy from even coming close to the chicken pasture area.

It seems to have taken only one zap to get the point across.

I'm thinking of unplugging it to see if the threat alone is enough to keep her away.

I take back my previous 5 gallon bucket stacking suggestion after todays discovery.

The handle is obviously made to tuck into another bucket to prevent stickage.

I need to take more time and listen to my tools more often...I wonder what other obvious secrets will be imparted my way if I can just listen a little harder?

Our Black and Decker 18 volt drill has been replaced with a DeWalt.

You can feel the increased power and torque the first time you use this beauty.

Well worth the extra cost if you find yourself delving into more advanced projects.

The biggest mistake I made with the do it yourself garden cart worm bin was to not allow enough space at the bottom for the tea to drip to.

The next error was to use a drinking container spigot as a drain valve. It needs to be bigger with the ability to be turned on and left on as opposed to the push button mechansim of the spigot.

The good news is that the worms did great! Which goes to show you how easy it is to grow your own worms. Once the kinks are worked out I think this garden cart will make a fine over sized worm bin. One that will provide buckets and buckets of compost tea in the future.

When we first moved to the farm here one of the chores was to haul water from the creek in 5 gallon buckets to a small raised bed of baby apple trees.

This was before we were living here full time and pre-electricity. I remember trying to run a small pump off the power of the truck in desperation. This produced a small trickle and seemed to strain the engine to the point where I figured it wasn't worth the risk of blowing a fuse or worse.


Pictured here is the Q-Drum, invented by Hans Hendrikse in 1996. It can carry 20 gallons with ease thanks to the rolling nature of it's design. From what I can gather it's only available in South Africa and cost around 500 Rands. This invention might have been enough to hydrate those poor little apple trees. The unusaully dry summer was a problem, but the real mistake was not mulching. A couple of Q-Drums might have saved the day.

I've often tried to imagine what would be the ultimate water storage container for a possible future where energy is scarce. This might be it.

I wonder how much it would take to make the inner walls glass or copper?

When we first got our used tiller it worked fine for the first season, but when I went to get it going the next year it wouldn't seem to start, so I used a couple squirts of Starting Fluid spray and off it went. I only did this a few times, but that was enough to get our innocent Statesman tiller addicted to Ether, which is the main ingredient in this wicked spray. Now it won't start without this high end boost.

Don't get me wrong...in the hands of a qualified expert a short spray of Starting Fluid can be used to safely troubleshoot several specific problems.

The trouble happens when a back yard mechanic like myself was never told in Health class how repeated use of Starting Fluid begins to wear off the oil that usually coats the inner walls of each cylinder, which leads to accelerated wear on the rings, piston, and the cylinder itself. This creates a decrease in compression and explains the increased difficulty in starting.

Is there any kind of rehab center I can send my tiller to? I would assume a complete engine rebuild would be in order to get the compression back where it once was.  Maybe one of those expensive oil additives might rejuvinate things back to normal? It's been a couple of years since I've had to till up new ground due to our no-till method of growing and the tiller repair is way at the bottom of the "fix me now" list.

Image credit of the close up shot of Starting Fluid being sprayed goes to dazecars at FordMuscle.com.

I found this used battery powered weed eater today for 40 bucks at a yard sale.

The guy included an extra battery, which just happens to be the same size as my old Black and Decker drill, which I still have 2 good batteries for.

Stay tuned for a full review on how well this so called "Grass Hog" lives up to its name.

After much trial and error I've concluded that the water we pump from the creek is too rich in particles for these little screen filters to handle.

Anna started experimenting with deleting the filters back in the spring. So far the results suggest we don't need them for this application. I suspect the high pressure is enough to push any stray particles out through the sprinkler nozzle.

The Champion generator started on the second pull Monday night when the power first failed here.

Tuesday rolled around and I made a big mistake by topping it off with some old gas. I thought the fuel was fine due to just using some in the lawnmower, but I guess this generator is more sensitive.

My first solution was limited by our local hardware store and the Dollar shop. They only had STP and Gumout, which I think is the same thing. I added both with very little results to show for it. It would start up...but putter and stall due to what I assume was the bad gas or water in there somewhere? My second mistake was not deleting as much of the old gas as I could before adding the supplements.

The next round of repairs involved a longer trip where one can find a proper auto parts store. I went right for the Seafoam and after a short consult with one of the clerks was off to the gas station for some premium grade petrol.

Dumping out the old gas and adding the Seafoam helped, but it continued to putter and eventually stalled due to what I'm guessing is some sort of blockage. I think it's going to take running it a while for it to smooth out.

Luckily the electric guy showed up with a chainsaw and a smile and cut down the offending tree that was hanging on one of our power lines. It was touch and go for a while as I watched the line hold the entire weight of the tree and finally allow it to fall without  breaking. I let out a loud enough cheer so he could hear me and we had power restored within the hour.

I made the mistake of using my goat gloves during our recent round of chicken feather plucking.

This material isn't bouncing back like leather.

I suspect the chicken dunking is what caused them to dry up in such a stiff manner.

This is what's called a 6 person bed weeder.

I like the idea of always having a shade cover that follows you around and it seems like it has to be easier on the back than the old standard method.

Afternoon siestas must be mandatory when you have such a shady place to lay down at after lunch?

Was that a Snap On magnetic, ratcheting, screwdriver I saw in yesterday's picture of the plastic hose repair kit?

Kevin, Carlsbad, CA.

You've got a keen eye for quality.

Yes, It's one of the few tools I still have from my copier repair days of the 1990s.

The handle is hollow and can be used to store spare bits, but what I like most is the magnetic tip and long reach. The additional leverage combined with the ratcheting feature make this screwdriver in my opinion the best money can buy.

It's got a steep price of 67 bucks, but somehow I justified it by using it 5 days a week as the main tool that began each copier operation. Could I have gotten by with a cheaper one? Sure, but one stripped screw in a hard to reach place can really ruin your day and once I started applying the added leverage the days of stripped screws were long gone.

I've decided these plastic hose repair kits are better than the metal ones.

It's easier to install, and most importantly won't snag on every other thing that comes by.

I know the metal might stand the test of time better, but this is some hard plastic, and I'll do almost anything to prevent any more entanglement with the mower.

The Jackson Titanium Xtra is hands down the best shovel I've ever moved dirt with.

The soft rubberized grip makes it easy to hold, but what sold me was the power step feature, which increases leverage by allowing your foot and legs to do more of the work.



It costs over twice what a cheaper shovel goes for, but well worth it in my opinion.

I was all set to get a Craftsman 24 inch pry bar/flywheel remover when I found this one for only 4.99 at Harbor Freight.

Usually the Craftsman no questions lifetime warranty is enough to push me into spending more for a tool, but in this case I think I'll be okay with the cheaper model....especially when it also has a lifetime warranty at a third of the price.

It says Pittsburgh, but it's made in Taiwan and it feels heavy duty. Stay tuned to see how it handles some real world pressure when I replace my first flywheel shaft key in hopefully what will be far in the future.

I only made it 2 weeks before I hit another fatal stump with the mower which took out the new flywheel shaft key that was installed recently.

This time I used a different guy who was a lot closer and 3 bucks cheaper. I was all ready with a long screw driver/pry bar and mini-sledge to try to do the operation myself, but once I started taking it all apart I realized the first guy tightened down some of the nuts too tight. I remember him using an air wrench, and not seeing a torque wrench being applied. Most experts think they can gauge it by feel, but this nut was on so tight I broke 2 sockets trying to get it off.

The moral of this story is to make sure your nuts don't get over tightened.

Did we really need the extra Trake?

Yes...the Trake is one of those garden instruments that when backed up with a twin can become twice the tool if you've got the extra hands to wield them.

When we first started this irrigation project the budget was a bit limited.

I'm sure it breaks every law of proper electric wiring, but sometimes you've got to do what you've got to do.
                                                                                                                                            

It's basically four 100 foot extension cords cobbled together and wired so each pole is carrying 110 volts. I'm pretty sure this is close to the maximum distance you should think about stretching these cords. Electrical tape works well for sealing up the junctions where each cord is plugged into.

We're going on the third year of this setup. There was a problem in the beginning with the pump connections, but I solved that by figuring out how to make the contact points waterproof.

If you feel like you're testing the limits of safety try picking up the cord in question to see if it's giving off much heat while you have your pump working. It's this heat that can be dangerous and must be dealt with by making the distance shorter or the electrical cord thicker.

When we first started using the large well pump to supply water to the irrigation sprinklers I was timid about how long it should be used at one time.

I was concerned that too much continued pumping might damage the motor, but little by little we kept using it for longer episodes. Now it's not uncommon to see them going for hours at a time.

Every now and then a sprinkler head will get clogged with some creek debris, but it only takes a minute to unscrew the hose and remove any offending algae or sand.

What's most challenging is getting 220 volts from the trailer to the creek. More on that in part 2 of this creek pumping series.

If you had chickens 100 years ago in America you would've most likely used a hand cranked corn sheller every day to keep your flock fed.

Thanks to Global Cycle Solutions now you can give your hand a rest and get all your corn shelling done with pedal power.

The device can be unattatched so you can operate the bike for transportation or hook up another clever gadget to charge your mobile phone or flashlight or whatever else you can imagine that needs a little power.

The cost is 60 dollars plus shipping which seems like a bargain.

My brother in-law was smart enough to buy a Little Giant type ladder years ago and I'm glad he did. It helped this small home improvement project be a bit safer and smoother than a neighbor's older ladder which wasn't quite long enough. I've always thought the old standard extension ladder was overdue for a make over and this is one of those times when the engineers got it right.

You can find them in a wide variety of sizes and shapes. The big plus is how compact this thing folds down to.

Harold Ray Wing discovered the first prototype in Germany back in the 1970s. He came back home to Utah, got a U.S. patent, started building them in his garage and selling them at trade shows and the rest is what they call ladder history.

Photo credit goes to Maggie Hess for capturing this Little Giant Chinese knockoff in all its long and sturdy glory. I wonder how much of a percentage Harold got from this big box store deal as the original patent holder?

Working on a tip I got from the local hardware store last week I went out this morning in search of the Flywheel Wizard. I was not only lucky enough to see him without an appointment but was able to record the short sequence of events that needs to transpire before the flywheel will finally yield its secrets.

It was a father and son team, and I asked them about flywheel puller tools. It seems they both agree that a special tool is needed if you're an amateur, but if you perform each step with care the old pry bar and hammer trick will work without doing any damage.

What you need is:

• long, hard screwdriver/prybar. (20 dollars)
• heavy mini sledge hammer. (20 dollars)
• replacement flywheel nut.(?)
• someone to help apply pressure to opposite side.
• flywheel shaft key
  

The flywheel nut should be positioned at the very top of the flywheel shaft so it will receive the brunt of the hammer pounding which helps to protect the flywheel shaft threads.





What you don't see in the short video is the flywheel nut being replaced due to something going wrong. I suspect he should have had his Dad pulling since the first hammer hit.

The Wizard only charged 18 bucks and had me on my way within minutes.

When I first discovered that I'd ordered the wrong flywheel puller I had a brief fantasy of fabricating one of my own to get the job done.


I never could figure out a decent direction to go in and decided to give up on it for a while and just mow with the semi un-balanced blade.




Well some guy with an interesting blog named Ed had a bit more gumption than I did and almost made his own diy flywheel puller tool pictured here.

He reports the wood breaking before the flywheel came free, which is a bummer. The way he finally solved the problem was to take it to a local shop where they used the crude but effective hammer and screwdriver approach to pop it off.

I'm starting to wonder if anybody out there uses these flywheel puller tools for the basic small to medium lawn mower engine?

I estimate the total cost of the chicken pasture electric fence installation to be around 75 dollars which ended up including the following items.

• Zereba K9 lawn and garden charge controller
• small bag of yellow plastic insulators
• about 300 feet of electric fence wire
• a half dozen small metal fence posts

Each bag of insulators comes with enough nails, but I prefer using drywall screws because it makes adjustments easier after you've got it all together.

I think we've finally found a product that will help Lucy figure out that she's not allowed to steal food scraps from the chicken pasture.

Just minutes after the new chick made it back to mamma Lucy went sniffing around the fresh chick trail. It didn't take her long to follow it to the chicken pasture. I just happen to be watching when she got too close to the Zereba K9 lawn and garden electric fence controller. The backward leap she made seemed to break a few laws of doggie physics.
 

It's easy to set up. Just wrap each end of the perimeter wire onto the wing nut at the bottom. It uses something called direct discharge technology which eliminates the need for a grounding rod. With a maximum range of 1500 feet the K9 electric charger makes an excellent solution to keeping unwanted pets out of sensitive areas. Expect to pay about 25 bucks for the unit and maybe another 20 to 200 depending on how long of a perimeter you're protecting and the quality and quantity of the fence posts used.

The drink dispenser I salvaged the spigot from for the garden cart worm bin is now doing duty as a waterproof enclosure for the new K9 electric fence charger.

These units somehow get their grounding from the electric line, which is a change from other chargers.

Since the do it yourself golf cart dump box is working out so well we've decided the Heavy Hauler garden cart can start its new carreer as a large outdoor worm bin.

It took less than an hour to scrounge around for the parts and put it all together.
The spigot was salvaged from a thrift store drink dispenser. (Thanks Mom)

I used a couple of 2x2's cut to 30.5 inches for the bottom support and modified a portion of the willow wall to function as the floor. A small gap at the bottom helps to prevent the spigot from clogging and worms from drowning in their own tea.

Being on heavy wheels makes it easy to manuever and tilt for the most effecient drainage

How dare you talk about extreme wheelbarrows without mentioning the Honda HP450 power carrier!

Norman, Phoenix Arizona

I stand corrected.

Norman is right, this Honda HP450 is one tough cookie.

I wonder if you could modify it to accept some sort of seat where you could sit and steer the thing to your jobsite, get out and put the seat aside till the work gets done, and then drive it back to the truck?

Photo credit goes to the good folks at IMBA for this great shot of the HP450 in action during a trail building day.

I thought I would end my wheelbarrow thread with an extreme version that cost a bit over a hundred dollars.

What I like most about this flavor is the ability to lay it flat on the ground to ease loading.

It's way more wheelbarrow than we need around here, but I can't help but to admire the design.

I figure if the ramshackled wheel barrow makes it through its first week back on the job then its got a bright future here on the farm.

No complaints from its main operator after several heavy trips.

I predict this fix to last around 2 years.

After almost 3 weeks of waiting, the new Briggs and Stratton flywheel puller arrived in the mail and today was the day to put it into action.

I was planning on having pictures of the operation and maybe a short video, but all that went out the window when I realized my mistake in ordering the wrong flywheel puller.

At least I know which one we don't need. Hopefully with a bit more homework I can determine exactly which flywheel puller is needed for this particular Craftsman.

How do large logs get moved on a remote log cabin construction site that has no power or heavy machinary?

Gas powered winch of course. The one on the right will cost you about 800 bucks and hooks up to most chainsaws. The bigger one comes with it's own engine and will run you over 1300 dollars.

A good equipment rental store might rent these out for around 50 bucks a day, which would be well worth it if you're trying to carve out a log cabin structure in the middle of nowhere.

That style of building would qualify as extreme homesteading in most people's book.

Thanks goes out to Roland for pointing  me in the winch/tripod direction for any future heavy root extraction.

With any luck our Poke roots won't get as big as this Sitka Spruce root in Scotland.

Sometimes an old fashioned shovel beats out a fancy roto tiller.

Big, thick, Poke root extraction is a task that needs someone to invent a solution for in the form of a tiller like machine. Maybe it will somehow use a small, flexible auger to chase down and grind up any unwanted roots within a 4 foot deep perimeter?

Hopefully it'll be easier to start up than our tiller was last year.

Don't forget to drill pilot holes through the wheelbarrow frame and the new 2x2 handle.

I placed another section of 2x2 on the other side with a pilot hole only half drilled to give the new screws something to bite onto without splitting anyone's grain.

This wheelbarrow insists that it has at least one more season left in it after some quick repairs today.

I still think it's wrong that the government took away the ability to use dynamite from the regular farmer.

If only it were invented 120 years earlier, then perhaps our founding fathers would have included it somewhere in the 2nd amendment.

Stump clearing would never be the same.

I was waiting in line today at Tractor Supply with a 50 pound bag of chick feed on my shoulder when I noticed for the first time how they sell disposable hand warmers that last 10 hours. That got me to thinking about how much heat might be captured from something like that with a 5 gallon bucket covering it?

We don't need that level of protection tonight, but it might come in handy if a sudden ice age reared its cold shoulders.

I guess the only way to know would be to test and measure the temperature, but it might work as a last ditch effort to save an outdoor plant if it got more than 10 degrees lower than freezing.

We used a U-Haul car trailer to tow the new parts Festiva from South Carolina to home this past weekend. (Thanks, Errol.)

The rental price was just over 80 bucks, and I'm happy to report on how smooth the whole operation went even on the large North Carolina hills.

If I ever do it again I'll insist on being the one to ratchet down the front wheel straps. The guy who did ours was in a rush and bunched up part of the fabric causing a small delay in unhooking everything when we got home.

The new goat gloves are breaking in better than the competition. I suspect the smooth molding process is thanks to the elastic like black fabric between each finger.

Big thanks to Vester for pointing me in the flywheel key direction in the comments section of yesterday's post.

I had to replace the blade twice last summer, and it stands to reason that the flywheel key is now the problem with the uneven timing and toughness to start.

Here's a good 5 minute video on exactly how to replace this part, but in the comments section of the video someone pointed out how the guy used a hammer and a large screw driver to get the flywheel off, which can result in damage to the flywheel if you're not careful.

The fear of fly wheel damage prompted me to order a special flywheel puller tool which is pictured above. This type works on most of the Briggs and Stratton flywheels, but you'll need to check your engine number to see if it's a proper match.

The lesson for today is to check out the comments. You might just learn something new about the wonderful world of small engine repair.

Our new Craftsman lawnmower is a lot easier to work on than its older cousins.

It only took a bit over an hour to take it apart, clean the points, and put it all  back together with no parts left over.

It's still a little rough to start, which I suspect is due to a slight warp in the blade. These blades have a more complex twist to them so they can work as a mulcher and throw the grass cuttings back towards the bag. It's this complexity that seems to make it more sensitive than most mowers and I would have to say gives it a disadvantage for folks like us who have the occasional stump to work around.

Of course this problem should work itself through as we continue to delete the stumps and level out the mowing area.

The heat lamp we had in the new brood coop somehow got damp during this afternoon's rain storm which resulted in a small explosion.

Luckily there were no casualties. I guess I should hurry up and build that heat pad chick warmer that Anna dreamed up a few weeks ago.

One detail to note is the placement of an Avian Aqua Miser in respect to new chicks.

I started off with one in each corner on the starboard side of the box. The height turned out to be a problem when all 24 chicks decided to crowd into that corner during a brief fire episode. The chicks who were bunched up close to the nipple were activating the valve and dumping water on themselves and their immediate neighbors. I'm no expert, but wet chicks on a cold night sounds a bit too close to a country western song for my comfort level.

The lesson is to avoid corner placements of your automatic chicken waterer for the first couple of weeks. After that you should be able to raise the waterer to avoid any such issues in the future.

These new goat gloves claim to be 67 percent better than cow leather, which will be worth the additional 50 percent to the price if they actually last that much longer.

The design and construction indicate an improvement, but time will tell if a goat really is tougher than a cow.

We got a few piles of wood chips from the local cutting crew almost 4 years ago.

I'd say it was well worth the wait for such fine looking mulch.

The bigest downside to using 5 gallon buckets for hauling mulch is when two buckets get stuck together.

One easy way to avoid this is to carry a bundle of twigs to use as spacers.

I can remember being on a construction job site and needing to separate two buckets that were hopelessly married to each other. A co-worker held one end while I pulled on the other. After about 5 minutes of struggle we decided to stop trying to recreate a scene from the 3 stooges and threw the buckets in a dumpster.

Before picking up our latest load of mulch I lined up all the 5 gallon buckets we had in the center of the bed.

I was a bit curious to know if they would stay in place or get knocked over by the force of the load.

Now that I know it works we plan to add another 10 buckets before the next load.

 

Today I discovered that 7 buckets of manure in the back with 3 buckets riding shotgun and 2 buckets of gravel on the floor board is about the load limit for the new home made golf cart dump box.

I can't believe it took us this long to make such an obvious improvement in carrying capacity.

 

Total cost on this home made golf cart dump box was just over 5 bucks thanks to using scrap wood from the old house.

It expands the back hauling capacity of the golf cart from 2 buckets to 7, with about 3 buckets worth in between the cracks.

Next up is a wooden rack to take advantage of some space up front.

This short video provides an accurate yet boring picture of how the rental chipper cuts a rug.

Our share ended up being 1/3 of the weekend time which worked out to be 65 dollars.

It was a great opportunity that would not have been possible without our neighbors' suggestion of sharing the time and the aid of their tractor to pull the thing all the way back here. Well worth waking up early tomorrow morning to drive it back to it's home in the big city.

I imagine this might be the closest thing we have to participating in an old fashioned barn raising which is too bad because this neighborly cooperation thing is a pretty darn good feeling at the end of the day.

 

The occasional water line damage is to be expected when your wife is just starting to learn the finer points of 40 caliber marksmanship.

 

There's a really good wiki-how that sums up what you need to know about sharpening your chainsaw with a hand file.

It seems the experts suggest a machine grinding at a shop after every 5 hand sharpening episodes.

You can buy small attachments for a Dremel to make the job easier, but these little hand files are a lot cheaper.

 

    Each round of gravel shoveling yields a few improvements on our technique.

I made the mistake of storing my hearing protection in the barn after a round of chainsawing a few months ago.

Not only did a team of mice shred the foam padding but it looks like they took out a long term lease and moved right in.

I finally got around to washing the mushroom wax pot last night and had some trouble.

It seems like a small amount of wax somehow leaked out and bonded with the teflon.

Next year I'll use stainless steel instead of teflon and avoid this sticky problem.

 

I got this cedar tree notched and ready to come down when a feeling came over me that it might still fall the other way, which would take down one of the power lines and leave us in the dark.

Nothing our little 4 ton hand winch can't handle. We just used the ladder to secure a cable high up on the tree in question, secured the other end to another tree and cranked it in a way that left it no choice but to fall away from the electricity.

 

I upgraded the beer can from last year's wax melting kit with this bigger and stronger tin can. I also improved the heating process by using a hot water bath as seen in the photo. This allowed for much better control and a safer place to rest the can while we drilled the next round of holes for the new oyster mushroom logs.

 

Project oyster mushroom logs step 1. Cut down small, fresh, box elder trees to be carried to the new soaking station.

 

It was a good day to take advantage of the nice weather and do some driveway repair.

Push with the rake, shovel, rake some more and repeat several times.

The couple that works together, stays together...or pitches a huge hissy fit and gets a divorce.  Mark and I don't celebrate Valentine's Day, but we do spend every day living in each others' pockets, usually very amicably.  In fact, one of my favorite parts of the day is the time I spend working on a project with Mark.

Even though I grew up with a handy father, I somehow missed most of the lessons on basic tool-use.  So Mark has taught me how to use a power drill, a miter saw, and so forth.  Monday, I was putting up the last bit of wall paneling, this time around the newly re-wired electric outlets.  How, I wondered, does one cut a small rectangle out of a piece of plywood with a jig saw?

I know this is old hat to those of you who dabble (or work) in construction, but I found this technique elegant and captivating.  First, Mark used a drill to start a hole in the plywood.  Then he cut along the line, curving around each corner so that he could keep cutting until an oval section fell out.  Third, he went back and cut the corners out --- the pictures hopefully make this process clearer than my description.  It's always a good day when I learn something new!

 

The do it yourself storage building now has a door up thanks to a couple more smashed brackets that work great at keeping the stopping portion of the frame in place.

 

We forgot to use a level when we were setting up the outer door frame of the storage building and because of that a small gap needed to be added towards the top to level it out.

 

The home made storage building got about half way sealed today thanks to four tubes of caulk and five tubes of liquid nails.

We ended up with several small gaps once everything went together with the salvaged wood for the storage building project. I was a little apprehensive about using liquid nails yesterday because I knew it was predicted to get colder today, but it looks to be setting up just fine.

 

Note to any future homesteading men out there. If you find a woman that will do your roofing without too much complaining then you've found a mate. Treat her well and don't work her too hard.

 

We finally got around to trimming a few of the downed pine trees this afternoon left over from the blizzard of 2009.

 

Today we installed some hard wood beams from the old house on the top of our walls to form a solid box for the storage buiding. We decided to extend each side out by a foot to provide some additional cover for the outer walls.

The frozen water shuffle got a bit easier after I installed a plastic faucet onto the pour spout of our 6 gallon jug.

We got the Chopper 1 axe up and running thanks to a couple of replacement springs and clips from the Chopper 1 website.

I've only just started using it, but I can already say I like it a lot.

It feels like I'm getting more splitting action for less energy input, which is a very good thing. What I like most so far is the feeling of increased safety. When there's not enough power to split the log the Chopper 1 just sort of bounces as opposed to grazing off out of control like the Super Splitter has been known to do if your aim is a little off.

Credit goes to Anna for capturing the exact moment when the Chopper 1 is completing a split.

Blue skies and above freezing temperatures helped us to breeze through two and a half more wall sections of our home made storage building project today.

Anna and Lucy are the miter saw experts on this job. I'm just backing them up with some heavy lifting and the occasional two cents.

 

The team at KMS woodworks has made some interesting progress in bringing together a compact solar charger that can be used for several low end power needs like a lap top. They are still in the testing stage, but it looks like they might make them available for sale in the 300 to 350 dollar range in the not too distant future.

It would be worth that much to me if it could power our modem and both lap tops for a few hours per day, especially during a power outage.

I really like the idea of having a portable off the grid option, especially one that can be taken on a back pack to provide the power for blog posts in some random ancient megalith site or more Mayan ruins.

 

The 6th wall section is now up and looking like a storage building.

Using this utility pump to fill a proper water container feels like a huge improvement over last year's 5 gallon bucket method. The biggest downside was lifting the bucket back out once you filled it as full as you dared.

 

I had my 2nd flat tire of the week just as I got yesterday's fixed. The first one was due to a sharp tree root jutting out of the frozen ground and jabbing itself into the side wall, but today's deflation could have been avoided if I'd had an inner tube in the tire, which it now has.

At least we got all the 2x4s shuttled back to our storage building project before this next storm sets in.

Cutting through difficult nails within a tight space like this is where these reciprocating saws really shine. The medium sized metal blade allows you to bend it at an angle, just don't bend it too much or it will kick like a mule.

This hand saw might look a little on the cheap side with its plastic handle and small size...but it cuts like the Dickens.

You will be impressed at how fast this thing can cut through a tree limb.

Thanks for the question.

It didn't take me long to come up with an answer to this one. The Stihl chainsaw would be my choice. You can get an attachment these days that can turn any chainsaw into a heavy duty hedge trimmer, which would be handy for clearing a new place. Firewood production would be my main motivation.

If you've got the time and talent a good chainsaw can also be used to make some impressive wood sculptures.