Spring is Here!

Hello again, it's been a while since I last posted, but that's because nothing has happened up until a few weeks ago. We basically survived through the winter, trying to keep the house warm and the batteries charged using the generator. Our water pipes froze, the drain pipes froze, our vehicles froze, and it seemed like everthing was going wrong!

As you can see in the above picture, we've finally started moving on the major projects that I had planned, and we are right on schedule! The picture shows a 750watt wind turbine on a 27 foot tower spinning in the ever present stiff breeze.

This picture was the turbine just after raising it for the first time. It's mounted on a very sturdy steel tube tower, and stays in place thanks to 4 steel cable wires and anchors buried in the ground. It cost about $1650 for all the parts, including the tower.

Before I raised the turbine itself, I lifted the tower on it's own, and tensioned the guy wires so that the tower was exactly straight up and down. I didn't want to risk my expensive turbine on the first try! Once everything was giggety, I attached the turbine to the pole and raised it up. The turbine is very heavy, probably over 55 lbs, but it was a simple matter to lift it up with the truck! We completed the entire project in about 8 hours, over a couple of days.

First, I strung out three cables almost 200 feet long. I had to drive an hour to find the cable, but it wasn't as expensive as I thought it would be. I bought 954 feet for about $200. It took about 500 feet to connect the turbine, and I've got plenty left over to at least start the next one! The turbine runs three wires to the charge controller, which converts the power to battery style DC, and charges my batteries. I set up the turbine on Saturday, and it is now Monday. We were away from the house for over 24 hours. Before I left, I started the generator and left it to run out of gas. The turbine was spinning, but I wasn't sure how much power would be used.

Well, we got back about 3 hours ago, and the first thing I did was open the battery box. Fully charged! The turbine not only kept the fridge and freezer running, it kept the batteries almost fully charged. When we got back, the wind started picking up like crazy, as it tends to do around here, so I turned on everthing I could think of, washing clothes and dishes, warming up food and such. When the wind is blowing hard like that, we have to take advantage of it!

Normally, we spend $6-10 per day on gas for the generator, not to mention the irritation of having to turn it on all the time. Just today, we've already saved about $10 in gas by having fully charged batteries when we got here!

In addition to the turbine, we also now have permanent running water. I ran a different pipe from the tanks, wrapped it with heat tape, and insulated it. After attaching all the other pipes, I flicked the pump on, and there it was, running hot and cold water! It took me some time to get it working properly, I accidentally forgot to glue one of the joints together, and it popped off. Water was gushing out like crazy, and I was soaked when I went under the house to fix it.

There are a few small things to fix up, a couple pipes that need to be reglued, some roof things that need to be fixed, and sealed with roof tar. Our shed needs to be re-organized, and I need a better way to organize my tools. Once the house is in good shape, clean and whatnot, we can start building the barn.

The final plan for the barn is going to be a rubble trench foundation with a concrete topper, compacted gravel floor, post and beam structure with strawbale infill. The roof will be whatever material is cheapest. I only have a few thousand dollars to spend on this thing, so it has to last!

Stay tuned for the next small project: chickens! I've found a source for heritage breeds of chickens, a little expensive, but I don't want the typical idiot breed of chicken. I want the hardy types that the pioneers used to raise, the kinds that know how to raise their own chicks.

I'll be sure to post lots of pics, when I get some.

Almost finished!

I can't believe we've been here for three months now! And, we just got internet...finally...

Time flies when you have nothing but work to do...but the weather has been fantastic, so it's not even a chore to be outside!

I just ordered the first of probably 2 wind turbines, and it should be here very soon. It's nothing special, just a small one, Chinese made, sold on Ebay. It probably will last 5 years at the most, and it'll need replacement, but in the meantime, it'll cut down on generator running time, which is extraordinarily costly, in gas and even more so in propane. The propane is nice, because it's electric start, and will start in the coldest temperatures, but it's twice as expensive to run! What I really need is an extra outlet from our main propane tank. I pay wholesale price for that propane, and all I use it for is cooking (so far). Then, I wouldn't have to keep changing over the tank every 7 hours either! Ultimately, I'd like to try and run one of the generators on methane or wood gas, or even both.

I've been trying to secure a long term financing solution, and a short term cash infusion to get us through to August. The fact is, I need a part time job of some kind to provide some extra cash on my days off, at least until I can put together some sort of business idea. We approached ATB financial with a refinance request, so hopefully, we can repackage all these short term loans that we needed for services into a long term, low interest, low payment solution. Then, all the extra money that I may have from time to time will be used for paying it down faster, and buying silver. The silver is a secret debt repayment strategy for when the economy implodes around us, which could be as early as next year! My plan is to pay off all of my debt using the proceeds from selling silver, which I expect to rise in price 10 - 15 times it's current value. Once we're out of debt, we could potentially live with almost no income at all! I'm really hoping for a few more years of falling prices, so I can stock up on more silver, put aside food, and start some long term food production with fruit trees, livestock, and a large productive garden. And trees too, for firewood. I'd really love to have about 2-3 years of stored firewood in case I can't get any more!

I've still got a ton of work to do, not including the daily chores, like wood cutting and stacking, making lunches and meals, and trying not to spend too much money! I've been a little frivolous with money, and I'm trying to reform. Something that I'm doing more is making hot chocolate and coffee, and bringing them in a large thermos to work. There are days where I've spent $7 on coffee alone, and that's not acceptable. I can afford to buy lunch every now and then, but snacks I've got to bring. I usually eat healthy lunch food, but garbage-y snacks, so a few apples, homemade muffins, and granola bars will keep me healthy, and save money too!

There are a few hard sacrifices to be made this year...I've got to sell the motorcycles, and probably a bit of silver coins too, to keep the cash flow up. I've got some major projects coming up, and no money to fund it (right now). I can always buy another bike, and more silver later on. I'd do anything, and sell anything to avoid losing this land!

Grit your teeth and hold on!

I haven't posted for a bit. We still haven't got permanent internet out there, but the little thing is coming in the mail soon.

We are now almost fully settled into the house for the long haul, just waiting for springtime to arrive. It was nice weather for a week and some, but now cold weather has returned, and the wind as well.

I have place a temporary water system, which seems to work for the time being. It's basically a portable water heater that sits by the sink and gives us hot and cold running water from a bucket, but what else does a person actually need? We take showers in town, wash clothes in town, and flush toilets by filling the tank. We heat with wood and run our generator for electricity. We don't use very much of anything right now, except for gas, which I'm using too much of. It's a good thing gas is cheap for now, because we depend on it quite heavily!

At some point this week, probably tommorow, I'm going to order the first of our wind turbines, and replace our refrigerator. The turbine will just be a small one, and the purpose will be to supplement our electric usage, and allow me to equalize the batteries, which I can't do right yet. I picked up two 24volt battery chargers, and for the first time, we actually had fully charged batteries! I looked inside the cells, and I could see bubbles forming, which means that they're almost fully charged. I hope that these few months of moderate abuse aren't going to damage the batteries too badly. And the turbine will reduce the generator running time, which is nice, because starting that stupid thing in the cold is a PAIN! I should have gone with the propane version...but the price was right. $400 for a 4500 watt genny is pretty good, even if it only lasts for 1000 hours.

I've almost got all of the siding on the house, so things are going well. I've basically abandoned the water tank until spring time, when it's not going to freeze daily. It's well insulated, but I still can't keep the outlet from freezing! Plus, the trench that the intake line sits in is now filled with ice, which will freeze the water inside the pipe, and I can't get the ice out...so we won't have reliable, long term water storage till spring. That's about when I'm planning to start the barn.

The long term plan is to have a 15,000 gal cement cistern buried 4 1/2 feet in the ground (Which will protect the outlet from freezing) and this will become the back end of the barn, in a separate room dedicated to protecting it from freezing. All of the rain that falls on the barn will be channeled into the tank, hopefully providing at least half of our domestic water use. The pipe will be buried at least 4 feet in a trench leading up to the house, whereas right now it's totally exposed to the air (it's insulated, but it takes a ton of electricity to keep it from freezing).

All of this hardship is just making my family stronger, and I can feel myself growing hardier by the day! I don't regret this at all, and I'm actually glad we have a bit of hardship to strengthen our character. We've been spoiled in the city for too long, we've never had to fend for ourselves, and I knew it was going to be difficult at first, and it has been. Summer will be a nice break, and will give me time to build some more permanent fixtures.

Tax time is coming too, and I think I can milk that for some major refunds, especially in the GST dept.

See you soon, and I'll have more pics to come. I just can't upload them right now.

Rain delays

It's now a month after our scheduled move in date...and we are living at my parents. How did this happen? Well, let me just give you a little piece of advice...if you ever decide to do any sort of major renovation involving water pipes, a new home, or anything like that, do it in the SUMMER!
Our water pipes froze solid, and my wife and I decided that we would wait until we could get the entire thing running, then we would move in. So far, I've got almost everything completed, but it's just so hard working in the cold!
I was foolish to pressurize the water system without having the skirting on the house. I knew it was going to freeze, but for some reason I just went ahead and did it! Well, the jet pump paid for my mistake...by self-destructing. When the water in the pipes froze, all the pressure had to go somewhere, so it traveled down the line to the pump, and blew up the plastic housing. I figured that probably a pipe would burst, but none of them did, shockingly, that I'm aware of!
Everything else, and I mean EVERYTHING, is done, and ready to live in, but the water and skirting aren't fully complete.

The plan was to get a bunch of straw bales, put them around the bottom of the house and put some sheathing over it to keep the cold out. So, a couple days ago, I took the truck over to Claresholm to pick up around 60 bales from a farmer there. I was shocked at how many bales could fit on the truck and trailer, but it was stacked HIGH! I've got pics that I'll post pretty quick here. I tied the trailer bales down, but the truck stack was too high, so what could I do...I drove home with the teetering stack of bales swaying in the breeze. Took me over two hours for a 40 minute drive, but I made it without a single bale out of place at all!
Then, before I had to go to work on New Years eve, I managed to get most of the bales and sheathing on the house, and wrap about 60% of the exposed pipes.

Uh, time to work now...

Pictures as promised

This is the wood stove, and the very first fire I ever lit inside. This stove all on it's own can heat the entire house in -20C weather. It does require a lot of wood, but thankfully, wood is free! Propane costs $0.69/litre, and the furnace can use up to 20litres per day, plus the 1200watts of electricity per hour! Guess which one we'll be using more often.




Outback inverter, providing a continuous 2500 watts of pure Sine Wave, and upwards of 8000 watts of surge capacity. I wired the electrical system entirely on my own. That green cord you see goes to the generator, and feeds AC electricity back to the batteries for charging them.

The hearth that the stove sits on, built by me. It's composed of 4 layers of cement board (Durock), cemented with thinset mastic and screwed together with a tile overlay. That give 2.5 inches of thickness, and R1.25 to prevent any heat transfer to the floorboards underneath. I have since cracked one of the tiles by hatcheting a piece of wood into pieces. Hatchets belong outdoors.

The house immediately after the moving company placed it. It now has two water tanks in front of it.

Eight L460 Surrette flooded Deep Cycle batteries wired into a 24volt configuration. The box is OSB, and is vented to the outside with a fan for air exchange. These batteries weigh 117lbs each, and cost almost $400 apiece.

So close...is it real?

I'm not sure how many people are actually reading this. Maybe no one is. Maybe 100 are. Probably not that many...whatever. This is a record for me too.

It's Tuesday, and tommorow the inspector comes to give the thumbs up/down on the house. The electric hasn't been inspected yet, but that's almost completely finished. I just have three things to do,
1. Ground the DC disconnect
2. Put a fan in the battery box and seal it.
3. Clamp the ground cable on the ground rods and cut them down to size.

Then for the rest of the house:
1. Wire pump, connect a few hoses, fill water tanks
2. Wire the septic pump to the main panel
3. Fix the plastic sheeting under the house
4. Add insulated skirting so the pipes won't freeze.
5. Replace the vent caps on the roof (yikes!)
6. Install the wood stove

And a couple of projects for the future.
1. Build a few solar panels to take the charging strain off the generator
2. Buy my wife a massive bouquet of flowers to make up for the last few months of insanity.

I've spent nearly every waking hour out there since my last post (with a few breaks, just to keep myself sane!) plus I've been working my normal hours. I've accomplished a lot.
1. I put the pieces of the one surviving stair and landing together and placed it by the back door.
2. I built the landing and stairs for the front door. I still need a couple concrete supports, but what I have will do for now. I also built half the railing, but I need an extra pair of hands to put it actually on the landing. That's tommorow's work.
3. I cabled the rest of the anchors. Now our house won't blow away in a strong wind!
4. I figured out why the batteries didn't seem to be charging. The inverter will only charge the batteries at 14AAC, which will take 13 hours to charge the batteries fully, at best. Probably longer. I've been running the generator every hour that I'm out there, and even when I'm not! I filled it up with gas just before I left, and presumably it kept running till it ran out. I do have a solution though. I bought a battery charger, and I'm going to rewire the bank to charge only 4 of the 8 batteries through the inverter. Then, I've got a battery charger that I will use to charge the other 4 cells on their own! Then, I'll equalize the batteries, and we'll charge them as often as possible.

I never dreamed things would be so complicated, or cost so much money, but I've learned a lot and overcome some real struggles. Several times I thought we were going to run out of money, but something worked out each time! It turns out my credit card is a good loan, since I have a very low interest rate. I called them today, looking to extend my limit, and they bumped it up by double!

So much work, but lots of money saved by doing things myself, and I feel so much more capable than I ever was! I was freaking out about electricity, but with a little knowledge, patience, and maybe a few accidental swear words, I am very comfortable around wires.

I promise I'll take some pictures soon. I keep forgetting while it's still light during the day.

Success

If things had gone like I'd planned, we'd be moved in by now...but you know what they say about the best laid plans! However, we need the extra time, there are a few things that are unfinished. Not many, but a few important parts.
I burned the midnite oil for 9 days, and yesterday, I got the electricity going! It turns out that the inverter wasn't activating when I connected it to the panel. There is a tiny little plastic jumper on the back and when I flipped it over, the inverter suddenly turned on! I walked around the house, replacing all of the incandescent bulbs with CFL's.
Then, I couldn't get the furnace running for some reason. The glowbar would turn on, but there was no flame. The propane wasn't flowing, but all of the valves were turned on. I didn't figure it out until I looked at the furnace, and saw two little wires dangling. I thought "I wonder if these go here?", and "whoosh"! We have heat!
I also managed to tie down most of the anchors that will hold our house down in the wind. Then I placed our bladder tank where it was to go, and put the pipes through the floor to where the pump was, and hooked it into that. I just need a few more parts and then wire the pump to an outlet, fill the tank with water, and voila, water!

I just found a truck mounted tank for $200, which is half of what I figured it would be, and larger capacity as well!

Well, I'm back to work again tommorow...