Dakota Firepit

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Here's a great fridge swap for an old RV. When the ammonia RV fridge fails after 10 years, don't replace it with an expensive RV fridge, use a small home fridge. Magic Chef HMDR1000BE fits great!

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=JW5DINfYCVc

Also, a friend had a fridge that wouldn't work and it turned out the fridge wasn't mounted level in the camper... so when the camper was level the fridge wasn't and the fridge wouldn't run.

Talking about energy conservation might seem like something some government program tells you to do. "Set you thermostat down during the day" they say. Ummm yeah... in the south if I let my house drift UP in temperature during the day and try to catch up at 4pm, it puts that much more load on the grid. In winter, sure... there may be heat gain during hte day but in summer, it makes no sense.

What else about energy conservation? How about when something in your house breaks, buy the most efficient thing you can. I have a pretty good sized house... 4800ft^2.... 5800ft^2 if you count the basement storage. The HVAC guys said I needed a 5ton but our walls are ICF, so it takes a lot less A/C to heat and cool. We "down graded" last year to a 3-1/2 ton mini split. My HVAC pulls less than half the power of a microwave oven.

Mid-year last year we found a heatpump water heater at the local lowes. It was new but the forktruck driver had a go at the box and we got it for 1/2 price. It pulls 360watts.

I bring these things up because if you plan to be off grid solar or even to run your house on a generator after the storm, its the difference between having a hot shower (4500w vs 360w) or the difference between running the AirCond (20kw start/3.5kw run vs 800watt run). If you are smart about these large energy users you won't need large inverters! You won't need more batteries. I went from planning a way to interlock certain high load devices to not having to think about it. For example, I had to make sure my total power draw was less than 3kw before I would allow the 5 ton HVAC to kick on. Now it's 800watts and I don't think about it.

Additionally, some power companies have penalties for high demand. If you draw more than, say, 10kw at any given moment they charge a $4 fee. Well if you have a 5 ton heat pump and a 4500watt water heater and are cooking dinner, you just got a $4 fee.

A neighbor reduced his power bill not with solar, but with inverters and a battery. He was getting nailed with demand fees so he programmed the inverters to never pull more than 3kw from the grid. Any excess needed comes from the batteries. Then the batteries slowly recharge. His power bill went from $350 to $100.

https://youtu.be/ZMWIISl2IoM preach brother Dave.

I've mentioned this a few times before. If the lights go out (ie a bad storm or even as much as the grid becomes extremely unreliable), what does your house look like from the street? Walk you property at night and see what some random guy walking down the street might see. Can they see your TV thru the front window? Nothing says we have a generator like having the only house with lights on after dark. Same for cooking out. If the power is out many will just grill outside. But smells travel and you might have some hungry and not so friendly people on your property.

Do you keep a gun near the door? Near your couch or chair? What would you do if someone kicked the front door in at this moment?

Do security audit of your house.

Todays project. Platform to hold two pallet totes with a cubbie underneath for the goats to hole up. We call this strip “goat alley”