again with the solar furnace thing
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Posted:Oct 17, 2014 12:56 pm
Last Updated:Oct 18, 2014 5:18 pm 3219 Views
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I started putting this thing together today. I got the bottom manifold and first row in. I will let that dry for a while before I go up any higher. it is easier to do it this way than to try to build the towers individually. it will be relatively lightweight. the only added weight is the two 2x2s on the sides. I will use a heavily insulated, but light weight back on it too.
more later
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practical tea light candle example
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Posted:Oct 16, 2014 10:18 am
Last Updated:Oct 16, 2014 10:30 am 3108 Views
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actual data this morning.
thermostat programmed to 65 overnight, 68 in the morning. according to my outdoor old school thermometer it is 58 outside. it was kind of chilly when i got up, so I lit up three tea light candle space heaters (previous post). I put two in the first, one in a second, and one in the makeshift one with a cracked pot in the picture.
at a nickel apiece, that is 20¢ for around 4 hours.
the heat has not come on even once since I got up, and I am getting a reading of 71 at my computer here. 63 is the humidity. all of the heaters pictured around my desk, using three tealights. the fourth tea light is on the counter in the kitchen. it is comfortable, I am wearing shorts and a t-shirt.
20¢ for around 4 hours. the furnace has not kicked in since I woke up. the thermostat says 70. the outdoor thermometer says 59.
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baffles
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Posted:Oct 13, 2014 1:18 pm
Last Updated:Oct 17, 2014 7:49 am 3378 Views
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still trying to save money on heat, I am building a large pop can solar heater out of an old vinyl frame picture window. I will put it on the roof just over my living room and attempt to pump heat into my living room through the window (like a window air conditioner). if it works well, I will do something more permanent.
I am thinking I can run an insulated flexible duct and have a fan on the end of it that comes in the house. that way, I can turn it on and off when the sun is out and see how well it works, without investing in the fancy thermostat and damper system. all the little extras like that are an extra few hundred bucks. I like my budget thus far better. ZERO.
these are the baffles for it. it will be 12 cans across. I tried to make a baffle out of wood, but I wanted the cans so close together that the wood would break. this way, the cans themselves are the baffles. this is the top and the bottom baffle, I just have to connect them with 216 cans in between. the window is twice as tall as it is wide, so probably 18 cans high at least.
I should be able to turn on a fan on sunny days and get heat all day. I can set the thermostat on the furnace at 68 and it won't kick in until the sun goes down. my heat bill here is really crazy. I am on the budget plan so I pay the same every month, and it is still a lot of money. if I can take a chunk out of my usage this winter, it will knock down my budget plan amount,. it is a self adjusting figure that depends on how much you use over the winter.
the tea light candle thing has been helping too. I always have one burning near me when I am in one place in the house. it also worked really well in the church Friday night. I put out 3 candle heater things with 4 candles each in 3 corners of the room. it stayed above 68 all night, when a bunch of people came, it got a little too warm for a while.
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candle light heat
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Posted:Oct 9, 2014 2:26 pm
Last Updated:Oct 10, 2014 9:02 pm 3128 Views
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in my never ending quest to keep this place warm without breaking the bank, I have discovered candle power. this is a convection space heater powered by tea lights. I have one with 4 tea lights, and one with 2 running right now. I can feel the little bit of warmth from the one on my desktop with 4. the thermostat is set to 68, but I am getting 70 in the picture and it just went up to 71.
google tea light heater to get the whole low down. basically it is a small ceramic/terracotta pot without any holes, covered by a larger similar pot with one hole. the base isn't important, it just needs to hold everything above the candles. the electrical boxes that I am using work well and let a little light out too.
the smaller pot gets really hot, and the bigger pot stays only warm, and it causes heat to come out of the hole of the bigger pot. I can feel it when I put my hand over it. I am hoping that both of these will help keep the church warmer when winter hits. it is ok when it is a full house and really cold out, body heat does the trick.
when it is just a few people, I just can't get it warm without blasting electric space heaters. I got a bunch of tea lights at walmart for like a nickel each. they burn for 4 hours each. it is a little cheaper than gas and a lot cheaper than electric. it is good to heat up a personal space without trying to heat everything.
the thermometer just hit 72. I realize that it is sitting fairly close to the candles, but it is about how close I am too. it doesn't have to heat the whole room. I can keep the thermostat low and keep it warm around me with these.
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investing in a future christmas
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Posted:Oct 8, 2014 10:39 am
Last Updated:Oct 8, 2014 1:03 pm 3111 Views
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I got my mail order seedlings yesterday and planted them this morning. twenty five (six?) little Norway spruce trees. maybe 26 because they were all bunched together and I may have cut a larger one in half. they all were really small. they came in a small box all tied together. $25, including delivery.
this being the first winter of the greenhouse, I figured I would start with something easy. these little trees will do ok even if the greenhouse doesn't stay very warm. I have been working on the heat sink, and I think it will help a lot at the least. I guesstimate I have 300 gallons of water in black containers.
I will transplant each tree into a 5 gallon bucket in the spring, and put them in corners around the roof top. I already have the bucket planters ready. they will grow a couple feet a year, more if I baby them. I should have a decent Christmas tree crop in 3 years. I will sell them out of my garage.
it isn't a HUGE fortune, but it will be a little extra cash around Christmas, which is always good. god is good
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equal time for hobbes
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Posted:Oct 7, 2014 8:21 am
Last Updated:Oct 8, 2014 8:02 am 3057 Views
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I always post so much about malvin (and calvin) and poor hobbes gets forgotten. it is like that in the house too. malvin takes up about 150% of my energy and hobbes is mostly on her own. I try to make up for it with hobbes in little ways and she is fine with that. she gets to sleep in my bed and that drives malvin nuts. he isn't even allowed in my room.
she knows when something bugs malvin and she TOTALLY taunts him about it. she hides where he can't fit and reaches out claws, and she sits on the edge of perches that are too high for him to reach and smiles at him. he isn't allowed to mess with her, and anytime there is friction between them, malvin gets in trouble. even when I know hobbes started it. she really enjoys getting malvin in trouble too. that is another thing I try to make up with.
she is really not bothered by him at all for the most part. he will bark and jump around and get all crazy, and she won't even move. if he comes withi a certain distance, she raises a claw over her head in warning, and he backs down and barks more. sometimes though malvin is so big in and clumsy he will actually run into her and knock her over and she will throw a major hissy fit. malvin hasn't had any scratches or marks anywhere that I can find, so I know she is just all show.
they keep a good distance between them at all times and hobbes is always hyper alert when he is moving around. they don't hang close together a lot the way that calvin and hobbes did, but malvin just adores hobbes nonetheless. hobbes acts indifferent, but she will sit relatively near him when he is sleeping and she only goes in her box when malvin is in his box beneath her. I think she enjoys when malvin tries to play with her too. especially when she gets him in trouble.
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gratuitous malvin pix
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Posted:Sep 28, 2014 7:23 am
Last Updated:Sep 29, 2014 7:43 am 3227 Views
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malvin is getting big fast. he will be 5 months next week and he looks like a year old pit bull. malvin is a bandogge, half blue nose pit bull and half neopolitan mastiff. he looks more pit, but he acts more mastiff.
the mastiff is called the gentle giant and he is really gentle. he LOVES everyone, but he absolutely goes bonkers over . I live in little mexico and most of the Mexican neighbors are terrified of him and won't let him near their . it is a shame, because when they are out on their own he is great with them.
he always tries to jump on everyone because he is still a puppy and gets too crazy excited, but as long as I keep him down he is really sweet. he will chill after a few (I have been teaching him to 'chill') and lay down and be still. except that he has a HUGE tongue and he has to continually kiss everyone. he unfortunately got the mastiff dewlaps and he drools like a running faucet. so a malvin kiss is more like a bath.
I always think of calvin when I thank god for malvin. I have a neighbor who still believes that calvin will come home some day. that will be something. having TWO 100 lb + drooly mastiff hybrids. I always pray that calvin is ok.
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winter crops again
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Posted:Sep 24, 2014 1:22 pm
Last Updated:Jan 20, 2017 9:19 am 5155 Views
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I did some research and I think I am gonna buy 25 Norway spruces and put them around the whole roof. they grow 1-2' a year, and they should be big enough to be Christmas trees in a few years. I can get them for $25. I am filling up 25 five gallon buckets with soil today.
I did some veggie research too and found a few things:
Perpetual spinach, chard, parsley, rocket, lettuce, radishes, Land cress, lamb's lettuce, Claytonia, Chinese cabbage, Chinese greens, Carrots, Celery, broccoli, artichokes, Parsley, Potatoes.
most of these will grow outside during a mild winter, and should do ok in the greenhouse even if I can't keep it that warm.
I am betting on NOT going to jail. they continued my case again today.
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urban farmer (and free man)
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Posted:Sep 23, 2014 7:38 am
Last Updated:Sep 24, 2014 6:47 pm 3192 Views
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I haven't even planted anything yet, but just getting the greenhouse ready has been really cool. I feel like a farmer, there is something about working soil that is godly. I can't explain it, but I have been experiencing it big time.
I had 7 HUGE Tupperware bins I had been composting in all summer. most of the soil in them was really hard clay that came from under the street. they tore up the next block over for construction, and the workers gave me a few big bins of the 'dirt.' it was really just big chunks of clay.
I got some 'organic' soil on craig's list. like 9 or 10 big garbage bags of it. I put that on top of the clay. i put all of my foodstuffs type garbage on top of that all summer. i also pulled all the weeds in the alley, swept up all the dirt that falls on the sides of it, and put that all in.
i should have turned it a lot, but it is hard to turn big chunks of clay in a bin. i speared it with a spade and tried to chop it up a few times a month. i watered it a lot, and it has been a really rainy summer.
i used the same spade and kind of picked out all the good soil recently, put it into 5 gallon buckets and brought it up on the roof. i reduced my 7 bins down to 2 and filled up all the pots i want for the winter. there wasn't many big chunks of clay left, there was just a lot of clay stuck on the bottoms of the bins. i combined all that.
a neighbor was doing some major weeding and i brought over my empty 5 bins. he filled them and then some. i put all that debris into the 7 bins and stashed it in the 'yard.' i figure it will all decompose over the winter and i will have some fresh compost for next summer.
this is fun
this just in:
I have court in Skokie tomorrow.
I just talked to my lawyer and he says that there is no way I am going to jail.
when I pressed the "what if?" he said it wouldn't again, and said that they wouldn't just lock me up on the spot again. I will be given time to get my affairs in order.
this is a HUGE relief.
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winter crops?
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Posted:Sep 19, 2014 6:58 am
Last Updated:Sep 26, 2014 7:23 am 3319 Views
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I am *almost* ready to start planting in the greenhouse. I have sealed *almost* all of the remaining openings, caulked everything, re-supported the garage roof under the planters, and *almost* filled planters with soil. the soil has been a real labor, I have to carry it up 2 flights of stairs.
I got 4 plastic 55 gal barrels on craig's and painted them black for a heat sink. the plexiglass roof is *almost* watertight, and the only place it leaks is over the barrels, which isn't the worst place to leak. I still have to fill the barrels with water, and I am a little concerned about all the weight that is going to be in addition to all the soil. that is why I re-supported the tin roof with 2 x 4s.
the thing is, I don't really have any plan what to plant? I am a city rat and I have never farmed. I picked beans for a summer in Macomb Illinois, but that was a long time ago and I didn't learn anything about farming. I was hired like a migrant worker when I was in school there. I was the only one that wasn't Mexican.
I digress
does anybody know anything about winter crops? about what might grow well in a rooftop greenhouse in Chicago?
I want to try to grow stuff that has some value or use.
the only thing I was considering is sweet peppers. and maybe beets too, and those little tomatoes. I eat a lot of salad.
this is all contingent on the hope that I don't go to jail. I have another court date next week.
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