With Another Nasty Election Looming, Prepping Goes Mainstream

Reason ^ | 15 Mar, 2024 | J.D. TUCCILLE

[Diana in Wisconsin]

I agree completely; it will get ugly in blue parts of America.

Beau and I were just discussing have a talk with our neighbors about the kind of community we could easily build here if we needed to. As a group, we have an amazing array of talents and resources available to us.

And, we’re all well-armed. ;)

[metmom]

Sounds like an ideal situation and a good idea.

[sauropod]

Bkmk

[Tell It Right]

My solar isn't just a "solar generator", at least not as the phrase is usually used (for backup situations only). Our solar provides 80% of what our home needs through the year (less in the winter, more in the summer), including charging our EV, in our all-electric home. Basically from mid-March through mid-November there are only 20 or so days I need to pull power from the grid.

It'd be cost prohibitive to be 100% grid free (particularly in the winter). Basically I don't want to fight the law of diminishing returns. But I've run over the stats from my solar inverters to see what would have to be done to get there in case the Dims go full mark-of-the-beast style control over energy. It'd be about as much on improving the home's energy efficiency (i.e. take down sheetrock to put in more insulation) as it would be on adding to the solar system.

IMHO, if you're interested in solar, the first step is to do common sense things to make your home not need as much power anyway (i.e. caulk seal cracks, add insulation, if you live in the south replace your A/C with a variable speed heat pump, replace your water heater with a hybrid water heater and duct the air intake of the water heater to pull warm air from the attic and duct the air output from the water heater into the intake of your HVAC -- but be able to redirect it during winter months). I'm embarrassed that I waited until I was looking into solar before I realized that half the battle is making the home operate more efficiently. I should have done that part many years ago without thinking about solar.

[Noumenon]

Yes, that calls for aggressive pest control.

[Bonemaker]

“It’s not that hard to have guns legally in most places, we did even in California.”

Democrats endlessly trying to stop that.

[Seruzawa]

There are some decent deals on M855 now.

[Carriage Hill]

BKMRK.

[Diana in Wisconsin]

“...half the battle is making the home operate more efficiently.”

Excellent advice. We live in a farmhouse from 1900. While Beau has re-modeled it all from scratch, that was 30+ years ago, so we are continuing to make improvements.

One super simple thing I suggested (and he did) was to insulate the inside of the north-facing cabinet under the corner kitchen sink. The kitchen was added to the 4-square house at some point in it’s history. It sits over a crawl space. Beau cut pieces of rigid foam insulation board to fit. It’s nice and warm under there now and no more frozen kitchen sink pipes in sub-zero weather!

Such a simple thing! We also replaced all the weather seal strips around the kitchen door. Granted, the door is hard to close now, but that baby is air tight! :)

New windows are needed, but they are many, so that’s going to be a ‘few a year’ thing...until we die, LOL!

[Tell It Right]

Way to go!

This thread is about prepping. I'm not into doomsday prepping. I'm into slow boil prepping -- I call it that because I see the left slow boiling the water to kill us instead of it being an abrupt cut off of basic needs. And for whatever reason, the Dims have chosen energy to be their main weapon to tighten the screws on us a little more, and a little more.

That's what solar is for me -- a financial defense against the Dims' warmageddon cult energy policies. For you it might not work as well in Wisconsin. But here in Alabama where we spend more energy in the year fighting the heat than we do the cold, solar is great as long as it's decentralized and as long as you do lots of homework on making sure it's feasible for your situation and, bonus points, learn how to tweak it to optimize it for your situation.

[sergeantdave]

As the world crumbles, preppers can crank up the generator to broil steaks, bake potatoes and prepare apple pie.

And the starving neighbors will walk by, mumbling how lucky that guy is to be eating steak tonight.

[SgtHooper]

Ensure that the unit/panels can assist you in getting water. If a well, get an inverter that can drive your well pump, or a manual pump to bring up the water. No water, no life.