New National Geographic show: Doomsday Preppers

[Guest Lester Weevils]

Lester Weevils, thanks for the additional info. I actually have a small camping trailer parked outside. The problem is that it only has one battery and even running the interior lights for a few hours drains it to the point that the low battery alarm starts beeping. When using it for camping, unless it is parked somewhere with an electrical hook-up, it gets treated more or less like a solid-walled tent - just a place to sleep - than like a more steadily-powered RV might. My (soon to be ex) wife uses a CPAP and we always took a spare deep-cycle battery with an inverter (sat the battery outside and ran an extension cord in the window) to run it when we camped in places that didn't have hookups.

Mostly what I am looking for would be a low-tech (and cheap) setup that would allow me to power, say, a lamp and small things like a toaster oven or a hot plate during a short-term power outage. Maybe something that could power a TV or radio at the most. I don't need something that would be constantly hooked up to keep a computer from going down so I am not really concerned with it being an uninterrupted power supply nor would I be looking to run a whole lot off of the batteries. I do have camping equipment that could be used for cooking, etc. outdoors but the problem is that usually our power goes out because it is storming - not ideal conditions for grilling a hamburger outside. My thought would be just to have available power that I could tap by using a 'redneck' setup of plugging a good, multi-outlet extension cord into the inverter then running it into the house when needed. As such, the unsealed batteries should be fine as ventilation isn't an issue nor is mobility of the setup a concern. Truthfully, for my purposes, just having two or three deep cycle batteries on hand and hooking the inverter to them individually (sort of like we did with the CPAP) and rotating to the next as each one goes dead would probably serve my needs. My biggest reason for wanting to link two or three would be so I could keep them all charged without having to rotate the charger to each battery and so I could utilize them without having to go outside (in the pouring rain, thunderstorm or whatever) every couple of hours to swap the inverter around. I'm just not sure what is the best way to link the batteries.

I know that some guys who like to build serious off-road vehicles sometimes link a couple of deep cycle batteries (mounted outside their vehicles) and then wire them up so that the vehicle's alternator (actually they sometimes install a second alternator) will keep them charged. They do this so that they can run winches, offroad lights and the like without draining their cranking battery. That is more along the lines of what I am thinking of except using a battery charger or maybe even a solar charger (like the one linked below) to maintain the charge when the batteries aren't in use. Supposedly, solar chargers of the size linked below (unlike lower-powered trickle chargers) can actually recharge batteries but I don't know how long it would take and, of course, they probably wouldn't do a whole lot during a storm.

Amazon.com: Sunforce 50032 15 Watt Solar Battery Charger: Automotive

Hi JAB

Yer right, non-sealed deep cycle ought to work great for you if they are mounted what? Under the travel trailer? Or some place else as long as hydrogen can't collect?

Is your travel trailer electrical wired with typical shore power hookup, charger and inverter, with switchover? Even if it is currently low-capacity, if it is wired like that already am betting you could just add more batteries. With a bigger battery bank it would take forever to charge and the inverter wouldn't deliver any more power than it currently does, but you would have power for a much a longer time.

If you want to run a hotplate or microwave, unless your travel trailer already has an inverter capable of that, you would need a pretty powerful inverter. Maybe 1500 or 2000 VA. Somewhere in the ballpark of 2000 watts is about the same thing you can get out of one circuit of your house AC without popping the breaker. 110 volts * 20 amp breaker = 2200 watts.

Many inverters are rated VA rather than watts. With a sine wave like the power company's electricity, VA is the same as watts, but it isn't exactly the same rating in a modified sine wave inverter that uses a crude approximation of a sine wave. For instance it might turn out that 1000 VA delivered from an inverter will be less power than 1000 watts delivered from your house power outlet. But they are "in the same ballpark".

Just saying, a decent quality 2000 watt inverter won't really drain your battery a lot quicker than a decent quality 200 watt inverter, when it is idling or maybe running a portable TV or whatever. If you have a "decent" big inverter it ought to still run a long time on a big battery bank when you are running small loads. I don't stay up with the market and haven't the foggiest what a "decent" brand would be nowadays, compared to a "crappy" brand. I usually go googling around reading customer reviews and try to pick the one I can afford which has the fewest unhappy customers. Every brand will have a few peed-off customers.

If you want to run a hotplate, toaster oven or microwave, a little inverter won't get the job done. A bigger one will do it, and won't crazy-discharge your battery bank if you only run those high-wattage items for a few minutes at a time.

But for instance if you run a hotplate or medium size microwave for a long time then you could suck a 400 ah, four battery bank dry in an hour or less. You can google and find charts showing how long you can run different appliances on a certain size battery bank. A bank that might run a portable TV or laptop computer for several days straight, can only run a microwave for an hour or so, full time.

[Guest lostpass]

All this prepping talk has got me prepping.

Now everyone buys food and ammo and those are great ideas. But I figure that when the worst happens, and passes, people will want to get back to things they love. And they'll be willing to barter for them. So the question is, what stuff can I invest in that I can easily barter in the worst case scenario?

I bought several hundred cases of cheap ass beer. Several pounds of tobacco and rolling papers, and, um, load of toilet paper and a bunch of starbucks coffee. No gold, no silver, no antibiotics.

This is where the problem comes in. I bought all this easily tradable stuff and then I realized, crap man, there's nothing left I want to trade for. I consider myself fully covered.

Edit: I do have ammo. Not to ward off the zombie hordes but to pick off extreme couponers.

[Guest Lester Weevils]

Am forgetting a lot I'm sure. It isn't as absurd as it sounds because almost all of it can be used even if the comet never strikes.

"Luxury" items have been gradually putting back, a little at a time. Some items more than others--

Charmin wet wipes toilet tissue

Mountain Dew

Key Lime juice

Bacardi 151, Mellow Corn whiskey, Vodka, Gin, Jaegermeister (when the comet strikes we will have a heck of a party!)

Southern Steel tobacco

Gambler cigarette filter tubes

Way too many batteries, AAA, AA, C, D, N, 9V

Ground and Instant coffee

Various spices and sea salt

Not quite "luxury" but makes rice, beans, lentils and macaroni taste better-

Canned Tuna

Libby's Corned Beef (kinda spensive)

Spam

Treet (cheaper than dog food but gets the job done)

Sloppy Joe Sauce

Boullion

Asst bulk--

Brown Rice, Beans, Lentils, Oatmeal, Grits, Mac&Cheez

Crunchy Peanut Butter

Saltines

Campbells soups

Ramen Noodles

Cheap granola bars

Centrum Silver vitamins

Modest amounts of "legit" dehydrated survival rations and MRE's

Asst Medical supplies, bandages and various antiseptics

Skin Stapler

Quick Clot

Antibiotics metronidazole, doxycycline, erythromycin, cephalexin

OTC meds for pain, constipation, diarheaa, heartburn, hemorrhoids, eyes, sore throat, nasal congestion, chest congestion, topical fungus cream, antibiotic creams, cortisone creams

Bottled water

Water purification pills

Backpacking filters

Coleman fuel

Propane bottles (camping size)

Gasoline

Oil

[TMF]

There are quite a few "near turn key" mid-size UPS. Well, smaller than a full-house solar battery system but lots bigger than a computer UPS.

The problem being that they are kinda expensive and of course anything with a bunch of big batteries is either gonna be un-moveable without disassembly, or "move with great effort and caution" on wheels. If you want some links to specific equipment lemme know....

....An inverter-charger is a whole lot more convenient than what I built. My beefs with them is that they are kinda pricey, and they tend to make the inverter a little stronger than I personally need, and the charger a little weaker than I would want. So if you want a really strong charger in an inverter charger you have to pay a lot of money and you end up with a real strong inverter. There's nothing wrong with the real strong inverter if you've got the money, but if you actually hook up enough stuff to draw what the big inverter can deliver, your four battery bank ain't gonna last anywhere near all day.

Man, a lot of good info but I think it'd be cheaper and easier to invest in a back-up generator to the primary generator and focus on fuel storage, unless I had a large solar panel array or something, which would also be real expensive.

[UncleJak]

I have the one thing everyone has forgotten: PEZ

[Guest Lester Weevils]

Man, a lot of good info but I think it'd be cheaper and easier to invest in a back-up generator to the primary generator and focus on fuel storage, unless I had a large solar panel array or something, which would also be real expensive.

Those are good points TMF 18B

Can't prepare for everything. One might prepare for 999 scenarios then get blindsided by the 1000th scenario.

Re electricity, maybe minimalism is best-- If the power goes down for an hour, day, or week-- Don't worry about it, live like great-grandpappy lived til the power comes back up, and be thankful nothing worse happened?

Haven't given it much thought lately and maybe it needs rethinking. As best recall, started thinking about it in late 1990's when began programming full-time. A long storm outage hit a nearby area and got to thinking about previous rare but longish outages we'd had. Not end of the world, just absurdly long temporary outages that are rare but they do happen. Got to thinking it would be bad if I had to quit working for a week or more just for lack of power.

Also, maybe too pessimistic, but had a hunch maybe our grid would grow gradually less reliable into the future. Maybe slightly more brownouts and slightly more brief blackouts every year. It was already happening in NYC and California at that time. Rolling blackouts eventually getting to a situation of routine extended power outages. At that time rolling brownouts had almost become routine for a New Jersey programmer I work with.

Was thinking if it happened to go thataway, then one might expect generator fuel to get just as hard to come by as electricity.

Was trying to think up a least-expensive way to have a couple of lights, keep food cold, and continue working thru an occasional week-long outage. Equipment which would be equally useful to avoid losing an afternoon of work due to occasional brief thunderstorm outages and such. Even running a laptop for a day to two off battery takes a lot of juice.

And anyway I like fiddling with stuff and after lots of reading about battery power systems it got almost unbearable not to tinker with it some.

Some stuff was more expensive back then, but other stuff has stayed about the same (inflation adjusted). I knew a couple of guys at the time who owned pro-installed full-house automatic backup generators. At that time a pro-installed full-house automatic backup generator would cost at least as much as a new car, maybe costing as much as several new cars.

That option was just off the table back then. If I had got one of those at that price then wifey would have had me comitted to a mental institution.

However, nowadays a pro-installed automatic backup genny ain't cheap, but they start way cheaper than the price of a new car. Especially if you size one just big enough to run the essential circuits.

An automatic backup genny may be the most cost-effective solution today, considering current fuel cost and availability. Probably as good as any solution for outages from an hour up to a few weeks. If things got so bad the power was off for many months, you probably couldn't get fuel to run a system that big. But for "ordinary" tiny disasters it is a pretty economical pick nowadays. Perhaps cost-effective if your job depends on electricity.

Or maybe it would be better to take advantage of a power outage as an excuse for a vacation.

It is all just dumb supposition. Thinking out loud.

[K191145]

This ought to be interesting. 700lbs of cucumbers is fine, except for the shelf life issue, unless they have done something to them to preserve them.

Pickles.

[Guest Smitty]

[JAB]

Re electricity, maybe minimalism is best-- If the power goes down for an hour, day, or week-- Don't worry about it, live like great-grandpappy lived til the power comes back up, and be thankful nothing worse happened?

The thing is, great-grandpappy's home was equipped for living without electricity. He (or great-grandmammy, anyhow) cooked with a wood stove. They had light sources that didn't require electricity. Heck, for that matter they had non-electrical equipment for getting done whatever they needed to get done.

When I was a kid (living at my parent's house which is next door to where I live, now) the electricity would go off every time a squirrel pissed on the lines. Seriously - we'd have power outages on nice, clear, summer days. Of course, outages on those days were no big deal because we could just go outside. The pain was that if we had an outage due to a thunderstorm when we couldn't go outside. The real pain was that if there were snow or an ice storm (yeah, there were a couple of freakish ice storms in East Tennessee back in the '80s for those who weren't aware) we could be without electricity for two or three days in conditions that certainly didn't allow us to stay outside very much. We did fine, though, because at the time we had a wood heater that kept the house warm and that mom could cook on. We also had several oil/kerosene lamps so we had light and could read a book and so on. Basically, during those outages we lived like great-great-grandpappy did - and it sucked. I mean, I know I could do it but I'd just as soon not have to.

Eventually, my parents had central air and heat installed so my mom no longer has the wood heater as a heating/cooking option. She still has plenty of oil/kerosene lamps and I have one at my place, too, but a small, electric lamp run from a battery backup seems a lot less likely to burn the place down. I also don't see any reason to sit there, in the dark, in weather conditions that don't allow for going outside without the ability to prepare a warm meal and being bored stiff if a little preparing in advance could lessen future annoyance.

Edited January 26, 2012 by JAB

[mcurrier]

All this prepping talk has got me prepping.

Now everyone buys food and ammo and those are great ideas. But I figure that when the worst happens, and passes, people will want to get back to things they love. And they'll be willing to barter for them. So the question is, what stuff can I invest in that I can easily barter in the worst case scenario?

Toilet paper will be a LUXURY ITEM!

[RobertNashville]

I can't wait to see how they paint preparedness as being the domain of freaks, weirdos and fringe lunatics...

Doomsday Preppers - National Geographic Channel

Series premiers on Tuesday, February 7th at 8pm CST.

I saw a show last fall by the same name and I think it was on NG channel...if it's the same show I'd say it was handled very well; in fact, I still have it on my DVR. I wonder if this is a re-broadcast of the same show or a new one with different people highlighted???

[Guest Lester Weevils]

The thing is, great-grandpappy's home was equipped for living without electricity. He (or great-grandmammy, anyhow) cooked with a wood stove. They had light sources that didn't require electricity. Heck, for that matter they had non-electrical equipment for getting done whatever they needed to get done.

When I was a kid (living at my parent's house which is next door to where I live, now) the electricity would go off every time a squirrel pissed on the lines. Seriously - we'd have power outages on nice, clear, summer days. Of course, outages on those days were no big deal because we could just go outside. The pain was that if we had an outage due to a thunderstorm when we couldn't go outside. The real pain was that if there were snow or an ice storm (yeah, there were a couple of freakish ice storms in East Tennessee back in the '80s for those who weren't aware) we could be without electricity for two or three days in conditions that certainly didn't allow us to stay outside very much. We did fine, though, because at the time we had a wood heater that kept the house warm and that mom could cook on. We also had several oil/kerosene lamps so we had light and could read a book and so on. Basically, during those outages we lived like great-great-grandpappy did - and it sucked. I mean, I know I could do it but I'd just as soon not have to.

Eventually, my parents had central air and heat installed so my mom no longer has the wood heater as a heating/cooking option. She still has plenty of oil/kerosene lamps and I have one at my place, too, but a small, electric lamp run from a battery backup seems a lot less likely to burn the place down. I also don't see any reason to sit there, in the dark, in weather conditions that don't allow for going outside without the ability to prepare a warm meal and being bored stiff if a little preparing in advance could lessen future annoyance.

Hi Jab

I agree.

Unless one has lots of money, regardless whether the power is solar/wind, generator, battery bank charged from utility company power, or any combination-- Some things draw too much juice unless you can afford a giant system. The closest to getting a lot of power without going too bad in hock is hydro, for the folks lucky enough to have a steady head of water on their property.

In the mid-1970's got a nice book on do it yourself home alternate energy. Tech is lots better today, but that book described about every option we have nowadays. The tech was cruder and equipment generally more expensive, but about the same deal as 35 years later. The author excellently described the options but his first chapter explained that unless you have flowing water for hydro or live in a very windy area, you'll probably never get close to power company rates or good power density. He said so go ahead and have fun, but expect it to be expensive and a lot of hassle.

It is somewhat more practical nowadays, but similar constraints. It is easier to figure out how to git er done on as low power as possible than build big enough to run certain stuff.

Which generally excludes air conditioning, electric clothes dryers, electric heat, electric stoves.

It is easy to google charts of the things that suck too much juice, and it is easy to learn to look at the labels on electric gadgets and add up the demands, and figure out what you can run off the power you can afford to install.

Last blizzard in the 1980's we had open fireplace wood heat but later on found out the chimney needs repair because the chimney guy said one side is too leaky. Should have got it lined when he was out here years ago, but at the time it seemed expensive and haven't got around to it since. We got a kerosene heater and put back some kerosene for next time. Keep from completely freezing next blizzard if the power goes down.

We have coleman liquid fuel camp stove and a propane camp stove and fuel for both put back for cooking.

If power goes down in the summer it will suck without air conditioning, but thats just too bad.

A medium-size portable generator will run a washing machine, but ya gotta dry on a line unless maybe you have a gas clothes dryer and ya got gas. If the generator has "borderline" capacity, probably have to turn off most other loads when you run a load of clothes in the washing machine.

Sometimes around here if it gets unusually cold or there are power outages, the natural gas pressure gets low, and I wouldn't be surprised to see it go out entirely in certain situations. So it seems risky to assume you will have natural gas all the time.

The stuff would run out soon enough in a prolonged "state of emergency", but ought to work good enough to ride out a storm and longish outage afterwards.

Edited January 30, 2012 by Lester Weevils

[JAB]

Hi Jab

It is somewhat more practical nowadays, but similar constraints. It is easier to figure out how to git er done on as low power as possible than build big enough to run certain stuff.

I think you are certainly correct, there. That is why I was thinking along the lines of a hot plate instead of trying to use the actual stove, etc. I have a charcoal grill, gas grill, propane fryer and a camp stove so for long term power outages I would start using those (when the weather permitted me to be outside in the case of the grills.) My mom has a kerosene heater and one room (added on after the central heat and air was installed) has gas heat so I could just pack in with her if a long term power outage became an issue. Also, my sister - who lives on the other side of me - has a fireplace. The stove in the camping trailer is a propane stove and the eyes are lit manually so a lack of electricity shouldn't prevent using the stove in true emergencies. Heat would be a different issue, though, so relocating to the camper may not be an option (then, again, I could always run the extension cord from the battery bank in the shed to the camping trailer, instead, I guess.) Between us all, we could make it for quite some time. My idea for the battery system would be more of a short term, stop gap solution for short term outages when the weather is too bad to be outside but where it probably isn't worth dragging out the more serious 'emergency' equipment or switching into 'long term power outage' mode. That is why I say I would just be looking for short term power to run one small lamp for light (if more light than my rechargeable Coleman lanterns puts off is needed), maybe run a very small, personal heater and maybe run a hot plate just long enough to fry an egg, make a grilled cheese, etc.

I should probably look into a small generator, too. In fact, that might serve my stop gap purposes as well (or better) than the battery bank. I just like the idea that I could use one of the relatively low cost solar chargers I mentioned earlier to keep the batteries charged - especially since a long term emergency would likely see any fuel I could store for a generator run out but a solar charger could build the batteries back up after one or two sunny days.

[Guest Lester Weevils]

I should probably look into a small generator, too. In fact, that might serve my stop gap purposes as well (or better) than the battery bank.

Hi Jab

Yep possibly a good small genny would cost about the same as a battery UPS? Maybe cheaper? Sealed deep cycle batteries ain't cheap. If you don't mind dropping an extension cord out the window, you are good to go after buying the genny, gas, gas cans, gas treatment and spare oil. A battery system has advantages but the genny has its own advantages and you don't have to build it yerself.

Folks too lazy to drop an extension cord out the window-- They might get the bug to install a manual generator hookup sub-panel to the house wiring. Am undecided if a manual sub-panel would be an advantage worth the money.

Adding the price of a manual switchover panel plus a decent quality largish portable generator-- Might get surprisingly close to the cost of the least expensive small pro-installed automatic generators?

Never had a manual switchover system but here is my guess-- The power goes down so ya go out in the rain and lightning. Drag out a big-ass heavy portable genny. Then hook it up. Then yank on the cord until it decides to start. Then wade back into the basement and futz with cheap-looking switchover breakers. After that hassle I'd get mad if the power only stayed down 15 minutes then came back up for the rest of the night.

Would also get wet with a small genny and extension cord hanging out the window, but sounds like a quicker job and no install required.

The simplest routes seem either small inverter generator with an extension cord, or an permanent automatic system?

Small inverter generators are kewl. Compact to store, easy to tote, gas-efficient, quiet, clean power unlikely to set a computer afire.

Didn't want to let go of the money for a Honda inverter generator but user reviewers are overall happy with Honda, Yamaha, and Subaru inverter generators. Had decided to buy a 2KW genny from any of the three and the Honda happened to be the first one I saw local in stock.

A mechanically-inclined person might get fabulous occasional service from a no-name generator less than half the price but I already accumulated an inventory of more annoyance than I'll ever need.

That size genny is too weak for some loads. You can't drive 220 V loads except strapping together two identical gennys.

Tiny 1KW and smaller are great for some uses. A generator in the ballpark of 2 KW might be a "sweet spot" because it ought to run most combinations of loads that you could hook up to a single 20 amp circuit in your house (and avoid kicking the breaker).

Edited January 31, 2012 by Lester Weevils

[wewoapsiak]

Looks like Ranger Man of SHTF Blog got to preview the show, sounds about like most expected the show to be.

National Geographic Doomsday Preppers Pre-Screening Review

[Caster]

Watched it last night. Two episodes. Not as bad as I thought. There were obvious flaws and morons, but they are ever present in all facets of life. Considering the source, I thought it was not too bad a show. I wish I could get invited to join a group as heavily involved and motivated as some I watched. No one around these parts wants to stick their heads out I suppose. Can't blame them for that. Only people I meet that even seem interested are even sadder than me and ten times less dependable. I'd love nothing more than to find a dedicated group that could use a casting/reloading machinist with a devious mind and give 'em hell attitude.

Edited February 8, 2012 by Caster

[Hershmeister]

The big dude on the show with the prepping youtube show lives right here in middle TN! So much for his op-sec! One quick google of his name put a pin on the map to his house.

I found it interesting that the "experts" would rate the preparedness and then tell you how remote a chance of the concern was.

PS: I'm glad the gal in Houston enlisted. She was worrying me with her obvious acceptance of the idea of selling her body to get by.