Thursday, March 19, 2015

consuming to invest 6


CONSUMING TO INVEST #6

Manual Tools

( note: I'm taking a vacation day tomorrow, so no comments or e-mail )
I’m a big advocate of all things manual.  Mainly to really cut down on what I need for power generation, but also on another practical and philosophical level.  Power tools cost a lot more, plus they want fuel, plus they break quicker.  Not a great combination for the post-apocalypse future we are quickly barreling towards.  I understand all you macho burley types get a squishy feeling in your colon at the thought of doing without your chainsaw to fell entire forests in a single afternoon, and will wax philosophically about it ( “why, with my Gustovus Adolfus brand Swedish seventy two inch bar self lubricating chain saw, I can construct tank traps and village defense walls and heat twenty three McMansions my brother preppers are living in.  So you see, I must simply have this power tool.  Non-negotiable.  Why, without it I might as well strip naked armed only with a steak knife and go squelch a riot in Harlem the week after Food Stamps run out” ).  Or, here’s a thought.  Stop needing to heat too large modern constructed dwellings.  Stop living in an easily accessed area.  Get a better class of survivalist friend ( like, from a trailer park ).  And start thinking of how to survive without luxuries.  Chainsaws are great while they work, and then you are screwed.  And don’t tell me you will stock chainsaws AND bow saws.  Because more than likely you will die of a heart attack trying to use the manual tool- you did everything prior to that the easy way and are in ZERO kind of shape for the apocalypse.  Manual tools are exercise equipment, both mentally and physically.  Power tool guys have expense rifles, with a scope costing more than the gun, getting to a pre-fabricated tree stand by an ATV that cost more than most peoples cars, hauled by the costliest truck and toy travel trailer combo, once every three years because his good paying city job will lay him off once he goes below 75 hour work weeks.  In fact, he thinks the Pakistani mail room boy might be there in disguise, ready to jump in at half salary.  The manual tool guy just wants to get some deer in the freezer to supplement the food budget, and car pools in his buddies eighteen year old Corolla to go bow hunting with a cheap non-compound unit he got at a garage sale and practices on weekends with.

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There is enough that we will lose after a collapse, items never to be duplicated again ( modern firearms and ammunition, 12v batteries, etc. ).  It behooves you to simplify everything else as much as possible.  You might not be able to replace a lot of manual tools, but you can stretch the time you have them far longer than with power tools.  And just the exercise mentally forcing yourself to constantly down-sizing will be innovating in areas you hadn’t thought of.  Now, obviously, there are some things not suitable for powering down.  I can’t replace my computer word processor with a manual typewriter for the simple reason I sell ( okay, I give away free then guilt a payment ) electrons rather than papers.  Yet, I don’t need a computer after a collapse ( the important stuff is in old school books ) so it doesn’t matter.  But the weeds in my fire prone yard will always grow, even after all the gasoline is gone, so I have a sickle now rather than a weed-wacker.  A powered unit is $50 plus, a sickle $15.  I save money up front and constantly from NOT needing gas and oil and spools of plastic line.  I don’t power cut my areas of sagebrush, but by hand with a saw and tree clippers.  I didn’t cut the lumber for my dwelling with power saws, but by hand.  Sure, cutting a piece of plywood like that is a gold plated bitch.  But rather than a power saw left over from the project, after costing me extra money, I instead have a hand saw getting dull that now works on that sage brush handily.  By digging by hand, rather than renting a backhoe, I still have the $30 in tools AND a better set of muscles I can employ next time ( not that I WANT to, just that I CAN if needed.  Unlike your ability to rent a backhoe once you are unemployed or they were taken by a warlord to be used as armored vehicles ).  Manual tools now save lots of money and earn you a valuable skill ( there will be plenty of fat out of shape office workers bewildered as to how they are useful in the future-don’t be one of them.  Believe it or not, plain manual labor will be in demand with few able-even if willing- to do it ).  Others will follow, so it will be a short term advantage.  But still useful.  In the meantime, you can bank the difference in tools, even still paying less and still having multiples of quality units. 

END

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11 comments:

  1. Good article James.

    I think that those two man hand saws are a good item to have for those heavy cutting chores.

    "I can’t replace my computer word processor with a manual typewriter for the simple reason I sell ( okay, I give away free then guilt a payment ) electrons rather than papers."

    No, but perhaps it wouldn't be a terrible idea to pick up one of those manual typewriters with error correction? I'll bet that they're practically giving them away these days? The "word processor" of the past may very well be the word processor of the future? I'd subscribe to your newsletter, as I'm sure others would, providing that I'm still employed at that point, and the cost is not greater than the much needed meal that my post collapse, malnourished body will be in great need of :D

    "Believe it or not, plain manual labor will be in demand with few able-even if willing- to do it."

    Scores of hispanic immigrants came to the U.S. and cashed in on this very concept, so there must be some truth to this.

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    1. I've been trying different word processors since the mid 80's. I wouldn't want to regress past a PC with Windows 95.

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  2. Well, that is exactly where I am at. I had the isolated junk parcel in the country on a two season road. Impassible mud in spring, snowmobile trail in winter, two miles in. I started out with a long thin sled and snowshoes the first year, graduated to a big old crap snowmobile the next three years with which I dragged everything from car parts to cinder blocks down the trail. That thing quit when I jumped a stonewall, so I hauled it back to the land and let it sit. I made money the next year and bought a grizzly 4wd atv while my old snowmobile sunk farther into the snowbank, only to dig down four feet to revive it when the belt broke on the tranny for the grizzly that same winter. The old beast fired up with a little prodding. Eventually I got tired of feeding it gas and oil and always turning it around by hand at the top of the road (reverse was shot) So, in the seventh year went back to the tried and true snowshoes and beat up old hand sled, held together with duct tape and epoxy. Ive become very fit and can haul hundreds of pounds of material in and out while the idiots on new morgaged snowmobilers whizz past me. If they were to break down in the middle of the wilderness I doubt they could get their drunken sorry asses out before succumbing to hyperthermia. My old sled is tried and true. And in th mud season I found that a deer cart works the best. Have tried all types of wagons and carts, but the deer cart can traverse logs, streams, mud and snow during spring with mud and snow. Worth its weight in gold.

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    1. Are you envisioning being attacked by Mad Max gangs on snowmobiles? :)

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    2. Well, not really, they are all a bunch of mamby-pambys, riding only in fair weather, always in packs, using state of the art electric snowsuits and brand new machines. But when it turns colder or a storm dumped a fresh powder they are no where to be seen. I'm the only one who breaks the trail with my pull sled. And come suppertime on a good day, they run home to mammies din-din and don't come back. Come the armageddon I,LL be master of the trail. I know it inside out, I've walked it so much.

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  3. Agree on having a full kit of manual tools, files and the other parts to support them. Good idea to USE your manual tools on reasonable projects to verify function (some manual tools are MUCH better than others).

    But, if power tools (especially 120v corded tools) come your way free or nearly so, they are a great "force multiplier" when you have a team of people and a generator with scarce/expensive fuel. If you have a 4000Watt genset, you shouldn't start it unless you have a 1/2 to 2/3rds electrical load to give it, AND it needs to run long enough to get warmed up/recharge the start battery. Battery charging in Bulk Mode (less than 80% charged) is a good use of fuel (use solar from 80% to 105%), assuming you have a 120v charger that can charge at up to 20% of the A/H of your battery bank. Serious chargers like that cost money if got new/retail. The other steady load for the genset is your freezer to make ice. The free tools (cleaned, lubed, sharpened, etc.) in the hands of your team of useful minions are set up on sawhorses where they will go to work with power tools while the genset runs. With the excellent Lord Bison military leadership technique, an assembly line of great productivity will occur 5 minutes after the generator starts. If you are so lucky, you can use even more extra power to run a pump to extract water from the well and pump it up to your elevated tank (to provide post-apocalyptic water pressure for thrifty showers and firefighting).

    This excellent 1930's carb-points-flathead twin genset technology is available in many P-O-S motorhomes of the 1970's and 1980's. Avoid newish fuel-saving gensets with OHV, inverters, computerized ignition and fuel control because while they do save fuel, they won't work on woodgas/Mexican dripgas or other crap fuel that will/might be available. Onan and Kohler are the ones.

    Building minion-sturdy housing, like HexaYurts, in a short time would be worth burning some fuel for.

    pdxr13

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    1. Any recommendation on a hand drill? The ones on Amazon seem like flimsy crap.

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    2. Craftsman 120v drill motor, made in USA in about 1961. Used, nearly free. Repairable, mostly with new brushes for the motor.

      Hand drill? Vintage only. Estate sale garages. Need of lube and filth will lower the price.

      Temporary Drill with yuppie convenience: DeWalt 48v NanoLithium Cordless Drill. These rawk!

      pdxr13

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    3. Bastards can't come out with a squiggley piece of metal with a handle on one end and a bit attachment the other, charge $25 for and make everyone happy? But now I can buy a 30 watt computer with Windows for $200? In 1995 you couldn't find one under $1k, and the monitor alone used much more than 30 watts.

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    4. Lehman's also has one James, but they're not giving it away, and they're out of stock on it at the moment. I googled "old fashioned hand drills" and all kinds came up on ebay and etsy shops.

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    5. I know I preach EBay for land, but most of their other crap seems like an overpriced garage sale in front of a McMansion.

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