Hard sellin’ a hot idea
Talkin’ the rocket mass stoves here. I really think that this is going to be something of a feature in homes in the future. The downsides to it right now are that everything going into a new buildin , must be “approved” and Listed, as in UL listed or one of the other testing places. That is expensive and the real problem in getting RMH stoves tested being they are also rather ‘artsy’: each being built on site for the particular home they are going into. No one is going to build the stove then dismantle it to send it Underwriters laboratories for testing, to the tune of 25grand or more. Not each and every stove.
Luckily, there are states that are making exemptions to such things. (I don’t recall which ones, though I seem to remember one being New England: shocked I was!)
Permies has been doing research into different builds techniques and materials, and even does particulate testing on their stoves. Their stoves, again, not mass produced therefore untestable by a standards company, have been besting the EPA recommendations on orders of magnitude. EPA suggests .4% particulate matter on a running stove. Permies has been producing less than a 10th of that.
And they use 1/4 the fuel of a standard wood burner for the same result in house.
There are all sorts of reasons why some people want this style of stove. They may be buying into the Carbon Myth, wanting to reduce carbon and particulate emissions. They may be trying to do similar to me, going off grid and want as efficient as you can get. Or the other side of the coin, that I am on, wanting the heat, but no one makes a stove that fits my house. It either runs too hot, or won’t put out the heat I need and ends up creating soot issues and always ends up pumping more heat OUT of the house than what remains in.
And then there are those that just want to supplement what they already have in place to help reduce costs overall. IE A heat pump that works, but want to reduce its duty cycle and use less electricity.
https://youtu.be/QY4mnYc0Mgc?si=ZHUkt0GxPV6qlIjZ. (One the groups trying for a modular unit, no affiliation, but a good explanationof function.)
And the choices are growing fast thanks to the internet and curious kittehs like myself. Rocket style stoves (J-tube top feeding downdraft stoves) Batch style heaters (typical front loader like most accepted wood burners). Russian and Swedish styled ceramic tile stoves (similar concepts of re-routing hot gasses through a maze of brick to collect more heat for slow release)
The concept is simple. Capture as much heat as you can before it leaves the house. Thats the whole purpose of these stoves. The Rocket stoves produce incredible amounts of heat, running at peak efficiency reducing emissions to base components of CO2 and H2O with minimal particulates. They generate ash in the ash bin, and some fly ash that accumulates over time in the chambers (and why they have clean out ports.) Everything else is normal and IMO non-pollutants. (the CO2 was gathered by the trees, and will be again. Perfect circle!)
Imagine the actual fire pit being close to 2000F and by the time the exhaust gasses leave the building, they are around 100F and clear with no particulates (or nearly so). Thats 1900F thats been captured by the stove to release out over time. No need to run a fire in the stove 24-7 to keep a house almost warm. Radiant heat feels better than forced air heat (and yes, thats a subjective statement) that definitely lasts longer. Load the hopper once every 12 hours or so, burn hot and fast for a couple of hours and forget about it. Better than waking every couple of hours to feed a beast that only sort of does the trick.
So here I am, Not in consideration mode anymore, but active ‘I’m doin’ this’ mode. But I hit a snag, one I need to resolve. Do I cut out the floor and run the stone all the way to the ground instead of ‘pumping up my floor joists’, or just reinforce. It really doesn’t make a difference in the performance of the stove, but I am thinking longevity of the building. Were I to build again, I already know, Build the base for the stove FIRST, and sort of build the house around it. Much like they used to do hereabouts. I have found three old fallen down houses built back in the early 1900’s and ALL of them had a chimney dead center of the house that went to the ground and the house was built around that. Some had two fireplaces on opposing sides, but all went to the ground.
And despite the word on the nets, all of them were built with locally gathered sandstone and slate, and only one had any firebrick in it. That fire brick was the ‘floor’ of the fireplace, No lime mortar though,,, That I can see. They did use the refractory cement over mortar except on the outside where they went with the cheaper stuff. In one case, no mortar at all: they used Cobb, clay and sand mix. And thats cheap around here if you are willing to do a little digging or swinging a shovel. River sand is very clean after a flood and usually piled several feet deep before you hit the mud. Clay is readily found near any creek, and like in my case, my house sits on a clay formation thats almost 2 feet thick and several hundred feet wide.(and it’s only 2′ down to it.) For the record: I will be using fire brick in the main combustion chamber as the temperatures get quite a bit higher than a normal fireplace would see.
Really, not counting labor times, building one of these should be doable by even the poorest of people, and work 10 times better than a UL listed store bought EPA approved steel and brick monster.
Ah, but Dio,, that means less money flowing and the money has to flow to keep the economy together.
Yeah,, that’s true, but what happens when the economy is no longer functional, but people still need to keep warm? One summer of some hard work and little expenditure but a warm house for years after, and repairs can be done the same way it was built: locally furnished material.
By the way, this is a DEEP deep rabbit hole if you start digging. Some people building J-tube rockets that don’t feed a box, but run through tunnels under the house, venting on the opposite side. The original ‘floor heating’ arrangement. (and that idea is OLD! Korea had a system like it, as did the roman bath houses.). Seriously, if you are thinking of building, consider how you want to heat and cool the house before you ever lift hammer or push saw. That will make the rest of the build so much easier, unlike where I am, thinking about dismantling part of my floor.
Go, be creative, learn something new, and fly the birds of freedom at those that want us to buy systems that need replaced every 10 years or so. (but be advised, getting homeowners insurance might be tricky!)
LIVE
LEARN
LAUGH
LOVE
LOAD
BLoo update: Good tidings at that. took her for a run Sonday to the tune of 150 miles (152 to be exact) and did a fill up on return. 9.98 gallons. 15mpg on a 25 yo SBC? No, I ain’ta complainin’! (and roughly 40 of that was here in town the day prior so its likely closer to 13/16 town/highway. Still no complaints.
Mindless ramble podcast
No intro/outro music, just me jabberin’way,,,, Enjoy,,, Mirrored on my sub stack
Endarkenment
Still manning the watchtower though I’ve little to nothing to add of late.
But I gots ta thinking about some larger aspects of things while driving twixt here and Charleston last week.
I can’t say how many times I have read or referenced analogy of current events to the Fall of the Roman Empire. And I can’t say that the analogy is wrong, but I am starting to think its off. Just as Malthus was wrong in his day, and for much the same reason: ignoring technology and species resilience.
IMO if we are going to see an Great Endarkenment, we are already well into it. In my observations, literacy is the biggest sign of that. Not that most can’t read, but that they are showing loss of comprehension and serious lack of attention span. If it takes more than 140 characters to express an idea, you are likely to lose 95% of a potential audience. I can’t count how many times I have heard, “in twenty words or less, what’s your point?” or some generalization of such.
With loss of comprehension and attention span, the next victim is critical thinking. We already see lack of Critical thinking skills by the simple fact of so few questioning the Heglian Dialects being shoveled around this year. Even when the numbers are obviously being skewed to perpetuate a fallacy, it seems that no one wants to ‘rock the boat’ and so remain compliant and obedient.
Our forefathers must be so proud of what 200+ years have produced.
What I am seeing that does fit the Fall analogy is the population replacement that took place near the very end of the Roman empire. By the time it was a worthless shell, the population of Rome itself had almost no Roman bloodlknes left. They had outmigrated long before.
We are aeeing that happening now as people leave the outskirta of certain cities to warmer friendlier areas. Its not a diaspora, yet! Come November, I would not be surprised to see caravans leaving said cities, loaded with all manner of desperate and haunted people looking for anywhere NOT at war.
Because we are, ARE, at war. Most people are still in denial of that fact because the body count is still below 100 corpses. When that figure starts to approach 4 and 5 digits,,,,
We are at war for ideals, just like we were back in 1860-65. One side still holds values that may seem cliche and labeled as racist or whatever, but they still hold value to those people (note, I am one of them) and the other side see those same values as the ruin of humanity or some such crap. Where a person stands amongst those two sides is a simple matter of degrees, but its not hard to find the divide these days. Hell, its in your face almost 24/7 now.
I touch upon one course of future in my recent book. When I was writing it, I had no idea just how far or how rapidly we could descend to this stage. I would like to think a “Divorce ” amongst the states could be done amicably, but I am a realistic in my pessimism. A break up is inevitable. And it will be heated and bloody. If it becomes a permanent breakup with this continent housing several nations like Central Europe, or one side dominating the other and a new nation/potentially old nation taking the forefront; who flippin knows but the fickle fates and God.
But Grear Endarkenment; not so much. There may be a slow down in innovation (already there on most fronts) and there may be decades where many formerly first world countries are vying for third world status, but it won’t be the centuries of the Dark Ages. Our technology is to advanced and education to ubiquitous to allow much more than a couple decades of slowdown. The only way this world would see such dark ages again is if the madmen started launching multi-megaton nukes with great abandon, shattering any semblance of our global structure and reducing world population back to 15th century levels(or less). Recall I said our tech and species resilience are the two factors keeping the Endarkenment at bay.
I know; such a lovely topic for a Friday post. Apologies to all.
Anywhoos, some memes to fit some of the above points.
Projection or prediction.
Read this if you haven’t already (not long BMS)
A month or so ago a shady group (I say shady because the red proponents chosen were all ‘anti-Trumpers’) assembled and ran a war-game scenario around our current Selection cycle. I’m not going to link it as its been all around, but if you aren’t aware of it just search for ‘Transition Integrity Project’.
All of the points they bring up are being blamed on the red party but the Right see it very differently as being induced by the blue party.
Then we see information about Color Revolutions and how they play out and everything “Fits”.
And a question in the headlines this AM was ‘why are gun sales still on the rise?’
Short answer, IMO, the quiet ones see a damned big storm on the horizon and Mr. Colt was the true great equalizer.
We have a presidential election between a hated president (I still dont get all the hype but Ive covered it other times and places) and an obviously mentally incapacitated septigenerian. His wife has a reputation of “power hungry” that almost equals that of HRC without the list of dead. His running mate has a history as well and the whole combination is deeply embedded in politics since graduation of higher learning: never a day spent in private enterprise or free-market (cough) world.
I don’t like Trump as a person, but his lack of political history (prior to 2016) makes him a better candidate in my opinion. And while he may have some nasty past, ain’t a one of us in this world vying for angelic status.(be honest with yourself. We are all sinners in this world in some way.)
So we have one side accusing the other of trying to steal an election while making efforts to do the thing they say (projection). We have(currently legal) gun sales continuing to rise. (Of course there is no way to know about the under the table sales but I’d say that is moving in similar fashion). We have an open seat in the SCOTUS and a potential Constitutional crisis on the horizon. And the country is showing political/societal/ divides greater than those of the late 1840’s. Toss in the whole Pandemic confusion, democrat controlled cities burning with riots and protests,,,,
Hell the damned list of shit this year has brought on or exposed is too damned long. What it all boils down to is a perfect storm brewing and its all been manipulated by people in positions of power. The big question in my mind is this: who is fucking feeding this maelstrom? Things like this dont just happen. Whats the ultimate endgoal of the providers? NWO? Or Agenda 21 stuff (I know the Agenda 21 group dissolved but many of the members reformed under “The Great Reset” and much of their list resembles A21 garbage.)
Yeah yeah yeah,,, I just lost some of my readers to “conspiracy theory tinfoil hat wearer” accusations. Heres how I look at it. It IS another piece of information and true or not, the best place to hide anything is right out in the open. Mmaybe its bullshit? Maybe its a real thing but so unbelievable that 99% wil write it off as crap, if they even ever see it. Its information and sometimes (a lot lately) that information intersects and even snuggles up perfectly with current events. I don’t believe in coincidence. Once is happen stance, twice is the warning, three times is enemy action. This year I lost track of all those ‘co-wink-i-dinks’.
Storm’s a’comin’
and we have no way of knowing its intensity or duration. Those that have set the winds to blowing think they can control it to achieve a certain outcome. Its almost as if they think they are God or somesuch.
Good luck with that, Gods proven to be the jealous type and doesn’t do competition very well.
Truth for many
The following is something posted on Fakebook, but I find it hard to argue with many of its points. There is a rapidly growing dysfunction within this country and what many on one side of it seemingly fail to realize, is that the silent majority may be silent, but not without means. When the silent majority ‘wakes’, results HAPPEN, and there is no mercy nor let up until the situation is resolved.If the following ‘offends’ you, before you go off the hook, remember I did not write it, but I find truth in it. You may want to look in the mirror and ask if any of the traits condemned are a reflection of your own.************************************If you are a liberal who can’t stand Trump, and cannot possibly fathom why conservatives would ever vote for him let me finally fill you in. It’s not that we love Donald Trump so much. It’s that we can’t stand you. And we will do whatever it takes — even if that means electing a rude obnoxious unpredictable narcissist (your words not ours) to the office of President of the United States — because the only thing we find more dangerous to this nation than Donald Trump is you.How is that possible you might ask? Well, you have done everything in your power to destroy our country. From tearing down the police; to tearing down our history; to tearing down our borders. From systematically destroying our schools and brainwashing our kids into believing socialism is the answer to anything (despite being an unmitigated failure everywhere), while demonizing religion and faith, and glorifying abortion, violence, and thug culture. From calling us racists every time we expect everyone of any skin color to follow our laws equally, to telling us that our “tolerance” of lifestyles we don’t agree with isn’t nearly enough — no we must “celebrate” any lifestyle choice or gender option (forget science) you throw our direction or you think it’s fine to calls us homophobic or some other degrading slur you decide is okay to call us — ironically all while lecturing us on hate speech. While you gaslight us about 52 genders, polyamory, grown men in dresses sharing public locker rooms with little girls, and normalize the sexualization of young children, you simultaneously ridicule us for having the audacity to wish someone a “Merry Christmas” or hang a flag on the 4th of July, stand for the national anthem, or (horror of horrors) don a MAGA hat in public. So much for your “tolerance.” (See why we think you are just hypocrites??)We’re also not interested in the fact that you think you can unilaterally decide that 250 years of the right-to-bear-arms against a tyrannical or ineffective government should be abolished because you can’t get the violence in the cities you manage under control. That free-speech should be tossed out the window, and that those who disagree with your opinions are fair game for public harassment or doxing, That spoiled children with nose-rings and tats who still live off their parent’s dime should be allowed to destroy cities and peoples livelihoods without repercussions. That chaos, and lawlessness, and disrespect for authority should be the norm. This is your agenda. And you wonder why we find you more dangerous than Donald Trump?Your narrative is a constant drone of oppressor/oppressed race-baiting intended to divide the country in as many ways as you possibly can. You love to sell “victim-hood” to people of color every chance you get because it’s such an easy sell compared to actually teaching people to stand on their own two feet and take personal responsibility for their own lives and their own communities and their own futures. But you won’t do that, you will never do that because then you will lose control over people of color. They might actually, start thinking for themselves, God forbid!This is why we will vote for Donald Trump. Not because he is the most charming character on the block. Not because he is the most polite politician to have ever graced the oval office. Not because he is the most palatable choice, or because we love his moral character or because the man never lies, but because we are sick to death of you and all of the destructive crap you are doing to this once beautiful and relatively safe country. Your ineffective and completely dysfunctional liberal “leadership”(?) has literally destroyed our most beautiful cities, our public education system, and done its damnedest to rip faith out of people’s lives.However bad Donald Trump may be, and he is far from perfect, every day we look at you and feel that no matter what Donald Trump says or does there is no possible way he could be any worse for our country than you people are. We are sick to death of your destructive, ignorant, and intolerant behavior and beliefs — parading as “wokeness.” We are beyond sick of your hypocrisy and B.S. We are fed up with your disrespectful divisiveness and constant unrelenting harping and whining and complaining (while you live in the most privileged nation in the world) while making literally zero contributions of anything positive to our society. Your entire focus is on ripping things down, never ever building anything up. Think about that as there is something fundamentally very wrong in the psychology of people who choose destruction as their primary modus operandi.If Donald J Trump is reelected, don’t blame us, look in the mirror, and blame yourselves. Because you are the ones that are responsible for the rise of Donald Trump. You are the ones who have created this monster that you so despise, by your very actions. By your refusal to respect your fellow Americans and the things that are important to us. You have made fun of the “fly-over states,” the people who “cling to their guns and religion,” the middle-class factory workers and coal miners and underprivileged rural populations that you dismissively call “yahoos” and “deplorables.” You have mocked our faith and our religion. You have mocked our values and our patriotism. You have trampled our flag and insulted our veterans and treated our first responders with contempt and hatred. You have made environmentalism your religion while trashing every city you have taken responsibility for. You scream from the rooftops about “global warming” and a “green new deal” while allowing tens of thousands of homeless people to cover your streets in literal sh*t and garbage and needles and plastic waste without doing a single thing to help them or solve the environmental crisis your failed social policies are creating. But we’re supposed to put YOU in charge of the environment while gutting our entire economy to institute this plan when you can’t even clean up a single city??You complain — endlessly — yet have failed to solve a single social problem anywhere. In fact, all you have done is create more of them. We’ve had enough. We are tired of quietly sitting by and being the “silent” majority. So don’t be surprised when the day comes when we finally respond. And trust me it’s coming, sooner than you might think. And also trust me when I say it won’t be pretty. Get ready.If Donald Trump is reelected it will be because you and your “comrades” have chosen to trash the police, harass law-abiding citizens, and go on rampages destroying public property that we have all paid for and you have zero respect for. If Donald Trump is reelected it will be because we are sick of your complete and utter nonsense and destruction. How does it feel to know that half of this country finds you FAR more despicable than Donald J. Trump, the man you consider to be the anti-Christ? Let that sink in. We consider you to be more despicable, more dangerous, and more narcissistic than Donald Trump. Maybe allow yourself a few seconds of self-reflection to let that sink in. This election isn’t about Donald Trump vs. Joe Biden. This is about Donald Trump vs. YOU.So if on the morning of November 4 (or more likely December 29 by the time the Supreme Court will weigh in on the mail-in ballot fiasco we are headed towards) if Donald J. Trump is reelected? The only people you have to blame is the left-wing media drones and yourselves. You did this. Yep, you!
Still paying the bill
All of that is now this.
I won’t try to emulate the Late Great Remus, but thats my woodpile report for now. Three more loads like that last and I will be full up for the winter. I still had half a row left from last year, but this one is looking to be a doozy with an earlier start. I have another shed, half this size, I may end up filling if our cold snap carries out much further. Added insurance you could say.
And my kayaks are feeling quite neglected this week. Will next week too since I have to make a run back to my old stomping grounds of yore to help family out. I may drag Betty
along in the off chance I can get in some paddle time on my ol neighborhood river. Nothing wild about it, some dull class one stuff and a lot of open slow moving areas, but its cleaned up a ton since I was a kid and any seat time is a welcome addition right now. Most rivers hereabouts are dragging hulls low and I am betting the same applies up there, so, Betty is the only choice if I get that shot. She rides higher and has that thick-skinned whitewater hull to take some abuse.
But its back to the grind(er) and burning metal tomorrow. A week behind as usual but steadily gaining to the end of that (current) list. (It always hits in loads that need done yesterday it seems) There is ALWAYS more after that, even if its just some strange shuffle of tool bags and a different hat to wear for a day. “The price of being good” is what the bossman said to me once.
At a cusp
I’m not sure what that cusp is, and with how chaotic this year has been, what with being fed lies to encourage tyranical rule, total breakdown of societal norms, intentional breakdown of ‘rule of law’ by those sworn to protect such; even the best prognosticators are scratching their heads this year.(apologies for the all the links there, if you check only one, that first one is the one to NOT skip.)
Prices are doing the upward swing, employment is still down (and I see some places are having a hella time filling the rolls, not because they haven’t the need, but because they can’t compete with what some people are getting in unemployment bennies). Heck, a friend has been posting need on FB for three weeks offering 12-1400/wk and can’t get anyone to jump. (I would if it weren’t so damned far away from me. But having a house in a down market makes moving not possible no matter how nice the pay. And I have no desire to drive 5hrs a day 5-6 days a week. Or to live in a cheap hotel through the week for it. Did that shit while working sound. I’m older now, thats a young persons scene.)Selection time coming up and I’ve said it and I am seeing more saying it: this one is going to be for all the marbles. One side wants what looks like something straight out of the original MadMax. The other wants “normalcy” returned (broad brush used in both cases. There are factions within factions here on all sides, but generally speaking,,,,)You know what I want to see? I’d like to see HONESTY. I’d like to see the media held responsible for fear mongering and downplaying truth. I’d like to see politicians held accountable for all the crap that is so obvious to us on the street, but because thier buddies are running the investigation, they get away with ‘purt much anything. I’d like to see an honest serious and unbiased investigation into all this pedophilia crap thats slowly being uncovered (and if Biden wins will be completely swept away as if nothing ever happened. Betcha!!!)But what I want is irrelevant. I’m just one little fish swimming in a tidal puddle. That tides coming back in though, and when it swallows my puddle, there are gonna be bigger hungrier fish just waiting for tidbits like me.This world is gonna get ugly for all the little fish, very soon.https://media-cdn.tripadvisor.com/media/photo-s/01/66/b6/b1/clownfish-hiding-in-anenome.jpgJust keep prepping: if ya hadnt been, gitbuzy. An extra $10 week in canned goods ain’t gonna kill ya now and may save your butt later.Learn to keep your trap shut, about everything, especially about what you have or have not.🤐🤐🤐🤐🤐🤐🤐🤐🤐🤐🤐🤐🤐🤐🤐🤐On a positive note though, I have a strong feeling that we will soon see a comeback of what some would call ‘Conservative Values’. I see so many around me getting anxious about the trepidations of Government and flat hatred of the doings of unofficial three letter groups and ilk. Its not the message, its the application, that is getting notice, and that application is what has awoken the silent majority. When said majority goes loud, well,,,Choose wisely.
Dio's Workshop 