Comments

Episode-1692- Expert Council Q&A for 12-11-15 — 10 Comments

  1. The original tarps were oil cloth. Linseed oil I think.
    There are several how to make your own oil cloth out on the web.

    • I HAVE made ‘oil cloth’ and I used linseed oil. I took a fabric painting tarp from home depot and I soaked it in a 5 gallon pail with linseed oil. I then had to hang it out on the line for a good 2 weeks in the sunshine to get it to cure. Linseed oil cures or ‘dries’ from UV light from the sun. It made a very nice flexible water proof cloth. You can speed this up, at Home Depot in the chemical isle (where you find the linseed oil) you will find something called Japan Dryer in a pint sized metal can. Adding this to the linseed oil will speed up the process.

      You might also do the same thing with EXTERIOR latex paint. I’ve wanted to do this, but have not had time. The $10 for a gallon stuff will work, try it straight and try it 50/50 with water. Soak it in a bucket, wring it out, and let it hang on a line till dry. The latex in the paint should work better than the linseed oil and dry a heck of a lot faster.

      Steve

      • Hmm here is my concern.

        As a kid in shop class we were always told to put oil rags into a special can because they could just catch on fire. I obeyed, I trusted Mr. Fox my teacher but there was always doubt.

        One day I was working on an old military stock I was in my late 20s now, never saw a rag go up but always followed the rule. I had a rag and set it up on the rim of my above ground pool. Meaning to put it away soon. Well it didn’t take long, direct late summer PA sun and man up she went, I am talking perhaps it was on that ledge for 20 minutes tops and it was on actual fire when I noticed it.

        In a pure Butthead voice (as in Bevis and Butthead) I said whoa it really does happen. Since it was on the edge of the pool the fix was easy enough. But I have never once doubted this concept again.

        So I guess my question is, is there any risk doing this to a tarp?

        • Linseed oil would be the NUMBER ONE chemical that can do this. Linseed oil will do this quicker and easier than any other ‘oil.’ I’m VERY surprised that your rag on the pool caught fire because it usually ONLY happens in a pile of rags. What happens is the oil starts to oxidize and that releases heat, releasing heat in a pile of rags, the rags are insulating and the temp starts to rise and rise until auto-ignition is reached. In a 5 gallon pail full of linseed oil and with a tarp in there, this will not happen if you have an excess of linseed oil, as in standing oil over the tarp in the bucket. This is because any heat caused by the oxidation is transferred to the oil which is then transferred to the inside of the bucket and thus to the outside of the bucket. There is a lot of room for the heat to escape. Even if you do NOT have too much linseed oil in the bucket, but just enough to soak the tarp, then the tarp is not in there for more than a minute, you don’t leave it sitting in there for any length of time. Once the trap is hung up on a line to dry in the sun there is so much surface to volume ratio (like a sail) that there is no chance of heat building up and autoignition. Good question. -Steve
          https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spontaneous_combustion

        • If you do NOT want to make one, then you can buy one. Its a very very flexible and SOFT nylon. You’d love to use it as a blanket its so soft. A baby would love it. Its really a water proof nylon fabric.

          http://amzn.to/1QclXrT

          This is called the MegaSheet, which, is the newer version of what use to be called the Neat Sheet, which, I must of owned a good 8 or 10 of these. The megasheets are 5 feet by 7 feet in size, I’ve used them as water proof covers over stuff in the back of my pickup truck, right now in my tool box, there are 2 of these. I still use them, takes a lot of effort to rip them, but they can be ripped. They are strong, light and 100% water proof. You can use it as a blanket, as a sunshade, as anything you’d use a trap for, but this does not ‘crinkle’….oh, you can use it as a rain shade as well, wrap anything you want to keep dry in this and it will stay dry (like a tote in the back of your pick up truck in the weather)…. I just love the hell out of these. There are multiple listings for it on amazon, plus its sold at other places online as well. Right now since its Christmas time, amazon is almost sold out of these. These 100% have the Steven Harris Seal of Approval on them. If you don’t like it, I’ll buy it off of you. Steve This along with some 550 cord, should be part of ANY vehicle survival / preparedness kit that you make. Also…make a great ground cover, sand and dirt does NOT stick to it. Water does not soak into it, it just beads up and runs off.

    • Ok.. this is from MSU. Name ONE THING. I dare you. Name ONE THING that we use in our DAILY lives that is famous that it came from University XXXX. Can you name one thing? No, you can’t. There is not one thing that we use in our daily lives that came from a university. NOTHING. ZERO.> ZILCH. SO all of these ‘postings’ on the forums around the net and everything else about this ‘paper’ that a university put out or this ‘video’ are all hog wash. Universities do 2 things, 1. publish papers, 2. file patents, and then do nothing with them. They use 1 and 2 to get more money from the federal government so they can suck on the tit longer and get more milk (money). This is all they care about, they do not care about actually doing anything with what they come up with. If you thought our public schools were messed up…the money sucking universities are even worse. – Steve

  2. The slender man history by Alex hit a little close to home. One of these girls was my next door neighbor that played with my niece. It was a very sad situation.

    I’m just glad that my niece had enough intuition that she did not care for this young lady.

  3. Well done gentlemen, you can rightly claim this single episode was worth well over $48K. Impressive to hear Steve and John’s take down of these business practices and a concise explanation of the rule of 72. Kudos to all three of you!