Another plan for solar dehydrator from Appalachian State University in Boone NC

http://homepower.com/view/?file=HP57_pg62_Scanlin
http://www.scribd.com/doc/36969288/Improving-Solar-Food-Dryers

$150 materials and no electric bill or $200 for Excaliber

Cheers,
Greg

There’s also a series of ready.gov Sesame Street videos that cover emergency preparedness. They cover the government basic recommendations and so aren’t as extensive as we might like – but certainly introduce the idea with familiar characters and in a largely nonthreatening way.

Oil yields for typical seeds.
http://www.croplandbiodiesel.com/oilperacre.html

So an acre of olive trees can produce 133-1575 gallons of olive oil a year according to the following sources:

http://www.ojaioliveoil.com/facts-figures:
“Approximately 2/3 to 4½ gallons of oil per tree. ”

http://www.oliveoilsource.com/page/olive-tree-spacing:
“These orchards are planted at a high-density of about 200 to 350 trees per acre”

Biodiesel from soybeans is about 50 gallons per acre.

I had a possible threat idea with downloading the entire Wikipedia. There are times when Wikipedia comes under fire for containing illegal materials. For instance just last year there were charges that there was illegal pornography on wikipedia. The software may allow removal of certain topics in the downloaded version of Wikipedia, but since I haven’t downloaded yet, I don’t know.

I doubt that it is much of a threat to the average listener to the podcast. However, if there’s some reason for a computer to be confiscated and searched, I would think that this could lead to additional charges.

Will it stop me from downloading it? Nope, but it is something to keep in mind.

I used Winchester 205 grain lead soft-point ammo to take a deer last October (2010), using a Mosin-Nagant 7.62x54R M38 carbine. It was a clean lung shot from about 30 yards. The young buck ran about another 30yds and then fell over dead. The Winchester ammo has nice reloadable brass cases and are boxer primed. It is also cleaner that the mil-surp stuff too.

I too tried a sub $1000 chipper and found it to suck really badly.

I rented a chipper (don’t recall the brand) but it was big and had tank treads on it. It made yards of mulch quickly and they delivered and picked it up for $90

I will rent once per year after my seasonal pruning for now on.

Ok I just got done listening to this episode.

Regarding the question: is gold “real” money?

I’m sure I’m going to get flamed for this… but why should I care about this again? I have started purchasing metal as a hedge against inflation. I’m not asking why or if you should have precious metals in your portfolio. I believe you SHOULD have them… however that isn’t the question on the table.

I keep hearing this topic pop in and out with impassioned arguments on each side. Each time I hear it I think to myself… how does the answer to this question impact my life? It doesn’t at all. Unless I miss the point.

In brief… who gives a shit.

My 2 cents for what they are worth (sometimes very little)

My problem with biodiesel is that it takes more energy to make it than it produces. How much energy is required in planting/harvesting? How much fuel is in the pesticides/fertilizers? How much energy is used to process/extract the biodiesel from the corn/soybean/cotton?

It’s an unsustainable method and the way scientist are solving this problem is through GM.

Personally I think solar is a better answer. An acre of the best crop produces maybe 150 gallons of biodiesel per year and that doesn’t take into account how much fuel was required to produce that 150 gallons. One acre of solar panels will produce ~4000 kwh per day. A gallon of diesel is equivalent to ~40kwh, so take your pick: 150 gallons per acre per year or 36,500 gallons per acre per year.

True there is a large input of energy to build and install those solar panels but it’s a one time energy expense.