Kevin Olson

A while back, I'd seen some instructions for making Tarahumara (Raramuri) huaraches, using a piece of tire tread for the sole, which looked particularly good.  But, can I spot the instructions, now?  If I do find the auspicious looking instructions, I'll post the link, though instructions abound.  Not sure if DIY is really what you are looking for, in any case, but they looked both tough and repairable.  And, by definition OG ultra-marathon runner grade.

I'd like to try growing Nicotiana rustica (wild tobacco) as an ornamental and for its insecticidal properties.  But, it's not an urgently needed thing - so many projects, so little time!  Sounds like it wouldn't be too difficult.

I have seen a YT video series of a fellow who was making his own pipe tobacco blends.  He got leaves of several varieties, aged them (if I recall correctly, he sweated them in plastic bags), pressed the mixed variety of leaves in a little homemade wooden press with casing (honey?  I don't quite remember, now), and hung it up in the sun to age for (several?) weeks.  Then, he took the plug out of the press and sliced it thinly with a manual food slicer, then rubbed out his blend and smoked it in a pipe.  I am endlessly curious about how and why people do things, especially anything "unplugged" or old fashioned.  I still recall my great uncles rolling their own - Bugler in a can, as I remember - using a rolling machine with a canvas web, though one of them could roll a smoke with one hand, no machine required.  Clearly, he was a professional!  Pretty darn cool for a young guy of 9 or 10 to be allowed to hang out with the old codgers while they were smoking under a big shade tree, telling tall tales about horses they'd known in their younger days (saddle horses, rather than draft horses, though all of them had farmed with horses, so must have been acquainted with plenty of draft horses, too, and likely oxen as well).

For anyone interested in the pipe tobacco curing project, I'll see if I can track down the channel and link a video or two here.  On edit, here's likely the series I was remembering, but I don't see the press aging video, so maybe I am mistaken, or maybe it was another of his videos:
 https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLxC94OIiSU3mYrlAJdGF591NcyBZ3eLga

And, on further edit, this is probably the plug press and flake video I was remembering, but not from the same YT channel:

Pete Grego wrote: start with stick and a cheap arc welder which you can snap up for about $20-$50 second hand. nothing fancy.

I do have a very light duty 110 volt arc welder (maybe a Montgomery Ward?) which I picked up very used for $5 or some such, long (long) ago.  But it is such a miserable welder that I can't even bear to give it to someone - it would just be cruel and unusual punishment.  It can only be used with 1/16" diameter rods due to the low heat output, and even then it's a bear to weld with.  Preheating with a gas torch is nearly mandatory for any useful welding.  Otherwise, rods just stick.

I also did once try to weld with a pair of 12 volt deep cycle batteries in series - very sketchy, but worked better than this really crummy welder.

I guess my point is that it is possible to get too cheap (not too inexpensive, but too cheap) of a welder that will be nearly impossible to use.  I can't bring myself to throw out this welder, but it wouldn't be fair to inflict it on anyone else, either.  So it sits, condemned to the gloomy darkness of my basement, in case I reach some fevered state of desperation for a welder which barely works.

I do have an old Leece Neville heavy truck alternator (rated for 200 amps at 24 volts, if I recall correctly - a u-pull-it scrap yard find) which I may eventually turn into a portable welder.  There is a lot info online, if you poke the right corners of the interwebs, on cobbling up homemade underhood welders from alternators - whether a separate dedicated alternator, or the vehicle's stock charging alternator - since the Jeep and offroad crew like to be able to do trailside mending.  Maybe try searching for "weldernator"...  Somewhere, I have suggestions on how to build a homemade Zena (brand name) underhood welder, the key benefits of which seems to be DC welding and adjustable heat at the stinger by twiddling a potentiometer.  It has been suggested that the circuit diagram in Zena's patent may contain errors, whether intentional (to preserve trade secrets) or otherwise.  As I haven't built the circuit, either with or without the alleged errors, I have no comment on this, and I am insufficiently skilled at circuit analysis to be able to judge for myself.

But, homemade welders may not be the easiest place to start when learning to weld.  Any more than was the Montgomery Ward welder a good beginner's welder.  I believe I paid $50 for the Lincoln (though maybe it was $100 - very cheap, for the welder it is), and the fellow who sold it to me thought he'd burned maybe a dozen rods with it, and it would have been a much better first welder.  So, good deals do exist, as you said.

I have an older Lincoln AC/DC tombstone welder, which I bought off Craigslist from a local fella, and an old Clarke brand wire feed (just flux core, not gas shielded) which I picked up from a used tool store locally for $75.  Both weld better than I do, though that isn't saying much.  But, I don't do a lot of welding, just whatever is needed to patch things back together - exhaust system hangers, gardens tractor bits and bobs, the occasional cracked shovel blade, etc. - no serious fabrication work, though I do have some bigger projects in the offing.  And, mostly I can get stuff stuck back together.  I did get some training about 20 years ago - maybe 10 class hours or so - through the local job service, when I was laid off and between jobs, but I have only fairly recently obtained the welders.  As yet, I'm not much of a welder, but I'm pretty mean with an angle grinder, so...

I will second a previous assertion in this thread that wire feed (and preferably gas shielded MIG, but flux core is better than nothing) is easier to learn than most other processes.  Especially if trying to weld thinner material.  Trying to weld cracked shovel blades with a stick welder is - erm - "challenging" if you are a tyro; either adhere the rod to the metal, or burn a hole through it, but not much in between.  I do have plans for building a high frequency arc starter circuit which could be wired into the tombstone welder to help get the arc established at low amperage settings - I even started collecting some of the necessary parts - but haven't yet built it; it needs a serious Faraday cage to prevent EMI from leaking out and messing with electrical appliances, the neighbor's pacemaker, etc.  The little flux core is a lot easier to weld with than the tombstone welder - zap and cool, lather-rinse-repeat, with minimal fuss other than the occasional birdsnest of wire.  I have used "real" MIG welders - the sort with gas shielding during the welding class, as I recall, they had  Lincolns  - and I believe the exact words that fell out of my mouth were "You could teach a monkey to weld with one of these!".

I will also agree with another poster that an auto-darkening helmet is a game-changer.  My old hoods are like welding blind, in comparison; they are now relegated for use by the welder's helper.  There are tricks, if you must use the old fashioned sort of welding helmet to stick weld - not least using a carbon gouging rod in your "off" hand as guide to get your arc rod to approximately the correct location "by braille"; just press the end of the carbon rod where you want to start welding, and then slide the arc electrode down it to the base metal to start the arc and thus be able to see what you're doing.  An acquaintance from church is a "real" welder (i.e. is certified and has professionally welded, including TIG'd fancy Inconel helicopter exhaust systems), and he says he basically wouldn't weld without an auto-darkening helmet.  My helmet is a "Metalman" brand from TSC (a Christmas gift from my brother), so nothing fancy, but there are plenty available, at various price points; get the biggest window you can.  A couple of other things to try:  A scrap piece of copper buss bar to back up welds in thin stuff may help with sag and burnthrough until you get the hang of heat control.  Preheating heavy stuff with a gas torch (even a plumber's propane or MAPP gas torch) may help prevent the rod sticking at low amperage settings.  Some rod formulations are easier to deal with than others.  If you don't do a lot of welding, you may want to bake old rods in an electric oven or other dry heat situation to get moisture out of the rod flux.  Don't stint on the ventilation - I can't believe inhaling welding smoke will do you any good.

And, speaking of my brother, of the auto darkening helmet gift, he bought one of the Miller 120/240 volt multi-process lunchbox welders - with the right accessories, it'll do most any electric welding process - during the COVID shutdowns at a steep discount, and he's used the daylights out of it, mostly as a MIG or with the aluminum spool gun, but also configured for stick welding.  It will do TIG, also, but he doesn't have the torch, foot pedal and correct regulator.  I don't believe he's had any proper training, but, needs must he's welded up a lot of stuff - bucket loader snow pushers, farm gates of impregnable design, a crane tower for a service crane to be mounted high on his band sawmill trailer, etc.  He's also burned more rod with my Lincoln than I have - by many pounds -  mending equipment trailers, loader buckets and whatnot, since the tombstone welder will make more heat than his lunchbox welder.  But, the lunch box welder will do light work on a 110 outlet - even on a 15 amp circuit for very light stuff, though the breaker may trip if it's pushed - and these small multiprocess welders can be obtained pretty reasonably in the "house" brands from Harbor Freight, Tractor Supply, Home Depot and auto parts stores, as well as the bigger name brands like Lincoln, Hobart and Miller.

All this being said, if you can find a mentor, or a community education welding class, it will be a big help.  But, you can learn a lot from YouTube University.

r ransom wrote:Germination usually takes two or three days for chickpeas.  It makes them taste delightful for both cooked and if we let the sprouts grow longer than the pea, taste fantastic raw (like bean sprouts).

I've read soaking (and changing the water just before cooking) makes beans less gassy and easier to digest for some. I haven't noticed much difference, but I like the savings of using less electricity to cook them.

Thanks for the info.  It sounds like some experimentation chez nous is in order!

I wondered about nutrient profiles because there has been a lot of clamor regarding "anti-nutrients" of late - phytates, in particular - present in legumes and whole grains.  As best I can tell, phytates functionally bind stored nutrients until needed by the germinating seed, at which time various enzymatic processes break down the phytates, releasing the sequestered nutrients.  Malting grains and sprouting legumes might thus make more nutrients bioavailable, but I haven't yet found anything analytically definitive on this as relates to foodstuffs.

A certain well-known television health guru here in the US has been advising people to avoid eating legumes and whole grains because of these anti-nutrients.  He seems to be advocating for consumption of white flours and white rice to minimize phytates and avoidance of legumes entirely for the same reason.  Since people have been eating whole grains and legumes to  greater or lesser degree since before the agricultural revolution, I am rather doubtful that they are such a problem.  However, I can imagine that traditional (if time consuming) methods of preparation and processing might have mitigated any deleterious effects - methods which have been largely dispensed with in the interest of modern convenience, factory throughput and shelf stability.

In the Instant Pot, I use two parts water to one part chick peas, by volume.  Cook on high pressure for 45-50 minutes, with natural release and the keep warm option enabled.

But, I almost always make hummus (well, no tahini, because my wife doesn't like the taste, so not exactly hummus).  Anyway, if I let the chick peas linger on the keep warm for a while, because I"m busy doing other things, no big deal, because they're they'll be getting mushed up in any case.

If a firmer texture is desired, draining them as soon as the pin drops on natural release will leave them at more of the commercially canned consistency.

I am curious about the soaking.  For instance, will soaking in room temp water lead to germination?  Does that change the nutrient profile in any way?

I do recall my mother soaking dry beans when I was a kid.  I'm sure that was how her mother did it, too.  But, that was for stove top cooking at atmospheric pressure.  I don't specifically recall my mother cooking dry beans in the stove top pressure cooker, though she used it a lot when we lived at altitude in the Mountain West to compensate for the lower boiling temperature at higher elevations.  Valley floor was around 6,000 feet ASL, so high enough to appreciably affect cooking times and require adjustments when baking.

Roger -

The design you and I were recollecting is the HAHSA (Heat And Heat Storage Apparatus), invented/design by Kenneth Darby of Falls, PA.

Here is a link to a contemporaneous CSM article:
https://www.csmonitor.com/1981/0304/030458.html

Somewhat different from the TMEN article to which you linked - your article's description was closer to the Richard Hill design, I think.  Dick Hill also designed a thermal mass heater (maybe for a local Audubon Society chapter? - fuzzy memory...) which is profiled in "The Book of Masonry Stoves" by David Lyle.

The HAHSA company still exists as Darby Industries (look under the heading "The little business that could...", subhead "A change in direction"), even though their focus has changed (apparently many times):
https://darbyindustries.com/about-us/newman-darby/

I don't know if the plans for the HAHSA are still available from them.

But, a rockety burner with a mass of sand or pebbles (see Paul's pebble bed thermal mass design) seems doable.  The batch box burner designs might be a better fit than the J-tube style for this type of heater.

Separating the burner unit from your residence may decrease the fire risk for conventional combustion (i.e. not very efficient), but for any clean combustor (whether Hill's downdrafter with secondary air, or a rockety burner), I doubt the decrease in risk is worth the loss in efficiency.  Though your homeowner's insurance company may disagree.

I suspect that a true masonry heater should be a lot easier to insure than a Hill replica, IF your insurance agent is fussy.  Mine, representing a major company with fancy television advertisements, recently quoted me $60 a year to add a wood burner to my home owner's policy, but she insisted on a separate/dedicated flue for the wood stove.  I plan on adding a manufactured insulated double wall flue anyway (Selkirk brand is locally available), so that's fine by me.  She apparently doesn't care what kind of stove I use; I seem to be much more concerned about clean and efficient combustion than is she.  But, many people here heat primarily with wood, and many more have wood heat as a backup or just for ambience, so my request for a quote to add the wood burner rider was no doubt run-of-the-mill for her.

On edit: I attached a HAHSA advertisement I found online, vintage 1981.

Roger -

Not to dissuade you from your plans, but the Richard Hill stick wood furnace might be a good point of comparison for something like this.  He used a forced draft downdrafter burn chamber (this was from the bad old days of the oil crunch in the late 70s, so long before rocket stove J tubes and the like).  He had a refractory tunnel downstream, with injection of pre-heated secondary combustion air, which was then passed through an atmospheric fire tube boiler, then a draft inducer fan and up the stack.  He heated up about 500 gallons of water (two old fuel oil tanks) per firing, then circulated the heated water for dozens of hours afterward.  In coastal Maine, he fired the boiler every second or third day to heat a rental house.

This is the best quality scan of Hill's report available, to my knowledge:
https://web.archive.org/web/20260122141201/http://www.hotandcold.tv/resources/woodfiredfurnace.pdf

Virginia Tech did some efficiency and emissions testing of this furnace under various conditions, and it was in the neighborhood of 80% thermally efficient, depending on the moisture content of the wood.  If I can find a link to their report, I'll add it on edit.

Hill found that he could cleanly burn even green wood (except green spruce, which was too wet to sustain combustion without a mix of other feed stock).  But, he gave up quite a bit in thermal efficiency, since the heater was boiling so much water contained in the fuel, which then escaped up the stack along with the latent heat of vaporization.

A couple of versions of Hill's wood furnace were commercialized in the US and Canada, and the HS Tarn Garn design was similar.

Not the same as yours, also not a rocket stove (it was too early for that), but an interesting approach to clean and efficient wood combustion, nonetheless.

I have seen documentation of the sand battery style of stove from your youth, perhaps in TMEN, (I even vaguely recall a name similar to the one you mentioned), but I wasn't having any luck finding it by that name, either.  But I'll look a bit more.

Kevin

Mr. Chickadee (Josh Stevens) made a Korean style floor a few years ago, documented in 2 parts:




Worth a watch, in my estimation.  Very traditional, no plywood in sight.  But, it requires a timber framed floor structure.  My current (slowly being completed) project used very non-permie 3/4" CDX over short span 2X6 joists.  One of those "do as I say, not as I do" things, I guess.  "Not as though I had already attained... but I press on toward the mark..." (pace St. Paul).

One of my timber framing books discussed using rough sawn 2" thick oak planks, grooved on both edges, with a spline fitted between planks in the grooves.  It may be in the Fine Homebuilding book, in the chapter on the Rhode Island Stone Ender (ISBN-13:  978-1561580477), but I am not able to double check at the moment.  This would be over fairly widely spaced joists in modern timber framed construction, though older timber framed structures would likely have more closely spaced joists than the spacing for floor joists for modern stick built construction.  The top surface of the plank floor can then be adzed/planed smooth after installation.  An ox (two operator) plane, or at least a decent scrub plane, would be helpful here, I'd think.  The splines will accommodate some movement due to seasonal changes in moisture content, will prevent sight lines/light leaks between floors, and keeps floor sweepings above from dribbling down into the storey below.  One advantage of the splined method over tongue and groove is that you don't lose width of your heavy planks to the rabbet cuts forming the tongues.

In Hermann Phleps' book "The Craft of Log Building" (ISBN-13: 978-0969101918), he discusses using heavy planks for floors which protrude through the wall to the exterior.  At least one pair of planks has matching fine tapers, cut on one of the edges of each, as means of tightening the floor.  If I recall correctly, this was in an alpine European context.  The folding or fox wedge planks could be drive in from the exterior of the building to force the rest of the floor planks outward to tighten up any gaps.  But, there aren't quite enough details in Phleps for me to completely understand the system, and I am a bit leery of exposed end grain of the floor planks as regards rot.

On edit, here's a puncheon floor (i.e. smoothed on one side, left in the round on the under side):

You can see a bit of adze smoothing of floor planks.

And, one more for reference, a traditional floor in a Finnish log cabin:

The floor build process is interrupted by a window installation.  These planks are edge doweled, rather than tongued and grooved.