Kevin D Roberts

Lots of great feedback, and I appreciate every one of the previous posts with insight or caution or encouragement. I won't reply and quote each person because I don't have the time right now.

The reason for doing this is not to install in a home, it is to see inside an active bell. As far as I know, all we have is temperature readings, and not a full picture, let alone a visual of a RMH in action. I also saw pictures and videos of people who put windows into their bell, and it is interesting, but again, not the full picture. If what it shows is "nothing" i.e. no smoke, that would be a HUGE thing to be able to show people! Obviously we can see it out the back end once it is running, and, as mentioned, it may be that glass keeps it from running efficiently enough to create the secondary burn, but how can we know without testing?

The concept of the glass not being insulative doesn't seem all that relevant, as the Steel Bell isn't insulative either. Of course the properties are different, and BS glass very well may malfunction as a bell, but again, I would not--nor should anyone--experiment with any part of an RMH inside a home.

The glass not being insulative would definitely affect the performance if put in as a riser or burn chamber, and I hadn't considered that, so I'll scrap that idea for the time being. I may come back to that someday for other reasons.

For a longer lasting "see the inner workings" experiment, I like my idea of a 10" system cut in half with glass on the viewing side, and the normal materials, albeit halved and oversized, on the other side. I got the idea from watching Steve Mould videos, where he does this kind of thing with plastic all the time. Here is a link to one particularly relevant to permaculture:  

What I want and expect this (the BS Glass Bell experiment, specifically) to show is the EXACT moment when the smoke catches on fire and the stove starts to function at "phase 2" efficiency. Seeing that happen ... might help with progressing RMH technology in some way. It may not be all that relevant or worth the cost, but I had an idea and I wanted to put it in a few other brains, and it definitely got to some of the intended brains, so again, thank you for reading and commenting.

The side view experiment is probably a bit more obvious, but I would like a better way to "show" people what an RMH is and the current offerings of this site and youtube do not satisfy the person who wants to actually see what is going on inside and help them to understand the inner workings in a meaningful way. The drawings and diagrams and infographics are nice, but ultimately, are not something one can show a building inspector and expect them to understand.

I was at the RMH Jamboree in 2021(?) (I think the first one), and Paul wanted to experiment with his Juice Box Straw design. Things weren't working out like we expected after a week of experiments, and I think some "insight" into the inner workings of a RMH would have made the experimentation MUCH simpler and understandable. I don't know what happened with the Juice Box idea, it sounded good on paper, but we couldn't get the air flow right at the time. Being able to SEE the air flow inside likely could have given us enough information at the time to adjust appropriately and possibly give the idea some legs.

Lead in: I have always wanted to have a demo RMH to show people how they work. My plan is to build a pebble bench style onto a trailer that I can tote around. That got me thinking of viewing windows, and making a "half" RMH that was all flat glass on one side, and whether it would fire enough to be worthwhile and explain concepts (think a 10" system cut in half). That led me to thinking of a glass bell, which would be theoretically possible, if you could find a borosilicate (think Pyrex) "drum" of large enough size. 20L seems to be readily available, albeit spendy. Can you make a demo RMH that size? With a 4 gallon bell? Then I got to thinking, probably you could make the riser inside the bell out of borosilicate glass. And if so, why couldn't you make the whole engine of the thing out of glass?

Theoretical question: Since borosilicate glass performs well under flame, and has comparable temperature tolerances to good steel and fire brick, could you make the whole burn chamber, riser, and bell out of BS glass? The idea here is a demonstration RMH where people can see immediately what's going on inside, and experiment with changes when other parts of the RMH are adjusted. I am not suggesting this as a household functional RMH, but that may or may not be possible. I am suggesting a somewhat expensive experiment ($2-4k) to get the glass made by a local artisan, and create something worthy of an RMH Laboratory.

What do you think? A thought experiment if nothing else. I don't know if people have experimented with BS glass in any structural or functional part of an RMH, and that might be something worth pondering for the tinkers out there.

Matt McSpadden wrote:I wonder if the cat just killed all the mice and small rodents that the snake would have fed on... no food, and they leave.

Well, I feel a bit silly to not have thought of that obvious answer... Perhaps a rat terrier and a cat will end up being the right solution--to out compete the snakes. As much as I like the little critters, other than rattlers, I may need to accept reality on this one.

Anne Miller wrote:We had a problem with snakes aka rattlers until we got a cat.

Are you implying your house/barn cats killed rattlesnakes?

I am buying land with a known rattler problem and am trying to figure out the best solution, as I have a quiver of young kids. I am 99% opposed to getting cats. But if that will solve my rattler problem, I would consider it. Are you SURE it was the cats? Was it immediate, or did they kill the young population until the older one died out? Did you lose any cats?

I also have a big ground squirrel problem, but I think I'd prefer a rat terrier. I don't think the terrier will kill the snakes, albeit one may be overly interested, and I would be much more disappointed to lose an LGD or terrier to a snake.

I am very interested to see how your workshop goes. Please post successes and failures, ingredients, methods, etc. as well as PICTURES!

I am curious if you have gone to a workshop to learn the JP method before, or if this workshop is experimental? Have you had successful sustained JP style compost piles in the past, or are you going into this with theoretical knowledge? Are you building one EXACTLY like JP did with the same equipment and everything?

I can't come to the workshop, but I want to build one of these myself. I would like to limit my experimentation needed as much as possible and have scoured the internet for any tips and tricks that might make a 8ft height by 16ft diameter compost pile perform as advertised.

If you are coming at this with experience and theory, would you mind sharing some things you've learned or what some of your sources were?

I wish you all the success and will be tuning in for updates!

Ledum Palustre 200c is the homeopathic remedy for this. Should be available from the nearest health food store or the like. Amazon can get it there in a few days.

"Employ Ledum 200, every 4 hours or so [2 or 3 pillules, or drops of tincture, by mouth], until the puncture wound appears very much better. Then, continue to utilize Ledum 200, once daily for three weeks post-injury, as some literature has shown that Ledum can help guard against tetanus."

Myself, wife, and 6 kids have recourse to this remedy several times a year. We've never had an infection from a puncture wound yet, and some have been pretty bad. We use this for tick bites as well. This is all in addition to as much first aid/cleaning as necessary and possible.

FWIW,

I saw this thread because of the dailyish last week. I just had a well drilled and, at the time, I *felt* like the driller scammed me. He dowsed a spot with a Y shaped stick or piece of metal, I don't recall, and it pointed down basically where he said he thought it would. I watched him do it, but it was so quick and with no explanation, I felt like... why the show? We had discussed the geology and had already agreed that this particular draw was likely a good spot, but nonetheless, he wanted "confirmation". Fine; I was happy to see something new, and I was hoping dowsing would work. It just had a strong feel of confirmation bias.

So, they drilled start of January and hit first water around 140ft, and ended up drilling around 500 ft. We got somewhere between 1-2 gpm. I felt I got a little ripped off. The frequent phone calls while I was working over the 3 days they drilled largely consisted of "It's only another $1000 and we can go down another 40ft (roughly). Surely there will be a lot more water just a little deeper because that's where the dowsing rod pointed!" I now need to spend a lot more money on infrastructure than expected, and will likely drill a second well, once my bank account recovers. Fair enough, I knew the risks.

So, then I see this thread. I am heading out to the property anyway to get some firewood and move a trailer, etc. I look through some scrap and find 2 30" sections of 12 gauge copper wire. I straightened them out and bent them about 6" at one end. I want to see if this was a gimmick. On the way over to the new well, I am feeling the rods deciding how to hold them etc. and I figure, whatever, it's either going to work or not. As I approached the well, nothing had happened. I walked about 50ft out to the east and west before coming back to the well. (It is on an elongated flat spot running east-west). As soon as I get directly over the well, the rods cross. I tried again dozens of times, holding the rods different ways. I can't reasonably make them not cross right over the well. Okay. I also found a line going down the hill toward a large oak, then further straight to a large madrone. Hmm. I was there with 9 other people. Everyone interested in trying got similar results. None of us had ever dowsed before. I guess I didn't get scammed per se.

It is a large property and I tried two other locations about 1/4 and 1/2 mile west of the original spot, both near, but not at the bottom of, large draws (ravines). Same thing. Clear lines running N-S that 100% line up with the largest of the trees on my property. After looking back, I don't know why I never noticed all the large trees were in a line, but it is fairly thick for a chapparal forest, and they are roughly 60-100ft apart.

So, the phenomenon is real. I don't know how humans made the connection to water or other things it might find. I can't hardly stop thinking about this in the sense that I am devising experiments instead of sleeping to try to learn more about what's really going on.

One observation: This property used to be a very popular gold mine until WWII, and was one of the very few that was reactivated after it was no longer illegal to mine gold. I have over 1000ft of workings (tunnels) on the land and can clearly see where lines of quartz were followed through the winding tunnels. Some of the places where I got "hits" seem to line up 1:1 with quartz veins. Quartz is not only associated with gold and water, but also electricity. I saw a convincing documentary that theorizes that quartz veins were created by uplift and sinking of rock layers that compressed and superheated heavily sedimented ocean waters. The heat is what drew the gold into the quartz in the first place, possibly. Quartz fractures and decomposes much differently than the sedimentary rocks around it, so it is easy to see why water might naturally find its path of least resistance in a quartz vein.

So many questions... First things first, though. I NEED a map of the entire world with dowsing lines...

I left some notes in there today. A little late perhaps. Not sure what the time frame is for feedback. I haven't read any other excerpts, so I was shooting from the hip. I think over all it is pretty great, and I am excited to get my copy, however, I realize the comments can sound a bit negative, but of course, I am only trying to help improve the product. This was cool to get a glimpse, so thanks for posting this. Does every chapter get this treatment from the community? I might have to start paying closer attention.

Thanks for curating kickstarters for us, Paul Saw this on the dailyish; pledged for both books. Wish you much success, Lonny.