brian keath

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since Apr 16, 2022
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escaping the city but in tragically slow motion
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Oregon, USA
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Recent posts by brian keath

Hi Greg,
I just stumbled upon your post, I hope you're making ends meet.  I'm not great at sprouting business ideas, but Jack Spirko frequently talks about this stuff on his podcast at https://www.thesurvivalpodcast.com/.  Searches for terms like `side-hustle` and `income` match posts that might be helpful, maybe also https://www.thesurvivalpodcast.com/home-v-homestead-24 about moving a home from liability to asset.
1 month ago
The body of most harddrives is a chunk of aluminum, so if you're into casting, you can melt that and use it.  Aluminum tends to oxidize very quickly during a melt, so melting thin stuff like beverage cans has a relatively low yield of usable metal, but harddrives should be much better.  I think I have a couple dozen waiting for the day I finally get around to doing some casting.  I'd love to make a Gingery-style lathe
1 year ago
There's some good info here on Linseed oil.  As several others have mentioned, boiling (either with heat or with additives) is to speed the "drying" process (it dries through oxidation and polymerization, not through evaporation).

Here are a few more bits I've pulled from Stephen Shepherd's Shellac, Linseed Oil, & Paint:
  • heat boiling is done at 300*F
  • the flash point is 420*F, be wary of fires if you try to heat-boil without good temperature control
  • once some linseed oil is boiled (or otherwise the polymerization has been jump-started), it can be added to other (raw) linseed oil to boil the whole; the book suggests 25% boiled to 75% raw

  • some other ways to speed the polymerization process (all of these can be used as "seeds" to "boil" a quantity of raw oil and mentioned above):
  • blown linseed oil has had air forced through it (the access to oxygen thus allowing the process to begin for oil not at the surface)
  • sun thickened linseed oil is made by leaving raw linseed oil in a clear container (glass is probably best) and placed in the sun; the viscosity increases throughout the polymerization process
  • stand oil is heated to 550*F for a long period of time; it becomes very viscous


  • Regarding oily rags, this oxidation process releases heat, and a pile of oily rags can easily become hot enough to spontaneously combust.  Dispose of your rags properly.  The simple way is to hang them to dry out doors where the heat dissipates as fast as it's produced.  The "industrial" way is to submerge them in a container of water, then pay to have them hauled away somewhere.

    Also note that linseed oil can be used to make cloth or leather waterproof (oilcloth, oilskins) or to make tack  cloth (for removing fine dust from wood before applying a finish).  Perhaps a rag from applying linseed oil as a finish can also have another life in your shop after being allowed to safely dry.
    2 years ago

    Marjorie Vogel wrote:What a timely post! I had an idea the other day and have yet to experiment with it.
    I've been picking up the sections of an old concrete silo from the farm my husband works at.  I would put five in the back of our SUV when I dropped him off each morning and now have a nice stack that I knew would someday be useful. Each piece is 2' wide and 3 1/2' long. They are corrugated, formed concrete with tongue and groove channels on all sides. They are meant to interlock in a circle, and then be stacked. The silo itself has metal bands every four courses to hold it together. Of course a silo holds all the weight inside. I know I can make round raised garden beds from one course. I'm wondering if I could make this kind of wall for a bed and just secure it by partially burying it?



    Because they are separate pieces, I think they would need to be fastened together to stay together.  Partially burying them would help, especially if the soil at and below ground level is well compacted both inside and out.  But you may also have trouble with frost-heave forcing them to move.  You could try it, and if it doesn't work save them for another project.
    2 years ago

    craig howard wrote:I'm not sure those curvy brick walls could handle dirt piled up behind them.
    Seems like it could cause them to expand and crack.



    I would expect this as well.  The shape is sufficient to keep the wall from falling over, but to fill them with dirt I would put ties between the walls to prevent the outward collapse.
    2 years ago

    Jenn Lumpkin wrote:Seems like things are getting really weird ... to me.
    Reading this, I just would like somebody who understands these things to forewarn me ... I guess this IS the forewarning.  
    If I could figure out what to do, I'd do it, but ... holy mackerel.   What's going to happen?   (btw, this link takes you to the "comments" at the bottom but Just go on up to read from the top.).  If you read it ... which I hope somebody will and then ... what to do, whut to do?   Like "trust He will provide for us," well that's a fine policy ... might just have to rely on that.  He's done it so far.



    Yes, the events we see unfolding every day are the warning (and it's hard to overstate the importance of Russia announcing they're going back to the gold standard).  No one can tell you (in advance) the exact moment to move.  Start early.  Produce as much of your needed food as possible; beat inflation by owning hard assets rather than dollars (ideally appreciating assets like real estate); stock your pantry, have some water on hand.  And be wary of debt.  Debt is the primary instrument used to control people in the modern world.
    2 years ago

    K Eilander wrote:
    As far as backups go, I'm using SyncTrayzor, which is the windows ui version of Syncthing though there are mac, linux, and android versions as well (all opensource) The important thing is the tool backs up data between my own computers.  All it does is watch for files that change and then copies them back and forth when it detects the other computer/device is online.   Set and forget.  Works great.



    Note the huge difference between backup and sharing.  SyncThing is for sharing.  It is not for backups.  If you delete a file, SyncThing will dutifully propagate that operation even if you did it by mistake.  If you delete a file and you have backups, the backup copies are still available.
    2 years ago