I got all the bearings and gears removed from my wore out cutter bar housing and then got on the phone and started pricing a new one. $947 plus tax was the lowest price I found !!!
Looks like I’m going to be welding thin places and holes for a while . Wish me luck .
Hurts me watching this. Its lots of work. My neighbour just had a similar apart a few monts back, one of the bearings shattered and did some damage.
Our 6 feet Vikon has sacrificial plated bolted underneeth. Hope it lasts some time…
Excellent learn-by-doing wisdom’s in this story ChrisKY.
Lessons learned back in the 1970’s/early 1980’s was when I developed the practical concept of living Grid-lite.
FULL modern level of Energy-Independence has a price-cost where the Independnece part of it must out weight all other concerns to work.
I seasonal heat with my own grown tree wood NOT because it is cheaper/easier!! The wood-sweating is “free” gym dues. Saves going to the gym car gas too. And that way I CONTROL my heat.
tree-farmer Steve unruh
I think it was in 1983 when the organization here that we work with built a very large methane digester using chicken litter from local agribusiness houses. they used plastic, but didn’t buy the right kind and it dissolved in a couple weeks. Maybe from the ammonia, I don’t know. This stuff would not, I think. I think you are right, it would hold gas. My oldest son Luke is doing a school project this year----building three different methane digestors. Maybe we need to think about a plastic bag. we were planning some sort of inner tube bladder for one…We unrolled one roll today and used it to cover the side garden. It was over 30’ wide and over 300’ long. I want to kill off a few different kinds of invasive weeds. We have some kind of grass here that came in from down south, some say it’s from China. It will grow straight through regular plastic mulch. I think this may kill it though. When we unrolled it, it was full of fermenting soy beans and black soldier fly larvae. Good stuff…Gotta love those Black Soldier Flies…
Steve, I like your concept of “grid lite”. I feel if that option was available, I would have a big fridge and deep freezer. We may even have a window AC unit and all the handy kitchen gadgets we had in the city. Living without for the past year provided a new ‘normal’ and learned to live with out. We make toast on out gas stove. We don’t use a clothes dryer, even in the winter. Inconvenient?Yes but doable.
We watch our battery level constantly. We adjust some of our uses to when it’s going to be sunny. Our water is heated only when needed. I love the on demand water heater. So does the wife. She gets to use the old claw foot bathtub and soak in a bath. We have only used 50% of 200 gallons of Propane in 2 years. Don’t get me wrong, we don’t do without. We are just more energy wise. We bought a smaller energy efficient TV and the satellite internet is always on.
I just bought a used efficient wood stove for $200. A man just called me from my Craigslist ad and wants my old parlor stove for $100. Basically I spent $100 to save a lot of wood processing for upcoming years.
I’m not sure we could have disciplined ourselves if we had electric or gas brought to our little homestead. This has forced us to come up with new solutions. Our gas and electric for our house cost us $800-1000/year. We could spend that in 3-4 months in the city.
Good article Chris. My impression is that like most back to the landers, the couple had excellent motivation, but failed at the level of essential skills and common sense. Nearly all urbanized people fail on those grounds, not knowing what and what not to do, and how to relaistically adjust their expectations outside of their urban frame of reference. Or how to even fix a leak in a water tank, or keep veggies safe from chickens…
I also question the land base for their goals, I have read closer to 2 acres expertly managed could be sufficient in a temperate climate, tropical won’t be greatly better due to the lesser daylight energy.
Grid systems and economies of scale are valid, but depending on life goals and how close to the grid one wants to live. Seems like these folks just tuckered out.
They have many bio digesters in energy starved places. India, China, and Israel all produce different sizes and versions. Here is some from china. I’ve looked into many of these and this is one of the better ones. Israel has a small one like this but I didn’t like talking to them.
I have specs in pdf documents if anyone wants them, Idk how to upload them here.
Picked up this new chainsaw earlier this year. This was the first time we got to use it. My neighbor Wayne who sells firewood was more than happy to help taking out the second tree for some free wood. He really liked the model I picked out. The second tree was post oak and was rotting just like it’s cousin.
I once used an air mattress as a gas bag.
The failure rate for homesteaders is actually pretty high. It is a lot more work then most people expect, and harder to generate income. But yes, most of it is because you aren’t exposed to the same problems in urban areas, and you usually don’t have a machine shop next door to fix it for you. Farming is a lot harder then most people expect.
The article is more or less right getting the first 50% renewable is fairly easy. Achieving 100% is a lot more work at this point. What he didn’t mention is kauai is realizing cost savings from their solar plus storage system. Even if they weren’t, it is easier to operate and it is a consistent price so they aren’t going to get burned with higher oil prices again. If we can get to 50% renewables easily and cost effectively, it is really worth doing just to keep prices from going up because of higher fuel costs.
I think they pay like 25ckwh plus a 50 dollar/mo connection fee on some parts of the island, and some of the islands have unreliable power due to frequent load shedding. Then you have longer outages due to winds. Part of the extra expense is you have to drill through volcanic rock to set the poles. Plus they hadn’t done much of anything to upgrade their grid since it was installed which was with the help of the army corps of engineers, and WWII surplus equipment as part of their bid for statehood.
Can you find a parts machine at an auction somewhere? Seems like you might find one with some other problem for that type of money.
I know I cant say enough about going lithium with my system. the previous 15 years with lead acid there was a many days I asked why what am I saving is it worth the extra hassle ,maintenance ,noise who knows .
since the battery change I wish I had did it sooner almost no generator run time this converts to no money out there and no bat maintenance . and we run more things than ever before and this has been one of the worst weather seasons in years steve is getting all the sun rain has been east for months . and still doing good .
Hello Dan .
I have an old spare parts machine but the cutter bar housing is no good on it also. Years ago I did find a used cutter bar but this season I have had no luck finding a used one.
I have taken a gamble and tried to weld up all the holes and pitted areas . LOT of welding the last couple of days . Some areas seemed kinda like trying to patch the holes in rabbit wire 
I think what this couple has experienced is the typical Rural-Livng: “two-steps forward - and then one step backwards”. But in their case they are adding up the “one step backwards” in three areas as a walk-a-way reasoning:
Not able to be totally fossil-fuel free.
Not able to completely grow enough/variety of food stuffs to not have to store buy-out.
Not able to Rural-living generate a sustainable income.
I just returned from our annual County Fair. Underneath the chills and thrill rides; the barking commercial vendors, this is still an ag-living fair.
In the Grange Association building was a six-person youths project display with them each documenting growing basil, leeks, and potatoes under different conditions of soil temps; north/south greenhouses exposures; well water versus river water versus captured rain water. They were graded by their controls, observations, AND their proposed improvements
for next growing season.
The FFA (Future Farmers of America) building had youths contesting and documenting in-soil, open air growing of squashes and tomatoes. ALSO a part of their grading was their plans for improvements next growing season.
The Four-H section had the 15 year old Blue-Ribbon winning girl picturing, charting, and graphing out her NEW from pasture converted 1000 square foot diverse kitchen garden. Past ground tilling up this had to be a solo project. And her zukinni squash against three other zukinni growers in pots and established garden space won a Blue ribbon too.
Her this-seasons set-backs she listed was:
Too cold and wet of Spring delaying early seed/plants growths.
Ist year as vegetable garden and the pasture soil was not base fertile enough.
Water source too far from the garden spot making her skimp on watering once we turned seasonal too dry.
And she dreamed too big of garden, and could not keep ahead of the weeds.
Her next-year, I will do better plans then addressed, each and every one of these.
The young island couple set sights on too many lofty goals; bound to have not-works, and set-backs.
Lose sight that they DO now live out, clean and fresh air, with the minimal possible “others” dictating what and how they must do things.
So in fact have gained far more than they appreciate. An over half-full glass-of-life.
And children have been growing up Rural for centuries with minimal problems. Get a dog. A dog breed that will make the child-minding it’s job. Every good dog want a job to do. not like there are snakes, wolves and child-molesters behind every bush.
Heck, my pole beans doing terrible this year - just have to drip-hose them like in the past next year. The heat has cause all of the lettuces, broccoli to bolt. The heat causing cauliflower to just leaf - not fruit.
BUT! I have been eating vine ripen tomato’s 30 days early! We have all of the corn ears tasseled out, now filling out 30 days early. Big, juicy plump cabbages. Squashes and cucumbers out the ears now.
Beets, rutabaga’s, potatoes, and now finality parsnips coming on - looking good.
That’s gardening. That’s farming. That’s Rural living. Not ALL ever, all makes it. Ma’ Natures way. She spews over-seeding to the winds. Let the seeds fall where they may just as long as some take root, to thrive. Live diverse, overlapping, redundant. Life-fully, and lively.
It has always been hard for city-folk to learn these things.
Our last 30 years Just-In-Time Culture makes this especially hard to transition too.
“Failure is just a learning experience to do better next time.”
tree farmer Steve unruh
I never was urban, but we “homesteaded” for a few years after we came home from school in Auburn. I guess that’s what you call it. I don’t know the real definitions of the terms----but we grew all our own food (>90%) and made all our own power except gasoline (vehicles), soap, household supplies, tools, healthcare, butchering, trade work, black smithing, horse/mule farming/logging, etc… etc… Lived on a couple-3 thousand dollars a year. Figured out it takes a lot of time and a lot of energy. Also found out that one has to change more about the way they think than you figure up front too. But I am convinced we could have lived that way indefinitely. Mostly I think the X factor in successful homesteading comes right down to what you are willing to live without. That’s the bottom line. Taking expectations from modern American suburbia into an “independent lifestyle” is a recipe for failure. It’s possible to get there over time, But nobody just jumps in from the suburbs and makes it all happen right away. Significant amounts of capital can shorten the time some, but it still takes some. You can think of any given function in a vacuum and foresee yourself successfully accomplishing it. But if you try to add 50 functions together and try to do them all the hard way, from scratch…well it all adds up and can get discouraging. Making soap is easy enough, unless your also baling hay by hand, and washing clothes by hand, and milking by hand, and making butter by hand, and making your own vinegar, and canning 3000 qts a year, etc…etc… all at the same time. There’s a reason the industrial revolution has had the effect it did. Same thing is true in survival situations in the wilderness. You just simply have to lower expectations for your level of lifestyle. Maybe you can catch a fish to eat, but not at the same time that you are building a shelter or making a fire with a stick. Whatever the definition of successful homesteading is, it has to be accepted up front that it includes a deliberate step into a lower lifestyle.
Excitement, commitment and determination will carry you for a while, but eventually most people start asking themselves, “why are we doing this again?” And at that point, they either have a good answer or they don’t. For me it came down to the question, "Is doing everything on my own like I am at this point as important as being able to have time and energy and resources to help other people?“My answer was eventually, “No, I want to have time for other things.” So we use the grid, we buy a little more of our food, we work more out to make more money. Fact is, I like modern technology. Just can’t let it rule your life.” I took my city girl wife from suburban Houston TX to Amish horse & buggy, outhouse, cabin, james washer, oil lamps and then back a few steps. She’s great. Maybe others have different experience. That’s just some of mine. And like I said I don’t know what is really meant by “homesteading”. Probably, by suburbia’s standard, I am still a homesteader. Or as I call it, a prepared American. I encourage all suburbanites to go back to “homesteading”…even if they can’t figure out a clear definition for the word. They just need to keep their expectations realistic…and timely…
Very eloquent, you have summed it up. The consumerist culture prevails because it is the easiest and most rewarding path if you accept your role in it, which for most is to exchange specialized labour for money, that all levels of the system then feed off. Which I believe is the real truth behind pushing women into paid work, to monetize and extract value from half the populations’ labour. The situation is precarious for all though, most people now don’t know how to heat their homes, keep their own food, and much less produce any, sewing machines go to the garbage dump, clothes are throw away. Shoes are throw away. Most people have hardly the skill to change a tire. It’s a beautiful life offered, but it leaves people to live effectively as children.
It isn’t necessary to make your own sewing needles and files, but I would like to say that most people had the common sense of their grandparents to at least know the gist of things, and in a pinch do it themselves.
I believe work for oneself has dignity. I have no royal blood in my veins, and don’t admire a life of leisure as a goal. We are built like sports cars, to work. And like sports cars granny driven, we will carbon up if lazy. And as a population it’s obvious that people are far from adequate physical challenge.
This is a good reference book for methane digesters. I have one, you can still find them on used book sites.
Also look up “Mother Earth News plowboy interview with Ram Bux Singh”.
Here are some updated plans
http://www.solarcities.eu/education/388
(video tutorial https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cwm5Rm8uIsk )
or for 900 bucks you can just buy a system
I get the feeling, from reading this, that people confuse pioneers with homesteads/settlers. As the business man would say "pioneers get slaughtered and settlers/homesteaders prosper. Didn’t most early homesteaders settle around small towns…
http://www.saskschoolsinfo.com/settlers6.html
If I was smart I could figure out how to live simple, not pour a ton of resources back into the system but yet take full advantage of it.
Yeah, I love dumpster diving. And I love selling storage sheds to people who don’t need them, that use them to store a bunch of stuff they obviously don’t need. Makes my living making much easier.
