 The start of a wonderful life .......
Sue n Bruce, 1997
|  Sue and I during a riding vacation in the Smokey Mtns. a while back, Sue riding our dearly departed friend Gerald Shenkman's Moto Guzzi and I was on my BMW R100RT. Great times were had riding all those mountain roads.
|  My favorite little tube tester,
The Sencore "Mighty Might."
|  A fantastic off grid inverter / split phase - and always CONTINUOUS HOUSEHOLD POWER even when your local power goes off - the EG4 6000XP runs from a battery bank that’s charged with your solar panels - also, the EG4 continues to run off battery bank when sun is gone - it automatically self charges the battery bank off the power grid when there is no sun - and if that’s not enough - the EG4 is putting out a pure sign wave to run your house @ 120 / 240 volts and giving you a full constant 25 AMP voltage supply, enough to run most all residential well pumps with ease.
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 Here are some statistics for the EG4 6000XP
And you can find more info along with excellent Tec support from Signature Solar -1-903- 441- 2090 - or 903 - 321- 7502 ( sales ) for great prices and always excellent Tec Support ! They have treated me excellent with helpful suggestions about solar projects.
|  The 6000XP mounted above the Li Fe PO4 battery bank.
|  The new battery bank equalizer for the Li Fe PO4 battery bank that keeps all batteries at same charge rate and voltage …….
|  1 of the 4 AGM batteries to be added to the li bank to bring capacity up to 600AH. These guys weigh in at 138 lbs - UGH !
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 Here is one fantastic little generator the 7.5 KW Firman.
I collect old generators and have quite a few around here but with all that said, one of my Onan RV generators cracked a ring and we had no way of getting anything going here for our freezers. I picked up this Firman and cranked it up and wow ! It ran for 11 days without a single hick up, and at that it ran an average of 12 hours on the 8 gallon tank or that would be about .6 gallons an hour !!! Stored it for almost a year when our power went out again. I was looking for a spare battery to crank it as I was sure the battery was dead …… NOT SO ! Fresh tank of fuel and that little 7.5KW rig cranked right up without any hesitation. What a generator ! What a battery ! If I was not convinced this is a great generator - it would not be posted here.
FIRMAN - Good as Gold !!
|  Such a stupid simple item here for picking up metal filings from drilling holes on your work bench. A plastic bottle with a short stick inside with a little round magnet glued to the end of the stick …… yea boy does this ever work good !
|  Here are the two parts that make it work - the stick with magnet and cleat plastic bottle.
Just put the magnet in first - put the cap on - and move the plastic container over the metal filings. ZIP ! - up they go on to the plastic bottle outside bottom. Lift it over your waste container and pull the stick out and all the filings drop off into the garbage - so simple so stupid and works like a charm !!!
|  WOW 1 look at this thing ……. It’s a new way of cooking food here in a vacuum sealed bag. It throughly cooks tough cuts of meat - chicken - fish - and more in circulating hot water. They use these in high end restaurants for getting perfect food cooked every time. You will see these things on the Cooking Chanel a lot in the kitchens there ……..
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 The unit is pretty easy to operate and ll clear on the set up screen for water temp - time for cooking - and vegetable's - meats - and more are cooked to perfection especially cheap tough cuts of meat like the chuck steak ….. that comes out tender as can be.
|  Another tower project in the works.......
|  Up over the treetops .....
|  Our little mini Berkshire piggy, Spats, has found Billy the border collie's dinner.
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 The jig is up!
Billy finds the culprit in the act.
|  Hey Mom! He's eating my food!
|  Our main gate at SW Spring High Glen on the 4th of July.
|  Service entrance gates being hung.
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 No, this is not a trombone, it is a two meter folded dipole antenna that works really great.
|  Emergency lighting for the shop here, using a reworked UPS ( computer power supply ) with larger AMG outboard battery with entrance light timer, and 4-100 watt daylight CFL bulbs that come on instantly with power line loss. A super simple system even a cave man could build ...... HA HA
|  Shop emergency CFL lamps hung ( over 8' high ), part of the cave man system .........
|  Here's a sixty's era Pioneer SR 202 Reverberation Amplifier, this reverb unit was made in Japan, I know, I brought one like this back in 67 from Yokosuka Japan where I was stationed. Someone lifted it from my shop a long time ago. So here's my replacement 40 yrs later. It has a unique sound all its own, and makes those old movies sound really great.
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 A whopper of a Variac. This one will handle 30 amps standing still.......ha ha....and it weighs in at about 30 lbs as well
|  Two matching 50 A Pyramid power supplies, I told Sue if we left them in the car trunk for a week, maybe they would have babies......
|  Spare 2N3771 output transistors
for the power supply's
( just in case ).
|  These are really cheap insurance for your household apliences, TVs, Refrigerators, microwaves, and light bulbs. They are what is known as an MOV ( metallic oxide varistor ) and if put across your breaker in the electrical panel, they will absorb the spike of voltage when it happens and, after many events it will finally short out and trip the breaker. ( I use a 130V @ 10A version, pictured here ) And then just replace it with another. These can last years and years depending on how clean your utility service is from your provider. They do save you a lot of trouble and expense and in bulk are about 20 cents each on eBay. I mount mine on a screw type terminal strip for easy replacement.
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 Here's an easy application of the MOV to a home breaker panel. This one is custom fit for a panel with a MOV on the load side of each breaker trying to catch any spikes or surges before they hit the household appliances and they are cheap insurance !
|  Finally got the little MOV group installed. Great addition to surge protection for the home. This way all critical circuits are protected especially my radio equipment !
UPDATE : We got struck by lightning and the house circuit that got struck, tripped the breaker with the MOV on it and no issues with all my radio equipment ! The MOV took the spike to ground and tripped the breaker before any damage was done !!!
|  Even though it resembles part of
"Willy Wonka's Chocolate Factory"
it is my animal automated watering system for the different corals here, chickens, goats, big hog, little piggies, turkey & rooster pen. An inexpensive lawn sprinkler timer and a hand full of solenoid valves, Sue got tired of carrying the water around in a pail.
|  Billy is not liking sitting next to a goat!
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 Sue takes the boy for a ride.
|  Another baby Saanen Dairy goat.
|  One of the 275 gallon tanks for reserve water here.
|  All four tanks parked and ready for action. These have a strong galvanized metal tubing for reinforcement when full.
Now there will be an intense plumbing project to follow.
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 Simple living in the country. With the global warming, we needed to keep as much of the sunlight out of the interior to help keep the AC working well. Even the dark tint on the windows produced a 98 * temp. Now with these ultra simple cheap awnings we dropped another 6 * inside now down to 72 inside and 89 outside. They are working great for about 12.00 each.
|  The simple frame works fine as the metal roofing has ridges and gives plenty of rigidity to the awning. Pressure treated 1-1/2" X 3/4 " firring strips were used for the frame and held togetrer with 3/4" stainless steel #4 screws. The strut support is 18 ga galv metal drilled 3/16 " holes and bent 90 * , also using same screws to attach them.
|  A close up of the support bracket and stainless screws.
The support struts are made from 1/2" EMT with flattened ends, drilled and a 1/4 20 rivet nut installed for ease of attachment with a 1/4 20 X 3/4" stainless bolt.
|  A brass barrel bolt secures the awning to the wall brackets on the window frame. When you put them up, just extend each barrel bolt and secure the awning in place and easy to take down for any cleaning or maintainance. They are so simple and work so well.
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