Yet Another reason to Prepare!

I went out to my car this morning and it gave me a another reason to think about backup heat for our house. Most people never think about there heat going out. I know why because there is no easy answer. I've been thinking about it quite a bit, and what I've been coming up with range of answers from solar to wood heat. I think we as a people should put more thought into it, and listen to our cars they might be trying tell us something!

Lesson's Learned Warranty and the Web

I purchased these side cutters for cutting my HO train track about 2 years ago, and  after about a year they broke as you can see. I have been meaning to get around to taking them back to where I bought them from, to see if I could get a replacement for them. They cost around $14.99. I couldn't find the receipt for them and I keep meaning to take them back but another year went by. I was cleaning my shop and on the computer looking at my blog when I came across the cutters and my post about the X-Arcade project and that was it! I wasn't going to make the same mistake twice so sense I was on my computer, I went to the website and emailed customer service a picture and how they broke and now we wait and see!

Update to the Soldering fume extractor project

This is an update to the Soldering fume extractor project. I added some white LED's to see what I'm working on. I salvaged the white LED's from broken led lamp that someone gave me.

I finely figured out what to make the base out of a friend of mine gave me a 4" steel roller from some type of machine I cut off a chunk with my band saw and drilled and taped a hole in the center to mount the arm to. I've found quite a bit use out of that roller never pass up free metal!

I also added a power supply and a on and off switch. Every thing on this project salvaged now I need to find a charcoal fish filter to hang on the back.

DIY coupon organizer's!

So I had allot of coupons laying around and not organized at all. Ya lets get real, I have a lot of stuff just laying around but coupons are a pain. When you go to the store there falling out of the cart your pocket you never know what you have and ya I could pay for a nice one at the checkout lane at the store, but you know me by now if your read this blog, I'm not buying one. I have way too much laying around I can just make one for free.

Step one free folder from some vendor catalog.

Step two some free CD protectors from some old software that has been upgraded. 

Step three cut them down so they fit the folder.

Step four put in folder and label each one section tab by type of coupons.

Step five the ones you cutoff to make it fit into the folder punch a hole through one corner  and take an old key ring with a clip and put it through the hole.

Now you can organize them at home take out the ones you want for your shopping trip and put it in your key ring holder and snap it to your cart and now your organize and doing something with that stuff just laying around your house. Final cost just time.

Movie Review Countdown to Zero

This is a must see for any one that thought the cold war was over. It is still a scary world out there! One of the more interesting comments in the move was if there was an all out nuclear war you would get 15 to 30 minutes warning max and we though people building bunkers in the 60's were crazy.It was also scary how many nuclear bombs the US has lost and how much nuclear material there is on the black market. All in all two thumbs up!   

DIY Emergency Lights

So I've been thinking about building some emergency lights for the basement for a while now. I was just at a conference and scored some jumbo white LED's from a DIY led throwies build and figured it was time to build the lights. A quick trip to the junk box for a few parts like some washers,nuts,screws,threaded rod,some angle iron and a light reflector from an old broken garden solar light.    

I figured I could screw them floor joist's in the basement so if the power goes out during a storm and we had to take shelter we could have light.

Now I need to get power to them a little wire and some screw terminals and little Perf board.

 So there up now for a test run!

We have light! It's just the right amount of light to see in the basement and it will run for a vary long time in a extended power outage. Now I just need a automatic switch to turn them on during a power outage well I guess will have to think about that for a wile and check the junk box. Not bad for 0 dollars!