Category: science kits

10:34 – I’m surprised that with all the comments yesterday, no one pointed out that I’d dated that entry 2015. Fixed now.

Still more kit stuff on tap for today. Barbara has a busy week, including a trip down to Winston tomorrow, so we interleave all the kit stuff on a time-available basis. We’re never short of stuff to do.

One of the items on my to-do list is checking into the details of our well. I’ve been thinking about having a 24VDC or 48VDC submersible pump installed to replace the current well pump, assuming our well depth is within its capacity. That could be driven by an ordinary transformer during normal times, and directly by solar panels or solar-charged deep-cycle batteries in a long-term emergency. The ShurFlo 9300 model I looked at pulls only 4 amps max at 24VDC, has a maximum lift of 230 feet, and delivers just under two gallons per minute at max depth. In a pinch, it could be driven directly by one 18V 100W panel, although two panels with a charge controller would be better.

Solar well pumps are a mature technology. They’ve been used widely for years, particularly in the arid western states for unattended livestock watering systems. Their service life is rated at 5 to 10 years, and repair kits are available. I suspect we’ll end up installing one eventually, but for now I’m reasonably happy with the generator and rainwater harvesting for backup. We could run the well pump on generator to produce 100 gallons per day using only 4 or 5 gallons of gasoline per month. Rainfall is pretty reliable around here. In the last six months, we’ve gotten measurable rain probably every week. We’ve had between 3.2 and 4.0 inches of rain per month since we moved here in December of last year, typically a quarter inch to a full inch at a time, and even the summer months have regular rainfall. In a pinch, we could store several hundred gallons of captured rain, which would be enough to carry us through any dry spells.

Back to work on science kits.

09:41 – I didn’t remember until after dinner yesterday that it was the 49th anniversary of the day that Billie Joe McAllister jumped off the Tallahatchie Bridge.

We just started rewatching the HBO series Rome on Amazon streaming. It’s historically inaccurate, but what drives me really nuts is that the characters all pronounce Latin words very badly. Jool-ee-us See-zur instead of Yool-ee-us Kie-ssar. Siss-ur-oh instead of Kee-kur-oh, Kay-toe instead of Kah-toe, Tye-tus instead of Tee-tus, Loo-see-us instead of Luke-ee-us, and so on. Mrs. Shreffler, my junior high Latin teacher, would have rapped all their knuckles. They also don’t understand the most extraordinary characteristic of Caesar as a military commander: his ability to move huge numbers of men and heavy equipment large distances in incredibly short times. Historically, that’s been the notable characteristic of the best ground commanders, from Alexander to Caesar to Gustavus Adolphus to Nathan Bedford Forrest (get there first with the most…) to George S. Patton. Caesar redeployed in literally days what his opponents expected to take weeks, giving them a nasty shock by doing so. Patton did the same during the Ardennes Offensive.

Barbara is out doing yard work. She’s always wanted to get rid of the rotting pile of firewood down in the back corner of the yard. I’d told her months ago that that was fine, but I wanted to have a cord of new firewood before we did that. She thought the pickup load we got in last month fulfilled that, but I was speaking of a literal cord rather than the face cord we had brought in. That was roughly 40% of a full cord. I told Barbara yesterday to go ahead and have James haul off the old rotting stuff, but I wanted to make it a very high priority to build a couple more firewood racks and get another couple pickup loads of new firewood stacked in them.

We’re building chemistry kits this weekend. This batch will take us up to reasonably good stocking levels going into June; about three dozen finished chemistry kits, two dozen biology kits, and a dozen forensics kits. Once we get that done, it’ll be back to labeling and filling more bottles, building more subassemblies, and building more finished kits. By the beginning of August, we’ll have bunches of kits stacked up and ready to ship.

Also this weekend, weather allowing, we’re going to plant some test seeds in our garden as well as some herbs in pots on the deck.

09:27 – We’re building more science kit subassemblies today, which we’ll be doing pretty much every day for the next two or three months. I issued purchase orders yesterday for a couple thousand dollars worth of components, which covers most of what we were short of.

We’ve devoted most of our time this week to getting science kit subassemblies built for the autumn rush, so there hasn’t been much time for prepping activities. I did order and receive from Amazon a gallon of molasses, which is used in cooking and baking to turn white granulated sugar into brown sugar, at a ratio of one tablespoon of molasses per cup of white sugar, and a couple cans of high-temperature flat black spray paint, which we’ll use in converting 2-liter soda bottles into gardening pots for herbs and other plants that do well in containers.

After 35 years of drinking coffee only occasionally, I’ve started drinking it regularly. One, or sometimes two, 10-ounce (~300 mL) mugs every morning. I’ve been playing around with different concentrations, and I’ve decided that 10 grams of ground coffee is enough for a 10-ounce mug. That means I get about 45 mugs per pound, or about 135 mugs per 3-pound can. At about $12 per three-pound can, Costco-branded Columbian coffee is about as good as any I’ve tried, and three of those cans is a one-year supply for one person, assuming one 10-ounce cup per day. Barbara and Frances don’t drink coffee. Al drinks much more than I do, but he also likes his coffee much weaker than I do, so six or seven cans should be plenty for the two of us. In the metal cans, the coffee has a long rated shelf life and I’m sure it’d still be fine for at least several years past the best-by date, so there’s no real down-side to keeping a good supply in our LTS pantry.