Preparedness for when

ALIBOBSY

OH drove past the local camping/army/prepper shop-called "the bunker" which says it all lol, and its closing down and having a big closing down sale. Sad for the owners and always bad news when a local shop goes down the pan, but as OH says as they are selling stuff off so worth a root around to see whats there, could do with some mess tins and other bits. Only trouble is OH loves the idea of camo clothing, been getting rid of t over the years since we got together and are down to one set on camo pants. I better hold him back or he might be tempted by the gas masks-boys and there toys eh lol.

Ali x

cornishchick

alice-mary wrote: »

Oh my, I hope I didn't come across as critical , I only meant that by reading the post I realised that I had better check on my own preps..... I'm sorry if I offended anybody and will now disappear back to my usual lurking.

Alice

No offence was taken my sweet now resume posting pdq

xCC

Besides. The fence has been knocked down by the wind so no fence to take........ bad pun in honour of BB:cool:

ragz_2

May have a need for the preps in a day or two... Does anyone follow space weather? Apparent a big CME erupted directly at earth today... Will post more tommorow when not on my phone. May be prudent to carry more cash in case satellites go funny?

nuatha

cornishchick wrote: »

Besides. The fence has been knocked down by the wind so no fence to take........ bad pun in honour of BB:cool:

Groan

cornishchick

nuatha wrote: »

Groan

Thank you I'm here all week and don't forget to try the reconstitution emergency food and tip your waiter:j

nuatha

cornishchick wrote: »

Thank you I'm here all week and don't forget to try the reconstitution emergency food and tip your waiter:j

Could I not tip the emergency food and try the waiter?

Yes, that's my coat

Cottage_Economy

Bedsit_Bob wrote: »

I was thinking earlier, how some people don't like the idea of paraffin lamps in the home.

An alternative is, of course, gas lanterns.

However, on investigation, I find the price of buying and running one rather :eek:

Take this one, the Gelert Mighty Lantern.

£15-98 from Amazon UK.

That's about 2.5 times the price of this Paraffin Hurricane Lantern.

Now we come to fuel costs.

A Paraffin Hurricane Lantern will burn for about 40 hours on 1 litre of paraffin, and 1 litre of paraffin costs about £1-50.

That gives us a cost of about 4p per hour.

Now to the gas lantern.

According to the description on Amazon, the Gelert Mighty Lantern uses 78 grams of gas per hour.

The cheapest price I've found, for a Coleman C500 gas cartridge, is £4-50.

It contains 445 grams of gas.

That gives us about 5.7 hours of use, which is about 79p per hour.

That's quite a difference.

Of course, the gas lantern does give out more light, but 3 Hurricane lanterns could be bought for about the price of one gas lantern, and those 3 Hurricane lanterns could be run for less than 1/6th the cost.

Not forgetting that, three lanterns can be used, simultaneously, in three different locations.

For the odd camping trip, the cost difference isn't a major concern (what's a tenner, for two gas cartridges, over a year?), and of course, one gas lantern occupies far less space in your pack, than three Hurricane Lanterns.

However, for long term use at home (and if you live in the back of beyond, you could be without power for days or even weeks), the cost of gas cartridges could well become significant.

Apologies if this has been brought up before, i don't get into the thread as often as I would like and I may have missed the discussion so sorry if I'm covering old ground.

One thing to consider with paraffin based lamps is they take oxygen from the air to burn, and give off some minor fumes and sometimes if poorly maintained carbon monoxide. More than one operating at the same time might consume a certain amount of breathable oxygen inside a house and make things a little fumey.

A temporary power outage would probably be ok, or a long- term situation where you would be able to access fresh air easily. In a prepping situation where your doors and windows had to be closed/sealed for a specific period if time possibly not. It depends what is being prepped for.

Tilley lamps can give off heat as well as light, but they can sputter a bit and always worried me so I consider those a last resort to use for me, but I still have one just in case.

When I was looking into this a few years ago I remember finding some threads on boating forums about the pros and cons of using lamps of various fuel sources. Might be worth a look on some if these forums, as many were living for days/ weeks using fuel-based lighting and heating. They may have some interesting insights on living with fuel-based burners on a daily basis for those interested in long-term usage. I remember someone saying for a great olde worlde atmosphere use hurricane lamps, for reading and detailed work use something else.

Also it's worth considering the lung function and immune systems of everyone in the property who will be exposed. Any asthmatics or those with allergies might need a trial run with the various fuels being considered to see if they react.

In the end I decided to have a wide range of different lighting gear to choose from depending on the situation and ventilation I had available.


On another unrelated topic, I went through all of my food and water preps a few days ago and fished out everything going out of date in the next couple of months and moved them to the kitchen to use/refill. I discovered I had forgotten to check my 72 hour emergency food preps and some if it had gone out if date. It's all packet stuff that can still be eaten with no ill effects, but I had completely forgotten to include it in my date rotations.

westcoastscot

nuatha, that's it - you made me splutter my tea over the keyboard! you lot have as weird sense of humour as me, which cant be good!

Nice to see new peeps posting, please don't re-lurk anyone - I don't come out to play often but read everyday and it's lovely to read new friends.

Right - off to work -my once a week 100 mile around trip today so need to top myself up with tea to do it.

WCS

beautiful_ravens

Hi,
I thought myself fairly well prepared for a not quite shtf scenario, until last week. Flooding - a river decided to flow around our house.
Now, it took a while to happen, but the worst thing about it was the toilet. Our drains and septic tank became full long before the floodwater actually reached the house...we had to stop using the toilet, and sinks. After only one day of a poopy-bucket, I left and took everyone up the hill to my mums house. We could have stayed much longer because the water got into the house very slowly. I might have been able to keep mopping it perhaps, I dont know.
My point is, when you can't use the sinks or toilet for whatever reason, things go down the pan [or not!] very quickly. What is the preppers solution to this?!

Cottage_Economy

beautiful_ravens wrote: »

Hi,
I thought myself fairly well prepared for a not quite shtf scenario, until last week. Flooding - a river decided to flow around our house.
Now, it took a while to happen, but the worst thing about it was the toilet. Our drains and septic tank became full long before the floodwater actually reached the house...we had to stop using the toilet, and sinks. After only one day of a poopy-bucket, I left and took everyone up the hill to my mums house. We could have stayed much longer because the water got into the house very slowly. I might have been able to keep mopping it perhaps, I dont know.
My point is, when you can't use the sinks or toilet for whatever reason, things go down the pan [or not!] very quickly. What is the preppers solution to this?!

In my preps I have a plan for cat litter after testing various types with our moggies. We use a biodegradable pine-based compressed pellet type of cat litter that comes in 20kg bags and we have a few of those stored in the house anyway. We pay about £12 a bag.

A bucket lined with a strong sac, a base of pine pellets that are added to after every use might allow you a good few days as long as long as you have somewhere appropriate to store the used bags once sealed up. If you can't use your water supply you'd have to prep for hygiene supplies to ensure your hands are cleaned well after each bucket use.

For a touch of civility and to avoid falling into the bucket I'd add a toilet seat to the top. And keep the lid down to keep the flies off. And accompany all small kids to the bathroom - all those pellets will be magnets for little hands!

By the way, this was in the mail this morning

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2535304/UK-weather-Remote-Somerset-property-island-flood-water.html

That's what I call a prepper!