Category: Fuel Storage & Distilling

From the SurvivalBlog Archives: Start With a “List of Lists”

Start your retreat stocking effort by first composing a List of Lists, then draft prioritized lists for each subject, on separate sheets of paper. (Or in a spreadsheet if you are a techno-nerd like me. Just be sure to print out a hard copy for use when the power grid goes down!) It is important to tailor your lists to suit your particular geography, climate, and population density as well as your peculiar needs and likes/dislikes. Someone setting up a retreat in a coastal area is likely to have a far different list than someone living in the Rockies. As …


Letter Re: Best Items to Store for Barter and Charity?

Mr. Rawles, My wife and I are are in our 50s, (never had kids) and we live in a four bedroom house on 80 acres (mostly leased out [for farming]), eight miles outside a town of 20,000 population, in south-central Iowa. Two of our cousins and one nephew–all military vet[eran]s–that live in town are planning to come out [and live with us], if and when times get nasty. We have now have (or will soon have) all our basic preparations in hand, including a three year food supply for five people, which we got mostly through Safecastle and Ready Made …


Prepare or Die, by J. Britely

Throughout my life I have been caught unprepared several times and while nothing seriously bad happened, it easily could have.  I have been lost hiking.  My car has broken down in very bad neighborhoods – twice.  I have been close enough to riots that I feared they would spread to my neighborhood, been in earthquakes, been too close to wildfires, been stuck in a blizzard, and have been without power and water for several days after a hurricane.   I managed to get myself out of each situation, I thanked God, and tried to learn from my mistakes.  I could have …


The ‘Perfect’ Bug Out Vehicle, by Crazy Frenchman

Introduction. Not all of us can quit our jobs and live year-round at a permanent retreat. Yet some of us may be able to afford a semi-permanent retreat (e.g. vacation home), at least partly stocked (a.k.a. main supplies), and located within reasonable ‘travel time’ to the city where we work. As a catastrophic event would unfold, you would bug out ahead of the crowds. Otherwise you could begin by staying in your house, assess the situation, and never actually bug out. If the situation would deteriorate besides all hope, then bugging out would become a sound option. As part of …


Letter Re: I Told You So

Jim: My pessimistic mentor in preparedness frequently says: “I hate being so d*mn right all the time!” I can’t help but wonder if you share the sentiment. I’m beginning to do so! The more I read the current news about market volatility, Peak Oil, and CCD the more I am reminded of the pieces I wrote and you published on SurvivalBlog months ago! The full texts are still available in your archives and the advice is still valid! For new readers and to refresh the memory of others here are a few quotes pulled out of the late in 2006 …


Letter Re: Switchgrass for Ethanol Production

Dear Jim, I just discovered SurvivalBlog.com in November 2007. I have bought two of your books so far. We are working on our lists, in the meantime I am building FIFO shelving for the canned part of our provisions. We thank God for you, your great work, and The Memsahib’s support of this. I’m not so sure this article will be a fit, but it is good news nevertheless. From Scientific American: Grass Makes Better Ethanol than Corn Does. The USDA and farmers took part in a five-year study of switchgrass, native to North America. They found that switchgrass ethanol …


Letter Re: Burning Soft Maple Wood as a Primary Home Heat Source

Jim: A few comments about the article discussing soft maple as a “softwood” firewood. Technically, Soft Maple is not [classified as] a softwood, it is a hardwood. That being said, yes it is a fine firewood – sometimes better that hard maple because it dries faster. I’ve heated my farm house and barn 100% with wood for many years. I also own several 100 acre-plus stands for “hard” and “soft” maples. A softwood is a needle-bearing conifer and a hardwood is a broadleaf deciduous tree. Some softwood trees have harder and stronger wood then many hardwood trees. Yellow Pine is …


Letter Re: Burning Soft Maple Wood as a Primary Home Heat Source

Hi Jim, I have set out on an experiment in heating my home that has been interesting and is important to relay to other readers as their are many questions about using Soft Maple as a heat source. My experiment follows nearly a lifetime of wood burning, tree felling, splitting, chimney cleaning lifestyle and is of course not from a “professional”, so ask a professional when experimenting with home heating. I have used wood only heating in my current home for five years with 100% safety and 1,000% enjoyment. Before that, I had 11 years of consistent home heating by …


Letter Re: Thanks to Congress, Ethanol and Biofuel Mandates Cause Food Prices to Soar

Jim, You may have noted the article titled Thanks to Congress, Ethanol and Biofuel Mandates Cause Food Prices to Soar, before and I missed it. The article [by Dana Joel Gattuso a senior fellow at the National Center for Public Policy Research–a conservative think tank] is very interesting. I can’t vouch for the veracity of the report, or the organization, however, it doesn’t do anything to lessen my fears that any congressional involvement in the energy business only makes things worse. Here are a few scary quotes from the article: ” …ethanol requires enormous quantities of water, a valuable resource …


Letter Re: Sources for Gasoline and Diesel Fuel in a Grid-Down Collapse

Jim: Here is a suitable electric pump that will lift fuel from underground tanks. It is 12 Volts DC, Facet Duralift pump , Facet part #40223 / Carrier part # 30-01108-01 SV (available from Carrier Transcold dealers.) They are typically used for commercial truck refrigerators. This pump is self priming to 120 inches (3 meters). Its designed to lift fuel 10 feet straight up. It is not cheap, at an average price of $125 from the dealer, but it works. I have one on my ’88 F250 7.3 IDI Diesel to solve fuel delivery problems. It also has a see-through …


Sources for Free Survival and Preparedness Information on the Internet, by K.L. in Alaska

Recent comments in SurvivalBlog provided excellent advice on using the public library. You can gain lots of knowledge with no expense, then purchase only those books you want to keep on hand for personal reference. Also, many colleges and universities loan to local residents, so you can use them too, even if you aren’t a student. If your local libraries participate, a great resource is Worldcat. It lets you search for books from home, then go check them out, or get them through interlibrary loan. What will happen to the Internet when the SHTF? There’s no guarantee it will survive. …


Two Letters Re: Sources for Gasoline and Diesel Fuel in a Grid-Down Collapse

Hi Jim, I work for a general, solving problems in the Middle East. Fixing vehicles is easy, its fixing the people that’s hard… I love your stuff on SurvivalBlog and thought I’d add: There are plenty of submersible type improvised fuel pumps will fit down into a 3″ pipe. Background is that GM and most other manufacturers’ in-tank fuel pumps are part of a tank ‘module’ which includes the fuel gauge sending unit, pressure feed, return feed, and evaporative emissions sensor. The pump is designed to run when submersed in fuel. I’ll get some part numbers if you would like …


Two Letters Re: Sources for Gasoline and Diesel Fuel in a Grid-Down Collapse

Mr. Rawles, A good out-of-the-box solution to diesel fuel transfer comes from Northern Tool & Equipment, item #360. I use mine for diesel, waste vegetable oil, and heating oil. One nice feature is that it pumps at 10 gpm. That’s moving a lot of fuel in a short period of time. I usually run mine off a 12 VDC jumper battery. Water often sits at the bottom of storage tanks. You really don’t want to pump that into your vehicle. A quick and cheap modification of the pump assembly solves the problem. I spliced in two feet of 1 inch …


Letter Re: Hunkering Down in an Urban Apartment in a Worst Case Societal Collapse

Hello, In the event of a disaster (I live in New York City) I intend to shelter in place until all the riotous mobs destroy each other or are starved out. I am preparing for up to six months. I have one liter of water stored for each day (180 liters) and about 50 pounds of rice to eat as well as various canned goods. I have not seen on your site anything about heat sources for urban dwellers who intend to shelter in place. I’m assuming that electricity would go first soon followed by [natural] gas and running water. …


Letter Re: Coleman Fuel–Uses and Storage Life

Hi Jim, According to Coleman’s web site, Coleman fuel can be stored for 5 to 7 years. I wondered if a chainsaw with the correct oil additive run on Coleman fuel. So I did a web search, and this is what I found, over at the Timebomb 2000 (Y2K) Discussion Forums, posted back in 1998] – E.L.: Coleman Fuel the Final Word! Boy What did I start? I have seen more rumors and half truths about Coleman fuel since I posted that it did work on engines!! Coleman fuel is a very highly refined version of gasoline! It has no …