Tuesday, June 13, 2017
too hot...
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Life off the grid in the SW Texas desert. An experiment in sustainable living. NUMBERS AT THE END OF EACH BLOG POST: temp at 8PM,high temp,low temp,rainfall,wind conditions(CalmBreezyWindyGusty). YouTube Channel https://www.youtube.com/c/TheFieldLab Daily live streams at https://www.youtube.com/thefieldlab/live
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22 comments:
Wow ... that's a lot of zeros! Kinda surprised 50% tough it out. What does Ben think of the heat?
And summer isn't even officially here yet.
SAM - If anyone (or any longhorn) has never experienced how great any device is that cools the air we live in - they don't miss it like I do now. This is from my personal experience. As a youth - I lived in 25 miles north of Houston, Texas in the 1950's and we had no air conditioning - despite the fact this is a hot location - with very high humidity levels. We did have an attic fan - that kept air moving in our house and created a cooling effect by evaporating our perspiration. My only experience back then - was with the cold air in the local movie house. None of our schools nor churches had air-conditioning. But we did not feel deprived at all - of this lack of air conditioning.
And it is very very hot at Terlingua in the month of July. I remember a trip there one summer (before we installed our air conditioning) that we cooled off by draining ice water from our food & drink cooler and taking a shower with that water. The next day we relocated to the Indian Lodge up north of there in the mountains & and the rooms we rented were air conditioned. They also had a swimming pool with very cool water. Once we get used to living in air conditioning in Texas - it is difficult to live without it - during our hot Texas summers.
RONALD ... The good old days. Mine were spent in Kentucky in the 1950's. The heat back then could be solved with a big cold, wet bottle of Nehi orange pop. We were tougher back then!
When I was out there in late September in the late afternoon I stopped briefly to rest after letting my dogs previously do their business tied up down along the road and for me to have a coke at the American Legion. I had to keep the car running with the air conditioner on so my dogs could stay cool until I left. The next week my dogs and I drove up to Parkersburg, W.Virginia - Marietta, Ohio, to look at some real estate (ancestors home). My Weimaraner was thrilled. She ran all over the green hills, chased the ducks on the lake, ran to the woods at the state park and was so happy. She did not like the smell of oil under the ground in Ohio, and wanted back in the car. Then it went down to 32 degrees and we came back (nearing Halloween with festivals). One girl said she was going to Florida because she could not stand to see any more snow. (She did not realize I was headed back to 80 degree weather in Texas. I could not get back here fast enough).
God has a plan and nothing happens by mistake and we are right where we are supposed to be. In Ohio in a little berg, I heard two of my relatives I do not know arguing and yelling about me (and a family feud) when I looked at a beautiful old home. I was sad for them, shocked, and when I left - angry. In San Antonio, a friend told me to do DNA testing. I did several. My daughter and then her father did more DNA testing. Guess what!! :-) Everyone was wrong and none of us were who we thought we were. I even found some cousins from the testing. My former husband is not an Indian like his mother said. (My daughter was so happy when she learned this). He is 1/4 E. European (Slavic). My daughter just returned from a vacation in Croatia, Bosnia/Herzogovenia (S. Alps), and Montenegro and had a wonderful time. Who would have thought.
And I learned to my amazement that I am Scandinavian and Irish. And very small amounts of Cossack Russian, Italian and a touch of Central Asian. And from my DNA relatives, I am the 3rd great neice of Jefferson Davis and have a mutual grandfather of Ulysses Grant and my ancient ancestors traveled with the Syrian physician Luke of the Bible and some others
in history.
Yes, Sam, :-) that Nehi orange pop was very liked through there. I remember it being suggested to me on a hot day. It was so good.
Would it help if you upped the scale of the contraption? What if one were to stack up a bunch of the largest clay pots he could find, plugging up any holes, keep them topped off with water and blow air over them with a couple box fans?
Regardless, if you a fan suggested project list, I request you add "building a zeer and testing how effective it is" on it.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pot-in-pot_refrigerator (there's a claim in this article that you can get the inner pot down to 40 F!)
I always appreciate suggestions - but you should be aware that I am not new to this game. I have researched just about every alternative system for off grid living that is out there and have found that most of the more miraculous claims go far beyond reasonable expectation when put into practice in the real world. You cannot trick physics. The very small size of my house means a delicate balance of my interior ecosystem. Scaling up my swamp cooler only means using more water and adding a lot more humidity. Since I can run an AC off my solar for a couple of hours a day during the hottest part of the summer, I see no need to force the issue - and I have pretty much maxed out the effectiveness of my swamp cooler. Blowing air over clay pots filled with water would be far less effective. I have read all about zeer pots and I am convinced there is no need to experiment with them. The 40° claim is very misleading. 45° is a more realistic lowest possible temperature and that is only on days when the outside temperature is below 65° and the relative humidity is 10%. Any form of evaporative cooling cannot go far beyond a 20° temperature differential. Again - I have plenty of solar to run a fridge for a couple of hours a day. I am pretty happy with the way I have optimized my systems and know enough to know what alternatives are a waste of time and effort.
I admire you. It's all too hot for me.
Reading your comment to Mark, I am reminded of a gentleman I met many years back who lived off the grid near Tucson. He dug his home deep into the ground. We visited him there, and it was a long trek down to the areas where he lived. Yes, it was actually cold down there.
If I had it to do all over again - I would have gone underground.
I've always thought underground housing had a lot to recommend it. I did very little research but one curious "complaint" has stuck in my memory. One guy said it was too quiet down there.
After almost 10 years out here...I am pretty used to quiet.
I guess we can cross that one off the list! ;-)
John ... is it too late to go under ground?
Not in the budget until I become a YouTube star...
Piece o' cake. Looking forward to the groundbreaking!
Well, if you want to become a Youtube star to pay for underground excavation, doing more interesting desert survival/tech videos couldn't hurt--even if you know the zeer isn't worth the trouble in West Texas some of us viewers don't! I'd love to experiment with a zeer and evap cooling but I'm stuck for a while in humid MO.
How about a series of diy/cheap desert homesteading myths busted videos? It'd be interesting.
I can't even fathom living in your little room with only an evap in that heat! We got to 98 today and I almost turned on my AC - trying to save money - so I withstood the temptation - lol... but you are like in a little tin box... you might need to clear out your chest freezer to make room for you to get in there... lol
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