Cooler Days Ahead: Supplies & Green Desert Progress!
In this episode of Occupy the Land, Donna and Ernie
Description: In this episode of Occupy the Land, we tackle end-of-summer maintenance on our Arizona desert homestead! With cooler 63°F mornings, we set up a new flex-fuel generator (propane and gasoline) as a backup to our trusty diesel generator, ensuring uninterrupted power while we repair our solar system’s charge controller. We haul four food-grade IBC totes to store 3,000 gallons of pool water for gardening and construction, and Donna assembles a chicken coop to protect future garden beds. Amidst impending monsoon rains, we prep for a side-by-side vehicle purchase and share the greening desert landscape, showcasing our off-grid resilience and progress!
Transcript:
00:00:46:10 – 00:01:11:26
Well, now that’s the end of the summer. It’s time to do maintenance on our power system. We’re only using four of the nine panels we have over there. You know, because we have, one charge controller that’s, not working. Right. And we we’re doing fine. We had enough power, and I didn’t want to disconnect anything or be without power in the product, because we got a lot of needs for power, and we had enough.
00:01:12:03 – 00:01:32:04
That’s keeping us going to where we get 100% by the afternoon and then goes through the night. So we’re fine. But we got the capacity for super power. But, we’ll go ahead and work on that this weekend. And, the generator, of course, we can just, you know, pop up everything with the diesel generator. It’s been working for years.
00:01:32:04 – 00:01:50:27
It came with the boss. We’ve been five, six years on this thing, and all I’ve had to do is, you know, change the oil, regular maintenance filters and so on. And, I’ve had to change some hoses and a belt and, you know, had the radiator redone. You know, over the years. So, but it’s just getting tired and I need to do a bunch of maintenance on it after the summer.
00:01:51:03 – 00:02:16:05
But I didn’t want to be without power. I’m like, whoop, whoop. You know, you know, one is none. You got one thing and it goes that you’re done and you have, another backup. So two is one. One is none. So when before I start disconnecting everything, I need to get a backup generator to the backup. And we have the shore power connection that we can take 30 and 50 amp into the bus.
00:02:16:05 – 00:02:30:27
And you do shore power. You go into an RV, location or something like that. You plug in and it’s, now the backup gets a backup. So we got this, flex fuel.
00:02:30:29 – 00:02:56:25
Super quiet. Hopefully. Inverter that does propane and gasoline. I don’t think I’m going to be using gasoline because, you know, gasoline, you gotta, you know, you deal with gasoline. I’ve just rather not. So we’re we have this 100 pound, tank that we use for heating and cooking and so on. That lasts a long time. Then we have, another tank, you know, in there, you know, that we use, when we’re on the road.
00:02:56:25 – 00:03:17:10
But to fill that up, you got to take the bus in to fill it up. So I screw that so you can use a little, five gallon ones and this, 100 pound, tank, you know, will last us for months. You know, we haven’t changed that since, I don’t know, the winter, but, we’re going to go ahead before I disconnect and start doing work on this.
00:03:17:10 – 00:03:32:02
I wanted to have a generator that was there, ready to go because, you know, you’re without power. That sucks. So I’m going to go ahead. I got it out and that’s what I’m going to be doing today is, you know, I just got to put oil in it and push a button. They say, we’ll find out and I’ll let you know.
00:03:32:02 – 00:03:51:15
Here we go. Now the generator came with the adapter for putting it on the propane instruction manual and so on. And I think that’s a spark plug wrench. And, looks like you can charge an external battery were that or jump it or whatever. I’m not sure what that is. We’ll go through the manual, but the big thing is an electric start.
00:03:51:15 – 00:04:09:07
Yeah. And a remote. So here we got the side open. I’m going to put oil in it and so on. It’s all nice and pretty clean. So what I’m going to try and do is get this working. And I may build or create some kind of a shelter for this, because I don’t want it to get all dusty and dirty and being a pain in my butt.
00:04:09:09 – 00:04:27:29
So we’re going to go ahead and just get her going first, and then we’ll start worrying about getting a cover for this and doing maintenance on our electrical system upgrade and get it, a lot more power, but I need a back up to the back up to the backup and make sure that we’re not without power, because that’s our thing.
00:04:28:01 – 00:04:52:26
So here we go. Quick start guide. Put the oil in, plug in the battery. Turn. Put on the, propane adapter. Turn it on. You know, pull. Started a couple of times. I don’t probably get it circulated, but you can just, you know, press the start button and it goes pinky swear as what they’re saying.
00:04:52:26 – 00:05:14:01
So I’m going to go ahead and put oil in. I’ll go ahead and go through the manual and then we’ll do the first attempt to start. I’m sure you’re probably got to get the propane to circulate into it. A little bit or so. We’ll see how fast and easy this is. Now, this thing was about $1,100, and it was on sale for 799 something.
00:05:14:04 – 00:05:29:29
And it was a a deal. One of those Harbor freight, an insider track. You got the card? You get a special deal. And we waited for this. Well before it went down. It was about the time that we knew we were going to need it. Have to do maintenance on the electrical system. So I wanted to get this.
00:05:29:29 – 00:05:50:08
It’s not one that you’re going to be running a long time. We got batteries and solar and so on. It’s just a pick it up. Make sure a cloudy day kind of deal and back up to the generator. It definitely diesel. Now diesel is the best way to go, more fuel efficient. And so on. And but this is great for doing a lot of things.
00:05:50:12 – 00:06:08:03
It’s on wheels and it’s got a handle. You can move it around and, until we get our workshop power all set up. I got the stuff. I just need to get a couple of batteries, but, it’s portable, and it can run my welder and plasma cutter and all that is so cool. So I want to get this going.
00:06:08:05 – 00:06:27:03
We’ll see how easy it is. All right. It’s together. We’ll see if we can get her start. I got oil in it. You know, I put the oil in there, filled it up and then connected the battery. It was, just has two, prongs that kind of plug in together. That was simple. We’ll leave it the cover off and to.
00:06:27:05 – 00:06:55:03
I make sure it goes I hey, I don’t want to try and pull started because I like pull starting. So it’s got the remote. Now you just plug in the propane into a jacket has there comes with this hose. I just plugged it in and, has regulator that goes right into the tank. I turned that on, and then I’m supposed to just push this twice slow.
00:07:06:12 – 00:07:19:16
Well, crap. And it’s not that loud either. And the just come down here. All right.
00:07:19:18 – 00:07:37:07
Well, now I gotta see if I plug it into the bus. Let’s let it warm up and do its thing while I get the electrical out. We’ll see what’s up. It’s not that loud. Very cool. But you know.
00:07:37:10 – 00:09:25:22
All right, well, so I’m getting everything set up to put together this, greenhouse. But it looks like weather. Be out. Over. So bounce over there. So we’ll see how good as far as I can find out when we have to pick it up, and we’ll see.
00:09:25:25 – 00:09:50:19
Well, it might be raining, so I’m going to go ahead now wait and get the adapter. I need a, 30 amp to 50 amp adapter for the generator. So I just ordered that on Amazon will be here Tuesday. I’ll just deal with that. But I think it can right now. I can run my, welder and plasma cutter and stuff, so I might get some projects done there with that before I put in my, solar in the shipping container over there.
00:09:50:26 – 00:10:15:19
But this, if it rains like it is right there, that’s it coming here. And even if it doesn’t rain here, that water’s coming here. So we’ll, go ahead and, you know, work on that. Now. Donna is putting up a, It’s like a chicken coop thing that she got, and she wants to put that up, be able to protect the garden from the animals.
00:10:15:22 – 00:10:36:22
So I’ll go ahead and go over there and help her, because, And sometimes she don’t want help. Leave me alone. Let me do it. I’ll go see if she needs some help. But there’s. The rain is coming. It’s been threatening promise and pinky swear and that it’s going to be raining, but it just never quite. Really gives us the deluge that I want to see.
00:10:36:24 – 00:10:58:18
But, it looks like we’re going to get some here directly, and, so we need to go check and make sure everything’s under and so on. I covered the generator and waited for, when I’m going to actually plug that into the bus. But I got plenty of stuff to do. Let’s go check on Donna. Well, what’s coming in is pretty substantial, so I’m not going to fight it.
00:10:58:18 – 00:11:13:25
I got some of the, framing set up over here, and I just leave all these other rods out here and pick it up either later today or. Or when I get.
00:11:13:28 – 00:11:46:26
I’ll occupy the land, occupy the landlord. What we’re doing is we’re putting up. This was pretty inexpensive. It was only like 100 bucks or $120 or something like that. But it’s a pretty good quality for what we’re doing now. It has, coated chicken wire, and then it has the frame and you put it up and they give you a bunch of these zip ties that, you know, is going to go, stuck right with over here, out here, Arizona, and you’re going to be doing this all over again.
00:11:46:28 – 00:12:11:07
So we have these, wire ties that are for doing, rebar. And what we do is you just put it around while we’re putting the different sections together. We’re going to go ahead and do this so we know that later we’re not having to redo this when it rot. So let’s just.
00:12:11:09 – 00:12:35:02
So we’re we doing all this a little stay going close later. And we’re not to worry about the sun. Right. We’re almost done with this. That is finishing the hand on there. We got to do this center here with the door and so on. And then we’re going to go get railroad ties, and we have a bazillion up and put this up and then screw it down into the railroad ties.
00:12:35:04 – 00:12:58:18
And that way it’s not going to blow away or go anywhere. And then we might be able to put the shade on one third of it. Then we have to put together another raised gardening bag and then don’t gets to play gardening. But one of the IBC totes over here for water, you know, keep that phone. This is on the other side of the wash, just on the other side of where the, building pad is for the main home.
00:12:58:20 – 00:13:19:06
So it’s kind of out of sight, out of the way, but close enough to be able to go, to be able to go over here, be able to work on it. So that’s what we’re doing today. And it’s in the wind, you know. But it’s really nice temperature. What is it you take probably 80 but dry. It’s much drier than it was yesterday.
00:13:19:06 – 00:13:34:25
Yesterday was very humid. That one on 70 was going to be 70s for all this week so far with nighttime temperatures in the 50s. So this is what you come to Arizona for.
00:13:34:28 – 00:13:52:21
3 or 4 months. Let’s get this shriveled up beef jerky. You keep hydrated, but the rest of the time is just awesome. Now the wind is really being this thing. So what? We’re we got a windmill that generates plus 3050.
00:13:52:24 – 00:14:11:08
And, but it might wind at night, so it’s really easy a little bit. So I’m looking forward to getting that up. I think I’m going to get some batteries. I’m going to make that part of the system on the workshop just to keep keep them up, because I don’t have a lot to lay up here. So I’m going to weld and stuff.
00:14:11:10 – 00:14:28:20
So we’re just keep working on it. We got the tractors back in the shop, we’ll take it back. And I think they found out what it was to bring in the fuel system. They got to take the fuel tank down, wash it out, put that up. That’s in the I got bunch of other stuff going on at work.
00:14:28:23 – 00:14:49:28
So, you know I’m not complaining. When we get that back, start a building on the dome again. You we really didn’t get ready for the rain and we needed the time to do so. We have a lot of other projects that we needed to do. We got done, so it wasn’t like we’re sitting on our hands. But, I look forward to get the tractor back now.
00:14:49:28 – 00:15:12:03
Donna wanted to get a side by side up for seeding razor play or something with, you know, a little dump bed in the back, and it looks like we found one of those. So either tomorrow or Wednesday, the day after tomorrow, we’re going to go ahead. Yeah. I think yeah, I think that we need to get it on Tuesday or Thursday.
00:15:12:05 – 00:15:32:19
So we’re going to go ahead. We don’t have to get it those days. It’s just when they following DMV they go by the time I want to do it all. But but it’s road legal. So then we could just go to town in here, zip it across the desert. So, yeah, that’s what Donna’s always wanted. She’s really big into that.
00:15:32:19 – 00:15:48:00
And I’m five. Whatever. So we’re going to go ahead and do that. And, you know, it’s going to be nice. We’ll share it with you. Hey.
In this episode of Occupy the Land, Donna and Ernie
In this episode of Occupy the Land, we tackle monsoon
In this episode of Occupy the Land, we take advantage