Author: porcupine

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What have you been doing to prep lately?

This week’s preps – November 25 2018

It’s not like I haven’t done any prepping since August 12, I just haven’t had time to write about it. I’ve actually done a few things:

  • Rebuilt the shelves in my garage
  • Cleaned out my storage unit
  • Worked on my long term food storage
  • Started researching property and jobs in the American Redoubt
  • Bought a sewing machine
  • Made lots of homemade beef jerky
  • Signed up for an online programming class
  • Finished programming my 5 UHV/VHF HT radios
  • Upgraded the sights on my carry pistol
  • Prepped my truck for winter driving
  • Bought a ping pong table

I learned the most from rebuilding my garage shelves and putting up the shed so I’ll touch on those below. Some of the other things might have you scratching your head and wondering wtf they have to do with prepping or being a Backyardsman, so I’ll post about those in the future. Anyway…

Rebuilding my garage shelves

The shelves in my garage were a falling down mess. They’d been “built” (that is stretching the term) by the previous home owner. The shelves were particle board with no support on the back side, so the sagged badly. The shelf supports were 1×4 boards nailed together at the corners so they wood was splitting. The shelves were too wide to comfortable get a car into the garage bay. One of the shelves finally collapsed so i decided to rebuild them. I used 3/4″ plywood for the shelves and made them 18″ wide (originals were 24″). for the supports I used 2×4 for the back support and 1×3 for the front. They’re not perfect, but a lot nicer than what they replaced.

Building a shed

One problem I have is lack of storage. We bought a small metal shed kit last year but never got it put up. My brother and sister are going back to China this week, so we wanted to get a shed put up before they left. A couple weeks ago we had a concrete pad poured to put it on, and over Thanksgiving weekend we got the shed put up. Instead of using our metal shed kit we decided to go with a wood framed shed. Home depot had kits for between $1000 and $3600. The $1000 shed kit looked like a cheap piece of junk and the $3600 was more than we can afford right now, so we decided to scratch build.

Our DIY shed is 7×10 feet, has a real window, and the siding is tongue and groove lumber. Total cost (including a hammer drill for installing the anchors) is about $1800. In my opinion it’s also a lot nicer shed than even the expensive model from Home Depot. It’s not perfect but we learned a lot and the next one we build will even be better. I’m really glad we decided to scratch build instead of going with a kit.

What does THAT have to do with prepping???

You might be wondering what a ping pong table has to do with prepping. What does a programming class have to do with being a Backyardsman? Or programming 2-way radios? I’ll explain it soon I hope. In the mean time, what did you do to prep this week?

Peace out,
porcupine

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Finally bought a sewing machine

Singer 328 sewing machineI never really learned how to sew. When I was a kid, my mom had a sewing machine that I used a little, but not enough to get good at it. When my Dad passed away in 2014, my Mom decided to downsize and gave the sewing machine to my sister. I’ve always been a little interested in learning how to sew, so I wish I’d have asked for it. Oh well… A few months ago I asked my mom for advice on a sewing machine and got the standard lecture I always seem to get when telling ANY woman I want something… WHY??? You can’t afford it. You don’t have room for it. It’s cheaper and easier to just buy what you want instead of trying to make it yourself. You’ll regret it. I made the even bigger mistake of asking in front of my wife, so it was a pile-on. Well, whatever. I did some looking around, and last week I finally bought a sewing machine. I don’t care if buying things already made is cheaper and easier, I want to learn how to sew. So risking the wrath of my wife, I bought a sewing machine…

My “vintage” sewing machine…

My mom was party correct. New sewing machines that I can afford are pretty much crap. The Singers of today aren’t your mom’s Singer. The minimum price for a “good” sewing machine is about $900 – $1000 and I don’t like them because they have “digital control” – if the CPU board goes out you have a very expensive door stop. In one way, my mom and wife were right – if I was going to try this with a new sewing machine it would probably be a waste. Well screw that, there must be better options and there are…

On a Hi-Point forum I found a post from someone who’d just made their first nylon holster. Looked pretty good so I PM’d him to ask what kind of sewing machine he had. He replied that it was a 60’s vintage Singer 328. After a little looking around I found these can be had for around $150 so I bought one on eBay…

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Hi-Point JHP45 first impressions

hi-point jhp45A few months ago I got interested in
cheap guns after watching some video reviews of the Hi-Point JHP45. I bought one about a month ago but I didn’t get a chance to shoot it until yesterday. It cost $166.98 (including shipping) so it’s definitely a cheap gun. I hope to do a full review of the Hi-Point JHP45 in about a month, but for now these are my first impressions.

Hi-Point JHP45 out of the box

Out of the box is literally “out of the box.” The Hi-Point JHP45 comes in a cardboard box. That’s not a complaint, just an observation because it’s the first time in awhile I’ve bought a handgun that didn’t come in a plastic hard case. Actually you can get the JHP45 with a factory hard case for $11 more than I paid, which is a pretty good deal. I decided to go as cheap as possible though…

The first thing I noticed was the looks. I’d seen pictures, but this gun is even less, uhmm, “aesthetic” in real life. The second thing is the weight. Almost all the weight is in the slide, which makes this gun feel really top heavy. The 2 color (red front, yellow rear) 3 dot sights are pretty easy to see, but the dots could be bigger. The front sight is part of the slide and not replaceable. The rear sight is adjustable and replaceable. In fact the JHP45 comes with an extra (“ghost ring”) rear sight. I haven’t tried it yet but it looks interesting.

The trigger feels about the same as all the other striker-fired pistols I’ve shot. Not as nice as a good single action trigger, but better than a DAO trigger. There’s a magazine disconnect safety that only works about half the time on my sample, and the gun comes with a single 9 round magazine.

Two things I really don’t like about this pistol are the safety and the ejector. The safety only blocks the seer, so if it fails the gun can fire even if the trigger isn’t pulled. The ejector in this gun is… the firing pin. If you rack the slide with a live round in the chamber, the firing pin WILL contact the live primer. If you’re going slow and careful it probably won’t be a problem. If you rack it a little too fast and hard though, the gun could fire. For these reasons I don’t think it’s safe to carry a Hi-Point pistol with a round in the chamber.

First time shooting

I took my Hi-Point out for the first time yesterday with three magazines of Winchester 230 gr. FMJ. Racking the slide takes a lot more effort than I’m used to which could be a consideration for some. Also, the first round on the first try was a FTF. Not a good sign, but once I messed with it a bit the gun functioned fine. I stepped up to the line and cut loose…

The first magazine was disappointing. I had a B-27 target set up at seven yards. Eight of nine shots stayed in the black. Meaning ALL the black. If this thing shoots that bad… I mean I’m not the world’s best shot but I’m not THAT bad… WTH is going on???

After the disappointment I decided to slow down and think a little. What went wrong? First, those 3 dot sights weren’t as easy to pick up when aiming at an actual target. Second, the JHP45 doesn’t track during recoil like my other pistols. Maybe it was just new gun jitters. For the second magazine I put on my reading glasses so I could see the sights better and slowed down a bit. This time all nine shots went into an area that could be called an actual group. Still not the accuracy I usually get from my Glocks though…

One thing that really surprised me was the recoil. I was expecting it to feel like something between a 380 and a soft shooting 9mm. Almost every comment I’ve read about the Hi-Point JHP45 says the heavy slide soaks up recoil like a sponge and makes it a very soft shooting gun. That wasn’t my experience. It doesn’t kick hard, but t doesn’t kick soft either. Feels about like my Govt Model 1911. Definitely more muzzle flip than my Glock 30 (a compact 45 ACP pistol).

Thoughts so far…

I didn’t have time to really wring this gun out. I wouldn’t carry it but it might make a good home defense gun. So far it seems reliable, and the accuracy issues I think are on me, not the gun. I’m looking forward to really putting this thing through its paces and seeing what it can do. I can’t recommend (or not recommend) this gun yet, but so far the Hi-Point JHP45 seems like a very interesting hand gun.

Peace out,
porcupine

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Cheap guns

hi-point-cheap-gunsWhen I was a kid there were two kinds of handguns: ones that worked and ones that were cheap. I’ve pretty much lived my life believing that most cheap guns are junk. I always bought the best I could afford. For pistols, that usually meant Glock. The cheapest I’d go was an RIA 1911 pistol. Anything cheaper was junk in my mind. I was reading an article on affordable handguns though and it got me thinking – what if the day came that I needed to buy a gun but I couldn’t afford a Glock? Will I be stuck buying a total p.o.s.? I decided to start looking for cheap guns that weren’t junk. Surprisingly (to me at least) I found some that might be OK guns…

Cheap guns – what is cheap?

First, cheap is relative. Compared to my RIA 1911 GI model, a Colt Delta Elite is an expensive gun. Compared to a Les Baer 1911, the same Delta Elite is a cheap gun. That’s not the kind of cheap I’m talking about though. I’m also not talking about a cheap piece of junk that doesn’t work. A gun like that isn’t a cheap gun, it’s an expensive paper weight. I’m talking guns that are affordable and reliable, and I’m defining affordable as $300 or less.

It was an accident…

I got into cheap guns by accident. I was reading one of the Glock forums and someone was making fun of Hi-Point pistols. Someone else (a Hi-Point fan) posted a link to a torture test on YouTube. The way the Hi-Point in that video stood up to the abuse was really impressive. In fact, after watching the video I decided I had to have a Hi-Point…

I bought a Hi-Point JHP 45. I’m sure it will be reliable, but it has some other issues that I’ll address in a full review once I have a chance to wring it out. Lets just say there are certain things the JHP 45 is “not optimal” for. So I started looking for other cheap guns…

New, not used…

I don’t have anything against used guns. There is one problem with used guns though – it can take a long time to find the one you want. Besides, I want to test guns that anyone can find, not just bargain sleuths. So far things look promising. Some of the cheap guns I’ve found so far are the Taurus G2C, Kel-Tec P-11, and S&W SD9VE. I haven’t found a good cheap revolver yet, but I’ll keep looking.

So are all cheap guns junk? I’m starting to think maybe not. I can’t afford to test every gun that tickles my fancy, but I have the JHP 45 to test. When I’m done with that I’m getting a Taurus G2C. Hopefully my Glocks won’t get jealous…

What’s your take on cheap guns?

Peace out,
porcupine

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Feral Gardening

feral gardeningEvery month in The Backwoodsman there’s a little text box with requests from readers. A request I’ve seen in the past few issues is for an article on feral gardening. I decided to check it out. My raised bed garden was an epic fail this year, so maybe it’s time to try something new. I tried Googling “feral gardening” and got almost nothing (it’s strange when even Google has nothing). OK, so what is feral gardening? Well, I know what feral means so I’ll go with that. According to my dictionary, feral means “in a wild state, especially after escape from captivity or domestication” or “in an un-kept state.” So I guess feral gardening means growing a garden that takes care of itself.

A garden that takes care of itself?

That doesn’t make sense. I can’t get vegetables to grow when I try really hard to take care of them. How are they going to grow with no care? Then I remembered a house we bought a few years ago. It had been foreclosed on, and empty for 2 years. The lawn was dead from not being watered and the yard was overgrown with weeds. When we cleared the weeds though, we found 2 grape vines. They looked healthy, and even had a few grapes on them. I didn’t know it then, but this was an example of feral gardening.

The next summer I was pulling weeds. My wife told me to save some of them. Huh??? I took one of the ones she wanted me to save to work to ask a friend about it. Turned out to be something called red root pigweed. It grows very well with no care and people do eat it. I tried some and it didn’t make me sick. Tastes kind of like chicken (not really). This year we dedicated half of a raised bed to it. Other edible feral plants I’ve found in our yard are purslane and dandelions. The purslane is kind of slimy when cooked but dandelion is actually pretty tasty (a little bitter though).

What about real crops?

OK so weeds grow really good without any work. That’s not exactly a news flash. What about real food crops? Well, I know that grapes will grow well with little or no care. Salsify will too, and will self-seed every year. Blackberries and boysenberries will pretty much grow wild. I don’t know any others off the top of my head, but I’m researching it. I’m guessing that any open pollinated veggie plant that’s drought resistant would be worth trying. I’ll be playing with some varieties next summer.

I think the best thing about feral gardening is you don’t have to limit it to your yard. If you don’t need to water, you don’t need it close to a house. There’s a big field near my house and I plan on doing a lot of my experimenting there.

Peace out,
porcupine

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The Prepper’s Blueprint

When I got into prepping, the first book I bought was The Prepper’s Blueprint: The Step-By-Step Guide To Help You Through Any Disaster by Tess Pennington. It’s not a bad book if you’re new to prepping. The author seems to know her subject and there’s lots of solid information in the book. In spite of that, I don’t recommend The Prepper’s Blueprint, for two reasons. First, there is no information in this book that you can’t find free on line. In fact, it’s freely available on the author’s own web site.

Repetitive repetition…

Second, the information as presented is repetitive repetitive. Some chapters look like they were copied and pasted from an earlier chapter. For example, there are four chapters on hardware or tools. Three out of the four tell you to buy a hammer. Two tell you to buy a crow bar and a multitool. One list has “sledge hammer” twice – on the same list. Other chapters are similarly repetitive.

OTHO, other topics are a little light on subject matter. As someone interested in radio communications, I can tell you the chapter on emergency communications has no useful information. The chapter on Home Defense is even worse than useless. Example:

First, 12-gauge shotguns offer a generous spread (i.e., you don’t have to be that accurate)…

She then goes on to talk about the best kind of “bullets” for a shotgun.

In conclusion, I do NOT recommend The Prepper’s Bluprint

Even though it does contain some good information, I do not recommend this book. The good information on some topics is offset by skimpy or wrong information on other topics. If the author would stick to topics she knows about, and expand on those instead of repeating the same info over and over this would be a much better book, maybe even one I’d recommend.

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My new mini tent…

For the past few weeks I’ve been experimenting with sleeping outside. My sleep system is pretty simple:

  • 9 x 12 foot heavy canvas paint drop cloth (folded in half) from local hardware store (base, helps keep the bivy bag clean)
  • USGI Thermarest sleep pad (since I’m too fragile to sleep directly on concrete)
  • Rolled up foam pad (used as pillow)
  • Hunka XL bivvy bag (used as light weight sleeping bag)
  • Wool blanket (in case it gets to chilly)

It’s been working pretty good, but I wake up with insect bites. Strange since we don’t have mosquitoes, maybe noseeums? Anyway, the bites itch like crazy so I decided I need a tent. I wanted something small that would work without stakes. After all, it’s pretty hard to drive tent stakes through a concrete patio… What I found was a USGI surplus bivvy bag. A bivvy bag is usually just a bag, but this acts like a mini tent to keep insects and other critters off me while I sleep.

It comes with a little carry bag and sets up easily. It seems a little flimsy so I’m not going to recommend it until I try it long enough to test its durability. The top is just netting so it won’t protect you from rain or snow, just bugs. I tried it the first time last night. Not a lot of room to move around once you’re inside so I didn’t use the Hunka XL. Just but the sleeping pad inside and covered up with the wool blanket. It worked fine. Slept sound and woke up with no new insect bites. This little mini tent is worth checking out if a full size tent is a little too much and a traditional bivvy bag isn’t quite enough.

Peace out,
porcupine

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The Great Indoors

About a month ago I started sleeping on the floor. My wife didn’t kick me out of the bed, and our bed is actually pretty comfortable. I just wanted to see if I could sleep on a hard surface. Turns out I can’t, at least directly, so I got a sleeping pad. Also I wanted to change my eating habits, and work on other things to get more self sufficient. Since I can’t always get outdoors, I decided to see what I could do in The Great Indoors.

Sleeping on the floor

I’ll admit, the first night was because I was mad at my wife. When I woke up the next morning my butt and shoulders were sore, but my back felt better than normal. Hmmm…

The second night my wife asked me if I was planning to sleep on the floor again. I told her yes, and explained about my back feeling better. So she decided to try it too. Next morning, her experience was the same as mine – sore butt and shoulders, but better feeling back. We figured the hard floor was good for our backs but hard on the pressure points (butt and shoulders). We moved back to the bed, but a couple days later Costco had LightSpeed self inflating sleep pads at a closeout price of $14.95 and my wife wanted to try them. We got two and they work great. Not as soft as our bed so good for our backs, but soft enough our butts and shoulders don’t get sore. We’ve both been sleeping on the floor since we got the sleeping pads. I sleep better and have more energy during the day. Sleeping on the floor – welcome to The Great Indoors.

Homemade beef jerky

I’m trying to cut my carbs, so eat more meat, right? I don’t always have time to cook though, but when I do I have a lot of time. It takes me about 5 hours to make a batch of jerky, so I’ve been doing that a lot for the past couple months. Cleanup is really easy and it tastes a lot better than store-bought jerky. Also makes a great trail snack. Hope to post a recipe soon…

Building a library

One thing a backyardsman or backwoodsman can do is read about skills necessary or useful. In that spirit, I’ve been building a library. Books I’ve added recently and recommend are Truck: A Love Story by Michael Perry, The Glock In Competition by Robin Taylor, Handbook to Practical Disaster Preparedness For the Family by Arthur T Bradley, and Seedtime On The Cumberland by Harriette Simpson Arnow. They’re all good reads and they all offer something to the aspiring backyardsman.

Taking it to the back yard

The great indoors have been pretty good for the last couple months, and proved that I don’t have to get away from the house to get away from urban/suburban stress. For the past week though I’ve been moving from the Great Indoors to the Great Outdoors. Well, at least to my back yard…

For the past week, I’ve been sleeping in the back yard. Instead of the LightSpeed sleeping pad I’m using a USGI Therm-Pad sitting on top of a canvas tarp I got at Home Depot (sold as a painter’s drop cloth). My sleeping bag is a bivvy bag I got from some European company. Can’t remember the name but when I do I’ll write a review. This combo works pretty good until 1 or 2 AM when the temp gets down to 45 or so. At that point I wake up and pull over a wool blanket. Then I go back to sleep until about 5:00 when the birds start chirping. Works better than my alarm clock. Now if only I could convince the wife and kids to join me in the back yard…

Until next time…

Peace out,
porcupine

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What did you do to prep this week?

This week’s preps – August 12 2018

My monthly prepper meetup was this past week so I went to that. It was nice to catch up with some of the people, but some others I was hoping to see weren’t there so that was disappointing. There was no specific topic, just general discussion. We did talk about bugging out vs. sheltering in place which is a topic I like. Also talked about finding a sustainable place that’s not a two day drive away. I was surprised that some of the old timers think that’s still possible, considering the out of control growth in our area.

Our rental house is about finished. We have 2 tenants so far. Another one is moving in tomorrow. Only 3 rooms left… My brother (in law) is quite the handyman. He’s doing all the wood trim and some tile cutting. My wife and her sister are doing the vinyl plank flooring. We wouldn’t be nearly this far along without their help. Good family is truly a blessing.

Speaking of my brother and sister (in law), from now on I’ll just refer to them as brother and sister. No “in law,” family is family. They’ve also done a ton of work in our back yard. My brother loves working in the garden. He also wants to go hunting this fall. Can’t wait to take him…

Misc. stuff… I bought a Remington 783 a few years ago as a project rifle. Put a new stock on it but it never worked right. Almost impossible to chamber a round and doesn’t eject worth s***. Finally said enough and took it to my gun smith. Found a jammed up ejector and incorrectly cut extractor. He fixed both and it works better but still not what I’d expect from a Remington. Don’t get a Remington 783 – it’s a crappy design. If you want a Remington get a 700. If you want a cheap (but good) rifle, get a Savage Axis.

Continuing the gun theme, I loaded 600 rounds of 9mm. I’ve been shooting my pellet gun every chance I get. I’m actually improving. I put a dry fire kit into one of my Glocks and got a holster for it. I’ve been experimenting with sights since my near vision sucks. I’m getting discouraged, nothing really seems to work. Maybe I can get some reader lenses for my Wiley-X shooting glasses.

Almost forgot – put bird netting over the peach tree to keep the birds away.

That’s about it for now. What did you do to prep this week?

Peace out,
porcupine

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What did you do to prep this week?

This week’s preps – well, preps since May 12 2018…

I haven’t really done any “prepping” for 88 days – over 12 weeks. I’ve been so distracted, busy, whatever that for the past 2 months I skipped CERT meetings, permaculture meetups, and I didn’t even stay for my prepper group meetups. That last one is a shame because the topic was map reading.

Life happens…

So what happened? Life. We picked up my in-laws and moved them in. Our rental house project turned into a really MAJOR project. I found myself suddenly in need of being able to secure a $200K loan (!!!) with really crappy credit. Still working on that one… Oh, and I managed to crash my truck. It’s still driveable but the side of the bed is wiped out. Another $2500 to get that fixed…

Life goes on…

Even though I’ve been slacking, I still got some things done that maybe could be considered prepping. I finished an online class in programming embedded computers. My brother and I have the back yard looking really good. He even caught a quail that he cooked and ate. Last weekend I took him and my sons to watch our first IDPA pistol match. Last night I loaded about 300 rounds of 9mm. We keep working on the garden 🙂

I’m also working on my personal library and I’ve had the chance to read some really good books. Maybe not prepper books, more suited to the backyardsman than a prepper. Some are Nothing To Do But Stay, Truck – a Love Story, and The Warwolf. Tomorrow night is my monthly prepper’s meetup so hopefully it will nudge me back into a more formal prepping routine…

What about you? What have you been doing to prep lately?

Peace out,
porcupine