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Look forward to seeing all of you there!
[what is your preparedness plan for 2010]
Frazer.
Tuesday, March 9, 2010
Monday, March 1, 2010
Update to October 26, 2009 Post
There has been a minor update to the October 26, 2009 post "No cellular service? No problem!".
I've found a Canadian Retailer for PLBs if you are interested in one. So check out that post!
[Something to think about, what is your preparedness plan for 2010?]
Thanks for reading!
Frazer
P.S. Don't forget to follow us on Twitter and subscribe on youtube!
I've found a Canadian Retailer for PLBs if you are interested in one. So check out that post!
[Something to think about, what is your preparedness plan for 2010?]
Thanks for reading!
Frazer
P.S. Don't forget to follow us on Twitter and subscribe on youtube!
Friday, February 26, 2010
MPN's S.A.S. Survival Tin + Challenge
This is my little version of the S.A.S. Survival Tin. I really want to get my hands on the S.A.S. Survival Guide book to read and learn from for my preppers library!
Some items I want to add:
Some items I want to add:
- Swiss Army Classic SD Pocket Knife, This will give me some tweezers, a toothpick, scissors, a blade and a nail file.
- Doug Ritter Special Edition MkII Photon Freedom Micro™, benefits include protected LED to keep the brightness
- ACR WW-3 Whistle, Chosen for it's compact form factor
- Pelican 1010 Case, Tough, durrable and water resistant
Tuesday, February 23, 2010
Thursday, February 18, 2010
Snow and Ice, Slip and Fall
I know of a couple quality products for snowy conditions that will keep you from slipping on ice or snow. This could be vital in a bug out situation, a winter hike, or even a work day depending on your profession. I use them because I have a bad knee that tends to dislocate when I slip on ice.
The two quality products I know of have their pros and cons. But with no further delay the products are Yak Trax and STABILicers. It really depends on a couple factors before you decide which ones to get. The STABILicers tend to be better for packed snow and not shoveled or cleared ground. I'm heading out today to buy a new pair of Yak Trax, I found on the Yak Trax website that there is a store right down the street that carries them. My old pair was eaten up by the salt and pulled apart.
The benefits of the Yak Trax is that they have much smaller cleats when compared to the STABILicers and work much better for shoveled walks, parking lots, black ice, and sidewalks. I've used both products and while the STABILicers are more durable but the Yak Trax do better in lighter snow environments like Southern Ontario. In Manitoba you might be better off with STABILicers.
So pick your poison so to speak. Both are good options depending on your situation and most common places to be walking.
I will give one piece of advice, buy the Yak Trax Pro model if you buy Yak Trax, the strap will save you a lot of doubling back to find the missing device!
Thanks for reading!
Frazer
[Something to think about, what is your preparedness plan for 2010?]
P.S. Don't forget to follow us on Twitter and subscribe on youtube!
The two quality products I know of have their pros and cons. But with no further delay the products are Yak Trax and STABILicers. It really depends on a couple factors before you decide which ones to get. The STABILicers tend to be better for packed snow and not shoveled or cleared ground. I'm heading out today to buy a new pair of Yak Trax, I found on the Yak Trax website that there is a store right down the street that carries them. My old pair was eaten up by the salt and pulled apart.
The benefits of the Yak Trax is that they have much smaller cleats when compared to the STABILicers and work much better for shoveled walks, parking lots, black ice, and sidewalks. I've used both products and while the STABILicers are more durable but the Yak Trax do better in lighter snow environments like Southern Ontario. In Manitoba you might be better off with STABILicers.
So pick your poison so to speak. Both are good options depending on your situation and most common places to be walking.
I will give one piece of advice, buy the Yak Trax Pro model if you buy Yak Trax, the strap will save you a lot of doubling back to find the missing device!
Thanks for reading!
Frazer
[Something to think about, what is your preparedness plan for 2010?]
P.S. Don't forget to follow us on Twitter and subscribe on youtube!
Monday, February 8, 2010
Apartment Prepper Series: Power Systems
ey Guys, I figured since I'm focusing the blog on where I am in relation to prepping and sort of making the blog a log of my journey to being prepared I figured on top of the budget survival series I'd start the Apartment Prepper series. So here is the first topic at hand, emergency power sources for apartment dwellers.
I think one of the hardest things to deal with in an emergency in an apartment is when the power is lost. You can't exactly run a generator set as easily as you could if you own a home. So What I've come up with is the use of batteries and battery back-up systems to compromise some of that short term ability. Keep in mind even a gen-set is a temporary solution and wont last for the long haul. However getting the fuel to run a Gen-set in a power outage might be easier than finding a power source to charge your battery back-up system.
I've found a few interesting items on Canadiantire.ca that would help in a power failure situation and I've put them on my prepping list. They really don't conform to the budget prepper ideology but they are handy to have even though they are expensive.
There is the NOMA PowerPlug 150 which is a nice choice, and fairly inexpensive option for roughly $100.00 all things considered. Basically you just mount the battery backup device to a wall outlet, it allows you to continue using the outlet as well, double bonus and when the power goes out the LED lights turn on so you can find it and you can take it to plug into a small TV or radio, along with a lamp or small fan. Now this option wont power an A/C unit but keeping a couple box fans around isn't a bad idea! Plus it's portable! This item could be excellent for apartment dwellers like myself or even homeowners who may want to try to avoid the gen-set as much as possible or until it's certain that it is a prolonged outage! It is rated as a 150 watt inverter.
The longer term more powerful option also by NOMA is the NOMA Back-Up Power System 400W.
Slightly more bulky but definitely more powerful, this unit can run a full desktop computer or laptop. I don't have access to the manual for either of these devices so I can't look into how long they can last or what all they can power other than what canadiantire.ca tells me but I'd guess you could get a couple hours of A/C use out of this unit.
Now I'm not to knowledgeable on solar but if your building faces a direction where you can get sun I'd imagine you could top off the power via a solar panel. I think solar is a great way to get power in an outage where you can't run a gen-set.
Another item I think is good to keep around are headlamps and LED battery powered Lanterns. I'm not a fan of Coleman lanterns since they can produce gases you don't want in your home or to be exposed to, I'd rather have some good LED battery operated lanterns and some batteries. You can get some decent battery operated Lanterns at Canadian Tire as well. Some are more compact and others are a bit bigger and run on larger battery cells. Whatever you choose try to find the brightest lantern that has the best battery life. You'd be amazed how much a small lantern like the one I reviewed here can light up a room when all the power is out. I do plan on buying more of those next time they are on sale!
Until next time...what is your preparedness plan?
Frazer
P.S. Don't forget to follow us on Twitter and subscribe on youtube!
I think one of the hardest things to deal with in an emergency in an apartment is when the power is lost. You can't exactly run a generator set as easily as you could if you own a home. So What I've come up with is the use of batteries and battery back-up systems to compromise some of that short term ability. Keep in mind even a gen-set is a temporary solution and wont last for the long haul. However getting the fuel to run a Gen-set in a power outage might be easier than finding a power source to charge your battery back-up system.
I've found a few interesting items on Canadiantire.ca that would help in a power failure situation and I've put them on my prepping list. They really don't conform to the budget prepper ideology but they are handy to have even though they are expensive.
There is the NOMA PowerPlug 150 which is a nice choice, and fairly inexpensive option for roughly $100.00 all things considered. Basically you just mount the battery backup device to a wall outlet, it allows you to continue using the outlet as well, double bonus and when the power goes out the LED lights turn on so you can find it and you can take it to plug into a small TV or radio, along with a lamp or small fan. Now this option wont power an A/C unit but keeping a couple box fans around isn't a bad idea! Plus it's portable! This item could be excellent for apartment dwellers like myself or even homeowners who may want to try to avoid the gen-set as much as possible or until it's certain that it is a prolonged outage! It is rated as a 150 watt inverter.The longer term more powerful option also by NOMA is the NOMA Back-Up Power System 400W.
Slightly more bulky but definitely more powerful, this unit can run a full desktop computer or laptop. I don't have access to the manual for either of these devices so I can't look into how long they can last or what all they can power other than what canadiantire.ca tells me but I'd guess you could get a couple hours of A/C use out of this unit.Now I'm not to knowledgeable on solar but if your building faces a direction where you can get sun I'd imagine you could top off the power via a solar panel. I think solar is a great way to get power in an outage where you can't run a gen-set.
Another item I think is good to keep around are headlamps and LED battery powered Lanterns. I'm not a fan of Coleman lanterns since they can produce gases you don't want in your home or to be exposed to, I'd rather have some good LED battery operated lanterns and some batteries. You can get some decent battery operated Lanterns at Canadian Tire as well. Some are more compact and others are a bit bigger and run on larger battery cells. Whatever you choose try to find the brightest lantern that has the best battery life. You'd be amazed how much a small lantern like the one I reviewed here can light up a room when all the power is out. I do plan on buying more of those next time they are on sale!
Until next time...what is your preparedness plan?
Frazer
P.S. Don't forget to follow us on Twitter and subscribe on youtube!
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