Sometimes you need a lawnmover. Isn't it such a cute little thing?



For big yards, you might need a riding mower. I wonder what it wants to be when it grows up?


When you've got 2ac of clearing, road edges, some dense brust, and hills that haven't been mowed in over a year, you need a true manly mower pulled by your diesel ATV. Can I get a GRUNT! GRUNT! GRUNT! from the congregation?


This is a DR products 13hp tow behind brush cutter. The cut width is 48inch. That is 1.2m for my friends in metric-land. This thing will cut through just about anything. 6ft high grass and weeds? No problem. Scotch broom? No problem. Up to 1.5in diameter saplings, wild bushes, and general junk where I don't want it? No problem. So far, anything I've been brave enough to push the ATV through has gone through the mower with no problems. I can even offset the mower to cut to the left or right of the ATV so I'm not getting whacked with branches while mowing down big bushy stuff along the clearing and on the sides of my road.

The whole setup is very slick. The orange box mounted on the right side of my rear rack is the control box. It contains the key switch, throttle, and blade engagement control. I can make changes without having to dismount the ATV. The turning radius is a bit wide due to the length of the seutp. It has no problem with hills, ruts, small ditches, and it sure beats trying to move with a push mower. I've got some sections I haven't done yet. I will take a couple "before" pictures when I get a chance. I made the first cutting pass at a 7.5in height. I'm going to go back now at about 5in and see how that cuts.

Heeeeeee's Baaaaaaaack

After the small distraction of a 12 month deployment to Afghanistan, things are really moving again. I ran the numbers and even in fantasy land where I do 100% of the labor myself, I couldn't beat the price of a good condition used double-wide. I looked at a few and bought one on my 2nd day back in the US.

These pictures are of the house in its current location. Sometime next week it will be pulled from its current location and moved to the dealer's storage lot.



One of the features that originally attracted me to the home were the big windows in the living room end wall. I've got acres of beautiful trees to look out at. This is an external view. Facing the front of the home, these windows are on the end wall to your right.



The view from inside the living room is even better. Camera issue - it isn't nearly this dark inside. The windows bring in a lot of light. The wood paneling looks good. It doesn't look like the cheap hardboard fake paneling you see so often. I'm a big fan of the exposed ceiling beam.

Looking at these pictures before I went out to see the home, I thought the living room was tiny and the wood stove was huge. It is just the way the photo was taken. The wood stove is quite small and the living room is large, as well as, open to the kitchen and dining area. I've added replacing the non-certified wood stove with a highly efficient pellet stove to my projects list. The current models are even eligible for the energy efficiency tax credits.

The kitchen is a good size for me. Enough room to move around, while not being so big and open you need a map to get from the refrigerator to the stove. In some of the other homes I looked at, mostly new ones, the kitchens didn't seem as integrated. The cabinets were in small rows hanging on open walls. It gave the kitchen an unfinished look of something thrown together. The refrigerator, range, and dishwasher stay. I don't know about the microwave. The small counter-height table/bar in the kitchen is really a neat feature. Eventually, I'd like to replace it with a bar height countertop. The perfect thing for a quick meal or a nice dividing line for entertaining.


This is the master bedroom. The walk-in closet and master bath are slightly ahead and to the right of the frame. I was happy to see the room with furniture in it. Often when looking at empty rooms, they seem huge. It is only when you start trying to fill the room with your furniture that you realize things don't fit. Since I've already seen the room with a king size bed and some other furniture, I know things will fit well.

Do I even need to mention I'll be changing the color in what will be the guest room? The other two bedrooms are a really good size. One will become my office and ham radio room. The other will be the guest room.

The current owners have owned the home since new and done some upgrades. Both the front and back doors were upgraded to full-size residential doors. This is the back door leading outside via the utility room. You can see the washer and dryer peeking in on the right. They don't come with the house. I figure that is good. I can buy some of the uber-cool high efficiency front loaders. Since it is me, you know there will need to be lights, dials, buttons, and maybe even SNMP remote management. The shelves to the left are of a good depth. I see them getting replaced with something done in nice solid wood with a dark stain+poly finish.

I love the layout, the big windows, good kitchen, and well kept nature of the home. The only thing it really needs is new floor coverings. The present carpet and vinyl isn't damaged. It has simply reached the end of its visually appealing life. I'm thinking natural cork for the kitchen. Porcelain tile for the bathrooms and entryways. Solid hardwood everywhere else. The overall decorating them is "cabin in the woods". I'm thinking a slightly distressed fir or pine floor (yes, I know those aren't hardwoods) will fit the concept well and give it a very warm cozy feel.

Updates should be much more frequent now that things are getting underway. Once the detailed elevation survey is done, I may be looking for input on where the house and garage-mahal should be sited.

Stay tuned.....

We Now Pause For Technical Difficulties

Travel for work, travel for fun. I made it home for Christmas and now I'm in Kuwait for a while. I will try to keep updating with some ideas I'm kicking around for the house and various rooms.

Moved Onto The Land! Wahoo!

I moved out here last weekend. I don't have reliable internet yet so no pictures at the moment. Suffice it to say I'm loving the peace, quiet, and dark sky surrounded by my big green trees. More later.

Moving Today - Not So Much

Didn't get moved today. Fortunately, I did some prep and testing of the RV's water pump system before leaving the campground this afternoon. At least this way I found the burst main water line from water tank to pump inlet before I was out at my place with no other water source.

Did I mention that the refrigerator decided to die yesterday morning? Please cover the eyes of young children and parental units...

@#^@#$^#%^$#%&%*^(^&%&#$^%#$%#%^$%&$^&$%@@$#%@#$^$%&%$^#

and while I'm on the subject...

#$^#$&$%^&$%*#$%^@#$%%$&$%^*$%^#%#

OK, I feel much better now. I think I can get to the tank input line from the top. I'll grab a few feet of the right size of hose tomorrow on the way home. If I can't, I can just use a bit more hose and a 55gal drum next to the RV for a temporary water tank. It just has to work until I get the pressure water working from the well. I'm guessing this will put me 2-3 days back on moving. I've gone through the manual's diagnostics on the refrigerator. All the inputs appear to be there and the controller board appears to be putting out all the right voltages. That tells me that something in the evaporative cooling circuit may well have let go. Rather than trying to fix an 11 year old RV refrigerator, I'll just replace it. It is an old discontinued model so I'd rather swap it out than pay a tech to come out and tell me I'm better off chucking it. Fortunately, the opening is a standard size so I won't have to recut the cabinet to fit a new one in there. I might pay one of those mobile-RV-repair guys to come by and install it. Something about trying to lift a 150lb refrigerator into a cabinet just doesn't sound like a lot of fun. I'll do a bit more experimenting tomorrow evening and then make a decision on what to do about it. About the only thing I really need to keep cold is my mountain of Diet Coke and some adult beverages. I can do that with a cooler for a week or two.

Sigh.. Not happy.. I'd be less happy if I'd found the burst line after moving out to the place.

Keeping Out The Brrrrrrrrrrssss

Time for another blog update. Twas a busy weekend.

As promised, here is a picture of the trailer in much better light. I measured it at 13ft long and 6ft wide to the beaver tail. Overall it is about 16ft long. Just the perfect size for what I want. I'll drop a new deck on it and rewire the brakes. Just on a quick look underneath I found one broken wire in the brake circuit. It appears to have brakes on both axles so that is a good thing.
We're coming into the season where things can get a might bit chilly. We also get this thing called "snow" that my family and friends from the south may not be familiar with. All together, wall like below can lead to a nasty case of the "Brrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrsssss".
Given that I'll be storing lots of stuff in here and using it for a temporary workshop, I figure I'd rather not freeze my butt off. A more regulated temperature and humidity environment will also be much better for some of the items to be placed in here.

So we start with one of these. It is a kit with a compressor, brad nailer, finish nailer, and stapler. It was under $300 and makes things go MUCH faster. I've used a compressor before, but not on a big project. Why the heck was I still pounding nails manually for big jobs? This thing rocks! I'll probably buy a framing nailer and a longer heavy duty hose to complete the set.
Also for the party we need a little bit of insulation. As you can see, it is a wee bit bulky. The insulation here is for the shed and the pump box.
After a few hours, the inside walls of the shed now look like this. The air stapler makes this process go very fast. It takes longer to cut the batts and press them into the stud cavity than it takes to staple them in.
Of course the international conspiracy of home improvement suppliers strikes again! I was out of daylight, just finished a package of 7 batts, and had 2 stud cavities left to go. The fiberglass poofs out to at least twice original size when you open the package. I'll wait to open another package until I've got some other stuff to do that can use the rest. Or maybe go by Lowe's and just get 2 batts.
The following afternoon, after getting parts for the next project, I got about half the ceiling done before I ran out of staples. I went through 1000 staples just doing the walls and half the ceiling. I'll do the center of the ceiling once I add some additional framing that is part of my nefarious plot for total world domination.
There you have most of what I got visibly done over the last week. I should be moving out there this weekend whether I've got the water system done or not. The RV has a freshwater tank and a pressure pump. I can't wait!

Feel free to leave comments and questions.

Back from Traveling. Back to work.

First off, a public service message: I don't even remember what they call it. "That's No Moon. It's a Cheeseburger!" would be appropriate. Do not attempt to eat a cheeseburger that is the length of a big steak knife in height and as big around as a hubcap!!!!! This is at "The Home Plate" outside Taunton, MA. Three of us challenged the humongo burger. None of us succeeded. One of the guys cheated by asking for his with no veggies or other stuff on the burger. He still didn't finish it. I made it through 3/4 of the burger and about 1/4 of the fries before I decided that I didn't want to hurt myself that badly.


In homage to a true American classic film - "That isn't a water tank."


"This is a water tank."
Did I mention there are two of them?

Each tank has a total capacity of 1500 US gallons. That is about 5700 liters for my international friends. To allow for expansion, I'll set the float switch to cut off around 1300-1400 gallons (~5100 liters) for each tank. These were the missing item that was holding up the pressure water system. These should be fun to get all plumbed in! I picked up some fittings and valves at Lowe's on the way home so I can start filling them. My pump puts out around 112gph so to fill both tanks would be a continuous runtime of around 25 hours. Needless to say, I'll be doing it in smaller steps of a few hours at a time.

The only factory installed fitting is the 2in female threaded outlet fitting a few inches up from the bottom. I will have to drill holes for the inlet, vent, and float switch in one of the tanks. I may put float switches in both tanks and wire them in series so they both have to indicate more water is needed before the pump turns on. Since the tanks will be plumbed together in normal operations, they should always equalize to the same level. Putting a pair of float switches in series means that a switch failure won't start the pump.

Each pump will have an independent shutoff vales mounted as close to the tank outlet as possible. Those are some of the items I picked up today. Since the tanks expand/contract a bit due to both the water level and temperature of the tank, I'll need a flexible section between the tank outlet and the buried hardlines running to the pump/filter cabinet. The flexible section keeps from cracking the hardline piping as the tank flexes.

They put large tabs on the tanks to allow tying them down. At 500USG in a tank, it will weigh 4000 lbs. What do they expect is going to move these tanks? About the only things I can think of are an earthquake or a bomb blast. In the case of the former, I want them to move a bit so they don't rupture. In the case of the latter, I think the location of my water tanks is going to be a long ways down my list of priorities. We don't get many tornadoes in Washington so I won't consider that one likely. If the tanks were going to be empty for a long period then it would make sense to tie them down.

I picked up a trailer today. It is a 16-20ft (I didn't measure and the guy didn't recall) tandem axle. The GVWR is probably around 10-12Klbs which is perfect for my needs. It needs a new deck and the wiring for the electric brakes cleaned up. The existing deck will work fine for picking up lumber, insulation, etc from the store and hauling light equipment around. Fixing the brakes is just a wiring project.

It was getting dark when I snapped this pic so I'll take some more tomorrow and post a couple of better ones.


Tomorrow morning, I'll pickup a 1-man auger at the rental place. Now that the tanks are in, it is time to dig the holes, install the fence posts, and get the pump cabinet built. Oh, I suppose I might actually put some fencing on the fence posts too. While I've got the auger, I'll likely also make holes for a mailbox and some new gatepost holes down at my back gate. Time permitting, I'll do a few more in locations I want near-term future posts. Friday I'm picking up a trencher from the same place. That is to trench for all the water lines I have to run.

I'll try to update as I do things tomorrow and Friday if I can still lift my arms after all that.