Back Up

Moms and their caves laying down and our camp set back up with our rental car while our truck is in the shop.

 Back up after the storm and enjoying the cooler air. 

Off for morning walk

 Off on my morning walk at 5am early November in Wildwood Florida.  You can see my 20 Meter diepole mini hamstick antenna up the back of our RV and my 10 meter inverted V next to our orange canopy.  I recently made a radio contact on 10 meters to Spain.

Campsites always look different before dawn and I like it.😎

A Good Day for Radio

 

Above the view of our campsite on a corner lot.  Below a view from our site.

Getting ready for a hurricane

Above some wind and steady rain hurricane is now a tropical storm.

Below is campsite all set up.

Below all put away for storm.

Below topping off my Jackery invade of power outage.

 Even though we are about 40 miles from the Gulf we’ll get two days of heavy rain and winds up to 55 mph.  Many have left the campgrounds, we have had winds over 70 mph in Wyoming camping so we are hopeful we’ll be fine.  This is my first hurricane Kathy has been through several over the years before we found each other.

I found it interesting prepping for the storm.  We were given checklists on how to prepare and I followed it. Now I am finishing up charging our batteries.  I also have 400 watts solar on the roof and 170 watts portable, plus a 3500 watt generator in the bed of our pickup.

The hurricane comes ashore on the 10th of November 2022.

Florida 😎👍

 Setting up in Florida for a while.  Good time for us to rest and see family and friends.

Below we have cows in our neighbors pasture and occasionally some pigs and turkeys.

Charging the RV batteries

I put enough solar on the roof to maintain our three (LA) batteries under normal use with a bit of reserve. However with our converter down and the solar off they were down to 60%. So i am using my smart charger to bring them Back over 90% before I turn on the solar agin while the converter is down.

Back in Florida

 

A Florida morning with clear sky’s in the oak’s 😎

Figuring out RV rain water collection

Hose on rain spout down to bucket.

Below I hook this on the dump valve then to the roof hose.

The Sawyer tap filter makes the water safe to drink.

 Trial RV rain water collection is an interesting subject for me.  I have taken bits and pieces from different YouTube videos and added my own.

First design is to simply attach a hose to one or more of my 6 roof rain spouts, down to a 5 gallon bucket with an overflow port. Five gallons of water is enough for one person for 2.5 days.  Two five gallon bucket’s will last five days or 2 people for 2.5 days.

Second design is hooking up the two back rain spouts by hose or pipe down and under the back of the RV to our freshwater dump valve. When it rains we open the dump valve and the rain water from the roof will fill our fresh water RV tank through the open dump valve.  Once full the excess will go out our overflow pipes to the ground or to empty into extra buckets.  Closing the dump valve will stop the water inflow.  I will add screens over all openings and see if I can put in a 20 micron filter in the hose to the dump valve.  For drinking I have a Sawyer Tap Filter and or if needed we can boil water for this purpose.  

We also have two six gallon jugs we keep water in in the bed of our truck.  Below you see the hose connection for our freshwater tank through the dump valve.

Sunrise over the Saint John

 7am EST go pod start of the day😎

Converter down

Above our flat flexible solar is pulling in 11 amps an hour on a cloudy day.  Below batteries started at 12.3 and are up to 12.8 volts should easily be full by dusk in four hours.

While charging volts are at 13.5 floating looks good😎

 Converter is down along with one ac so using solar to keep batteries charged while parked for several days.  Bedroom power is also down so using my solar direct plug in to power in the bedroom.  Rest of RV is on the second leg of power with no problems with power there. 

Will order new converter when we leave for Florida to be installed while there for the winter.  Also had to install our spare water pump found the old one had a hairline crack in it and was leaking some.

Still enjoying Texas

Making ham radio contacts over 1400 miles away on my portable HF radio.

Colorado River through the trees at the back of the park.

 Still in Texas.  Some folks we know went down to the Tampa area yesterday.  In places they were doing only 10 miles an hour with all the repair personnel working to bring back the areas hit by the hurricane.  Our friend's home is livable with only a little shingle damage. We will enter Florida on Friday and take a few days to get to our campground.  In the meantime we are enjoying Texas 😎😎

Breakfast

 Preparations for breakfast on the road.  Often we add potatoes to the mix.

Fall is in the air

 Fall is in the air so it is time to start heading south for the winter holidays.

More nights and earily mornings are in the 40’s (F).  Wyoming winters can range from 60 below to plus 60 so often we like heading south nowadays.  We will pullout one the morning.  Snow is not far away now.

Hurricane keeps us in Texas

 Hurricane keeps us in Texas.  We were to arrive in our snowbird state (Florida) we will stay in Texas (another state we love) another week.

No cook oatmeal

 Often when I plan to get up a few hours before breakfast, I will pour a pack of instant oatmeal in a cup with some water the night before.  I usually cover till morning so when I get up it is ready to eat cold. 

I do this with instant, quick and minute oatmeal.

Solar is set up

Our new direct wired plug direct from the bedroom to the batteries.

Above to the left is the true AC the right is the battery to inverter to plug.  Below you see my black solar controller and my red inverter in our battery compartment below our bedroom.

 Solar is finally set up for our RV.  Primary goal is to ensure our batteries stay charged for 12 volt operation.

Secondary goal is to setup one wall plug directly from the battery through the 500 watt  inverter to my oxygen concentrator and CPAP next to my bed.  

This gives me a third option for AC power for my medical equipment.  I now have #1 shore power, #2 generator power (gas) and #3 solar.

Sky Over Wyoming

 Sky over Wyoming.  These sky’s are always beautiful all time’s of year.

Veggie powder

 Tomatoes are going to in short supply this fall Sept 2200.  So I am rehydrating veggies and making some into powder.  Tomatoes are my top priority right now.

This 6 oz jar holds 22 Roma tomatoes at summer prices.  We will use this to make tomato paste, sauce and tomato based soup an much more.  In this form it goes further then 22 tomatoes and lasts longer.

My 50 watt folding solar panel

 My 50 watt solar panel has its own solar controller built on it.  It will work through my Jackery or go direct to charging one of my batteries.  On a typical day I should be able to charge and maintain my Jackery 290.with this panel.

Jackery + Solar+ Charger + Battery

 Solar through my little Jackery works great for small projects. On a cloudy day my small SLA battery for my radio is pulling 30-35 watts through the charger.  My 50 watt solar panel is giving 8 - 45 watts to my Jackery 290.

The sky goes from cloudy to partly cloudy today, not the best or worse day for solar

Here is an overall view of my charging setup today.

My little Jackery works great with my 50 watt solar.  I also have 400 watts on my Rv roof and a 120 watt portable solar panel when needed as well.

Dehydration to save weight

 Vacuum sealing in jars with our manual vacuum.

Below you see the kit and a sealed jar it works great.

Below is the box the kit came in I bought off Amazon.