I think this might be good consideration for a Prepper truck?
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Just got my baby back - had to special order pinstriping, but it will have it just as it did originally 
I am so stinkin' excited to have it back! Can't go cruisin' til I get lic. and insurance back on it. I might have the tabs, but let insurance go since it's been almost a year in the works. 
<- that's my happy dance.
I am so stinkin' excited to have it back! Can't go cruisin' til I get lic. and insurance back on it. I might have the tabs, but let insurance go since it's been almost a year in the works. <- that's my happy dance.
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The Katrina story is a good consideration for people that live downtown or in the suburbs.
But for people who already live some where remote/rural (ie like most of the people on a Homesteading Forum), having a working vehicle for years after an event is worth making a prep.
If you really do live remote, then you probably are not within walking distance of a doctor. If a family member gets really sick or injured, and you don't have a working vehicle, then you better have a stretcher and a couple of strong people who think the patient is worth all that pain. While you are carrying that patient to and from medical care, your tactical risk may well be greater than it would have been in a vehicle (where the time exposed is less and where you can devote all your arms and legs to offensive response). Knowing an area well, good planning and good tactics can make vehicle use safe enough. The military works their way through vehicle use in dangerous places as a standard problem and practice.
For those who expect to barter/trade goods you have now or food you will be growing, how will you get that to market or your consumers? Are you going to carry that on your back? Or are you going to invite the buyers to come to you? Are you going to hand out maps of where you are?
Very few people are food independent now. For those who don't store fuel for a tractor.....how are you going to scale up production at the same time you suddenly need to be running a security watch roster 24/7. You won't have even the hours spare for agriculture that you have now. A running tractor can do in an hour what back breaking manual labor does in several days or even weeks.
There are many variables/unknowns about a very severe crisis. Even for those that have put high priority upon picking somewhere to live that is remote and have chosen objectively and wisely, we can not know for sure what threats may develop where we live. Some locational threats are unsurvivable. To survive those, you need to relocate. If you still have a working vehicle, then you can at least bring enough of your gear/supplies to have some chance of getting re-established where ever you end up. People often post that you can't just head out into the forest and survive - but that depends upon what gear and supplies you take with you. If you have the right and enough stuff with you, then you can survive any where. Without a working vehicle and fuel, you can only take what you can physically carry, and that is a tiny fraction of what you need to survive long term.
Mobility is one of the key capabilities that the military resources - and for very good reasons.
The idea that you can choose to bug in like you are ticking a box on a motel room service breakfast form is contrary to a survivalist mindset. The common post seen in these online discussions that "you will just be a refugee" ignores the fact that through human history, in most cases of unsurvivable localized conditions, those that relocated survived and those that stayed died.
For those that say that "I will just stay here and meet my fate", most don't have a good enough imagination about how horrible and painful their death might be. A survivalist mindset means always looking for that survivable option. Prepping involves having those options prepared and ready.
As for those who think vehicles are just a bullet magnet........here is some good advice:
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Can not see the car and I have a sudden hunkering for some chilis ribsJust got my baby back - had to special order pinstriping, but it will have it just as it did originally
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The photo is showing on my end - not showing up on your end?
I think where our thought differences lie is you talk as if after some type of earth shattering event vehicles will still be up and darting about ????
In my mind, such as what happened in Texas/looseranna/Mississippi after Katrina not only were inner cities transportations shut down but yes rural areas were also affected from power problems to shipping and deliver, trees in the roads roads washed out it was all over I know I was here in the middle of it all . I do realize that some do stockpile fuel while others will use a mule and harness gas will be to expensive to to deliver groceries or go to the doctors office the doc will not be there and you need to
Learn to take care of yourself at home the way we did for thousands of years if you do need to move an injured person a single person can do it with out having to have help from others learn from the Indians build a travois that can be attached to an animal such as a goat/cow/dog/horse or a bicycle
Yes a vehicle would be a nice item to own but in my opinion when society falls the automobile is going to fall also learn the old ways to survive. My great greatgrandfather deliveredproduce tomargetevery weekend in a wagon drawn by his mule
The trick is to not live where there are eight thousand cars in the first place. Places with that kind of population density are unsurvivable anyway so long term fuel storage and many other considerations are moot. The only prep for a place like that is the means to leave before everyone else knows its time to leave.
Yep. It's well known among people who actually study these things that EFI engines run bad or alternative fuel, much better than carb engines.
Sure, but there but that 'until alternate means' contains a small ocean of possibility.
What most people mean is "until the power comes back on"
If you mean, "A couple days until I can get everything salted" thats a different matter. (although really, you would need a massive amount of frozen food to have to run a generator to preserve it until you can salt it all)
What I am getting at is that you could keep yourself in drinking water for years by just using your fuel to run a well, or keep everything 'normal' for a couple days.
If its a short term outage, a couple days, you don't need to run the generator.....if its a long term outage, you don't WANT to run the generator except for very specific mission critical uses.
Most times people are running generators, is not for things you actually NEED generators for, it just to make things 'normal'. And most of the time, it doesn't matter. But the time it DOES matter, most people won't realize it, you'll have generators banging away 24 hours a day up and down every street...for a few days....
This doesn't mean generators are useless, far from it, but you need to think more in terms of running it an hour a month to run a critical machine, rather than for keeping things 'normal' in your house.
Same with vehicles. They are a super power not to be ignored, but you won't have a 'daily driver' in SHTF.
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It is now, nice ride
Only half jokingly.....this is only a problem for those lacking imagination:
Limiting solutions to problems encountered in 'normal' disasters, is itself, a kind of normalcy bias. Some problems are ONLY problems because the disaster wasn't big enough to allow the solution.
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Actually I don't. I assess that the fuel the vast majority of people have will be gone quickly. I just don't intend to be one of them. I have fuel stockpiled and I suggest others do too.
Yes - I do. Others should too. That is my point.
Like I said, that works up to a point, but beyond that you either get someone care or they die. Morale stays higher if folks in your group see that you are willing to do what it takes to keep them alive. There will be doctors still around. Some will have the basics they need to provide care average folks can't. They probably won't be making house calls. Doctors have been around for centuries too.
I suggest you practice doing that now. It may well be more difficult than you think. As I posted, slow transport methods leave you more exposed to security threats for longer. The car/truck replaced the travois for good reason. Stockpiling fuel is not so difficult that you should turn your back on why the vehicle is better.
Were there millions of starving, heavily armed have nots around when he took that food to market.
Having a mule now (or indeed post event) as a prep is much more expensive and time consuming than having a suitable fuel stockpile.
I am not a Luddite - I am a survivalist. If using modern technology will improve my chances of survival, then I will use it.
Build a smoke house and dig a root cellar. That will take care of food d storage, if you are lucky enough to have a snow run off creek close by. Divert to some water to flow around a new type plastic refrigerator or freezer. And use the snow melt to make a fridge chest
I always said I wanted one of those but inverted so it could act as a scoop when I hit dear and pitch them up over the hood into the back of the rig.
Thank you!
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Agreed.
In warmer climates and/or in summer, a small to medium solar powered system can run 12V camping fridge freezers so you can not only keep what you have while you can/preserve the surplus, but you can also use it to process your own livestock/hunting kills - and for years after a really severe crisis breaks.
A big solar system can power your domestic fridge freezers.
Solar power is more expensive per watt than generators - but it can provide silent independent power for years instead of days - and that should be taken into account when balancing the cost against capability.
If homesteaders/survivalists are rational about what they really need to power, then in the right place/climate, solar can be a good option.
Even solar is a temporary solution. Batteries, well maintained, last 10 years and the panels, if well maintained last 20.
Going back to 18th century processing is a good long term solution.
Going back to 18th century processing is a good long term solution.
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LiFePO4 actually last about 15 years - but your point is technically correct.
However, using technology in your preps means you have more than a decade to adapt and you won't have to adapt while less prepared people are still a very real threat.
If I am still alive >15 years after a really big collapse, I will be happy to use old world solutions.
But for the first several years of a PAW, I will be using technology to provide me with the time I will need to devote to keeping myself (and others) safe from violent threats.
Some people think that the only solution to the manpower/time needed to operate good security is to group with many people - but every pair of arms and legs you take on to pull guard is another mouth to feed. Many will come with dependents that are useless. Most people will not be worth feeding.
For those of us who would like to keep our group small, technology is the factor that can make that system work.
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Late 70's, early to mid 80's Yotes and Datsun (Nissans) all had points and condensers. They ran fine and would do as well as the same era american machines would. My old 86 yote truck got better than 30mpg. Better than most truck built today by any maker.
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Yep - they were light weight, had only minor changes for smog control and almost no ancillary crap running off the motor.
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Re:
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adapt while less prepared people are still a very real threat.
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Yes vut dor a limited amount of time.
How long will the unprepared survive without food, clean water and medication?
Two weeks before they start to waste away and a month maybe if they eat all if the docs cats rats and then turn to cannibalism.
What is your guess?
Ben
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But....
Wasn't leaded gas required to event pinging that would destroy the engine?
You tell me.
Ben
It seemed to run fine on any fuel I fed it. Never had any pinging with it.
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Statistically speaking - a Bell curve.
Some die almost immediately.
A bunch die in the first weeks/months.
Some will take years to die (and among them will be the most intelligent/dangerous ones).
Many overstate the immediacy of the die-off (perhaps mostly based upon wishful thinking). In my view, they fail to take into account the amount of supplies that are out there in the world that the (shrinking pool of) scavengers will take months to years to pick clean.
Cascading failure may take a very long time to unfold - like a train wreck in slow motion.
That is why I chose to prep for years and beyond a decade rather than anything shorter.
Those of us that own and live on land that is located somewhere survivable and have serious preps, are a tiny minority of the population - think about what that means.
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Ethanol and other additives raise the octane level to prevent engine knock.
There is always a limit... no 12:1 pistons unless you are running only alcohol or LPG.
There is always a limit... no 12:1 pistons unless you are running only alcohol or LPG.
Yes, and for those of us that were around in the last 'oil crisis' remember them pulling in everything with an ECM and reprogramming them to run on E85.
Almost everything on the road today would have little-no problem running on 100% ethanol.
In response to your post, the import vehicles were made for "the world market".
If you travel to other countries you find a great many of them, regular=85-octane, poor countries as far down as 65 octane
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A Einstein
Re:
Those of us that own and live on land that is located somewhere survivable and have serious preps, are a tiny minority of the population - think about what that means.
Provided those that know how to leverage the assets available are not killed to devour there resources ... there is tremendous opportunity for surpassing what was available to those that settled this country.
The resources (save the buffalo) they had are still here. But we have sooo much more 5han they had.
Locks dams cannels railroad grade already cut...
Woodlands cleared and plowed.
An abundance of refined metals steel, iron, aluminum that can be cast using basic material properties which are well documented provided we have a hard copy of the related sciences.
If a group can develop a pragmatic plan to reboot a civil society there may be an opportunity for all/most? to contribute. More contributions could increase productivity... and the growth could near exponential.
But all of that is pipe dream if we don't survive the chaotic interlude.
Ben
Think there will be multiple waves of deaths, hitting different places, at different times.
The first wave is suicides by people who know what is coming and can't face it.
Next we will lose diabetics, many old folks, many of the people on SSRI's, when their meds run out, a lot of recreational drug users.
A lot of people will die by accident as they try to learn to survive. Fires, Burns, CO poisoning, food poisoning, etc. People trying figure out all the stuff we already know but starting from scratch in the middle of it, trying to piece together things they saw once in a movie or read online and getting it wrong.
Starvation, I think roughly starting 30 days in, peaking at 90 days after the last grocery store closes. This is important because its very likely government WILL function for some time and pull together to provide food, which will likely fail ,but may mean that true starvation doesn't being until some time much later than the actual lights out date.
This will be very bad news for a lot lightweight preppers, say, people with a few months worth of food, who start living off their preps day one, and in the end, run out of their preps about the same time all the non-preppers get really desperate.
This was why I kept re-supplying during the start of covid, even though I could have locked down for a long time, I didn't want to start actually using preps until I had to, so instead I just trusted my PPE and kept re-supplying and never actually depleted my stocks but grew them significantly even when other people where running out. A policy I've kept to this very day (successfully).
Deaths from violence, starting on day one...and peaking several months or years later. This curve will be VERY dependent on specifics of what is going on. Severity of destruction dose not track with severity of violence, its totally dependent on public perception and mood. We could get massive violence from a minor disaster, and vis versa, depending on region, timing and national mood.
Deaths from uncontrolled disease, seasonal based and growing worse ever season until die-off is so extreme they burn out. Malaria will be a major one a few years in.
Throughout the transition, there will be multiple peaks, multiple 'eye of the storm' periods where it may be relatively safe. It will require careful and constant monitoring for the time to 'choose your moment' to get certain things done.
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