Since October we’ve been installing solar panels, an inverter, and battery here at the institute. Last week we got permission from our energy utility to operate our system. It took longer than expected, but we’re up and running. You can read about our site evaluation, system design, components, system layout, and part of the installation … More The Institute Has Solar Power
The news is full of talk of recession. The dreaded inverted yield curve (short-term bonds have higher yields than long-term ones — the inverse of the typical state) has occurred less than two years before every recession since 1955 (and the one time it happened without a recession following was the economic slowdown of the … More Low-Tech Recession?
The garden is in full grow mode right now and we’re up to our ears in leafy greens. Some, like lettuce, can’t be held over for the winter, but other, more hardy greens can be. Kale, spinach, and mustard greens can be frozen, canned, or dehydrated. Although canning is usually preferable to freezing, in this … More Freezing and Dehydrating Mustard Greens
We recently built a few chairs to increase the seating area for workshops and meetings here at the institute and it was an easy choice to use the bench design of Aldo Leopold, a pioneering ecologist and local folk hero here in Wisconsin. These triangular benches are seen all over the area, from back yards … More Leopold Bench or Chair Plans
This is another DIY feature on bicycle repair. We’re bullish on bicycles as an efficient and clean means of transportation. It isn’t as low tech as walking, but it is far better than any other mechanized mode of transportation, according to the discussion on a previous blog post. … More DIY Project — Clean and Repack Bicycle Axle Bearings
The worms I added to the institute’s worm bin (instructions here) are doing well, as far as I can tell. They are rather tight-lipped neighbors, though, so I have interpret the tea leaves, in this case, literally. The Bin As this is a prototype of a wooden bin design, I’ve got a little feedback for … More Worm Report — Established and Working
This is the first DIY feature on bicycle repair. We’re bullish on bicycles as an efficient and clean means of transportation. It isn’t as low tech as walking, but it is far better than any other mechanized mode of transportation, according to the discussion on a previous blog post. We made a short video, which … More DIY Project — Replace Bicycle Tube and/or Tire
I’ve built a simple worm bin out of wood and wanted to post the designs. You can find them below as images or here as a pdf. I used wood because so many people have already published good tutorials on plastic worm bins. Furthermore, I didn’t want to use a fossil-fuel-derived product. This is a … More Low Tech Designs – Wooden Worm Bin 1.0
Yesterday we published plans for our first simple coop design. You can get the PDF of the plans on that post or in the “Low Tech Designs” page under the “Publications” tab, above. Here I’d like to share my thoughts and photos of my build of the simple coop prototype. This has slight modifications from … More DIY Project — Simple Coop
Continued from Part 1. So far, we have skinned, fleshed, salted, and rinsed our hide. Refleshing (optional) This is just a repetition of the scraping done in the first step. After salting and rinsing, more membrane (and a bit of fat and flesh missed before) can be scraped off on top of the hide-scraping bench … More Research Update — Deer Hide Tanning Instructions, Part 2