To all east coast woodburners ....

Good luck and God bless. Sounds like you guys are going to get hit hard. The only good thing for woodburners is that when its all over, there will be TONS of free firewood all over the NE states.

Take care of your families and don't take chances.

Pat

Thanks Pat. You folks closer to the east coast be very careful. They are predicting power outages even as far in as we are in upstate New York. I know all you folks will be able to keep yourselves warm. Stay safe.

Thanks for the kind wishes. We spent the last two days buckling down. We brought in a ton of wood to keep it dry and ready. We have buckets upon buckets full of water. All of the animals are locked up (we have 13 goats, 2 ducks, ~20 chickens). Anything that is worth anything is locked away in the shop building. We have extra gas, diesel and propane. Generator and chainsaw have both been test run today.

Now is the 2nd worst part...waiting. Worst part will be tomorrow: experiencing.

Good luck everyone. We are wood burners. We SHOULD be prepared.

Yes! That is what I like to here avc! You sound ready! We have plenty of propane for the grill. Plenty of food. Wood is all under cover for the winter. All I have to do here is go stock up on some more gas for the generator. I will do that tonight. Have some already, but think I will get another 10 gallons. Ya never know.

On a seperate note. That sounds like a nice assortment of animals you have there. How many egg layers do you have? How many eggs do you get every week? We are researching and getting ready to get some chickens in the spring. I have a project of a portable chicken coop sometime this winter.

We took care of gas yesterday. The line at the stations was insane. Everyone had their red cans.

We are doing laundry and washing dishes while we have power. Better to start the nightmare with clean clothes .

ALL of my chickens are females. We had a rooster, but they killed him 2 nights ago. After a while you get used to death with chickens. None are laying right now unfortunately. We got most of them as chicks ~6 months ago so they should be laying shortly. However, they are all molting for the winter. When Spring comes we expect ~1 egg/day from each. Figure a solid doz daily.

We had 4 ducks we raised from ducklings. 1 magically died ~ a month ago. Another got eaten by something about a week ago. The other 2 are best of friends and are walking around quacking at each other constantly. We get ~1 egg/day from the female when we can find it .

The goats are all pets. We are keeping some for a friend who's barn burned down last spring while they rebuild. Others are "rescues" from the slaughter house. My friend is a livestock dealer, he brings goats from Texas to NJ for sale to butchers. When there are babies born during transport or holding we buy the mommy and baby and raise them.

Hobby farming has really enhanced our lives. We find it quite enjoyable. We have the utmost respect for the farmers who keep this country fed.

ac

We are even expecting some wrap-around rain bands and some wind from this system as far west as I am, very strange. It seems like the east coast gets hit with some crazy weather or storms almost every year. If it isn't a bad Noreaster its ice storms or just some nasty tornados.

I installed an 8Kw Generac standby generator this summer because I know our day is coming here sooner or later. It will power pretty much my entire house. About the longest power outage I can ever remember here was about 12 hours. Some of those outages from ice storms last for weeks. I can't even imagine going without power for that long. Now I don't have to worry about it. As long as I have lots of propane in the tank I can go for over a month off the grid. It sounds like this storm could easily knock out power for 2-3 weeks in spots.

Be safe guys and hopefully this thing will weaken before it gets inland.

Starting to get windy here in CT. We're used to it. We've gotten kicked around pretty good in the past couple of years. Have 125 gallons of diesel on hand and both tractors are full. 10 gallons of gas on hand for the chainsaws.

We run a 50+ year old 12k watt PTO generator powered by a Ford 1900 diesel tractor. Burns about 3 quarts an hour under full load.

Thanks Pat53. All set here, generator has been tested and 25 gallons of gas in the shed. Brought in enough wood to run the stove for 5 days and have 24 cord already under cover for sale and house heat. Deep freezer and kitchen stocked. Four, 20 lb propane tanks already filled for the grill. Both of my chainsaws are gassed and bar oiled, extra chains are sharpened and stored in the truck tool box. Truck tank filled. Also stocked up on DVD's in the Walmart bins for $5 each with plenty of other classics I own to watch. When power goes out we loose the internet and cable tv. And yes I'll be out there after the storm cleaning up downed trees like last years snow storm. If by chance we get any snow my plow was tested and runs great. I plowed snow last year then 2 days hauling wood getting 4 cords of wood that I have not split but its log stacked.

Thanks for the blessing Pat53. All set here. Got all 5 generators in the garage, ready to share with friends and family, 30 gallons of gas, truck full of diesel and 10 more gallons just incase. Enough oil to make 17 gallons for the saw.
10 day supply of wood next to the boiler. 20 gallons of fresh water. My house runs on propane so cooking is not a problem.

Ready to rock and roll.

Hope everyone else is safe, protected and prepared.


Hey avc8130, hows the install going?

The gougers are out n full force here, saw a fairly small generator on CL for $1100...probably only worth about $400 at most.

PA has already declared a state pf emergency. Up here we expect wind damage but nothing like the coast will probably get. Got a call this a.m., my office is shut down today and probably tomorrow. A bit too cautious I expect but if they are gonna give me a paid day off I'm taking it!

This storm is tracking really weird. We usually get the remnants (if not a direct hit) of almost everything that comes up the coast - usually off the water. This time it looks like it's going around our back yard, in a big slow circle all the way around us. We'll likely get the usual wind & rain - not near as bad as others though (hopefully). Good luck!

Good for you Bob! Enjoy it.

Thanks for the blessing, Pat. Right back at ya! We'll see how it plays out, I'm just hoping the shingles on the house hold up, and the basement doesn't take in too much water. As for a genny, don't have one yet, but its in the plans after this storm that's for sure. Gonna look into a diesel model, something I can run Bio fuel through. Stay safe everyone, batten down the hatches and if you live around elderly or neighbors that don't have the means to get through, lend them a hand and/or check on them throughout this storm.....

Chimney connection bits have arrived. Installer was out last week taking measurements for the black pipe to connect it up. He is also putting an entire new heating system in his house, so that is #1 priority as I could always just flick on the oil burner if we get a cold snap the wood stove can't handle. We are probably 1 solid day of work away from the boiler being installed. I'm just not sure when that day will occur.

ac

Getting hunkered down. Spent the last two days getting ready, didn't do anything I wasn't going to do this year just did it all in one weekend.
People are going nuts, there's not a loaf of bread to be had. CL ripoff artists are selling $319 3500watt generators for $700 to $1200!!
As for me I have both saws sharpened, cleaned and gassed, wood laid in, generators tested and ready and 45 gallons of gas standing by. The only thing I'm short on is beer.

The govenor just said they will be closing all the state highways at 1:00 p.m. so I'm going to bail at 12:00.

UPDATE: Got the last 12 pack of Sam Adams "Harvest Collection" Life is good!!

Personally, I would have stocked up on the beer before any other provisions....priorities ya know !! LOL

Neighbor called to say he was going to the store if we need anything, 1st thing I did was check the bar fridge for beer.......good to go!

Good luck to everyone over there. A day or two without power from time to time helps us keep perspective I suspect. But it sure sounds like this storm will bring a lot more than that.

Just lost power. 4:15 p.m. Generator up and running by 4:21.

WoodsRover, how are you doing up in your corner of the state?

I'm in Florida. I'm skeptical the company will be able to airline me home when my trip is done. Tomorrrow is Ft Myers, Tampa, Charlotte.

My wife said the power went out.. for 7 seconds. Kohler is humming away. We've got propane enough for a month.. Firewood for a couple years.

She's got enough LEAD to keep all of that stuff to herself till I get home.. whenever that is.

JP

Muncybob,
Were you a Boy Scout? I was not....and that's why I've only got 3 beers in the fridge. I stand corrected, it's now down to 2 beers and prospects are looking dim for a beer run. We are up to 5 & 1/2 inches of rain and the creek is in the road. I will not be.

7:50. That is as far as First Energy could keep my lights on. I can't blame them. Sandy is a groan.

ac

Looks like we lucked out, lost electric for only a few seconds. Good luck to everyone else and hope you all are safe and dry.

Yup. Very fortunate here as well. Did any of the hearth.com members get hit hard? Hope not.

Still out and they don' t have any estimates yet for restoration.
I'm loving that little inverter generator.
Ran the big one till 11:00 then switched over to the little one for just the fridge and a light. 8 hours later I had to put about 3 quarts in it.
Ran the big one for 3 hours this morning for breakfast and showers then back to the little one again. It will run the fridge, TV, and the wifes computer and internet all day on a gallon. Will fire up the big one again for the evening til 10:00 or so.

Repeat until power is restored.