# Had a realization last night



## QuasarZ (Mar 17, 2014)

I have been slowly prepping for about a year. My wife and I sold our townhouse and will be building in the spring. 6.5 acres with half woods, 45 miles from a big city. 

We are currently renting in a small, crap house. Not many options that will allow a german shepherd out there for renters. The power went out last night and I got thinking. If something happened where it was long term, we would be totally hosed right now. We are so not prepared for anything like that at the moment. It was kind of like a 'holy crap, we are sitting ducks' moment. We cannot wait to break ground and get our house underway. 

I'll keep slowly packing food away and updating my gear, but the heavy duty preps will have to wait until we move.


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## 101airborne (Jan 29, 2010)

Quasar.... first off welcome to the forum. I know what you men about options when renting. Been there! At least you're in the correct mind set and realize where you'd be if something happened rather than waiting on someone ELSE to take care of you. Hopefully you can get into your new home soon. 

Are you planning on building a prep friendly home? By that I mean a place to shelter in an emergency (tornado, etc)? Something to think about. You also mentioned having to "wait" on heavy duty preps. If you don't mind me asking is that due to finance or room for them? If it's room you might not want to wait because we never know when TSWHTF. Being 45 miles from the city you might not have access to a convienent storage facility, but you might be able to get a temporary storage maybe even on site where you're going to build. An example here is renting a connex container. They come in 20' and 40'. They run between $40 and $100 a month delivered to your site. They are heavy duty, very secure with the proper locks, waterproof and convenient. You can even buy them for as low as $1,000 I bought two of them for my BOL/ retirement/ vacation place.


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## QuasarZ (Mar 17, 2014)

It has to do with both, room and money. As I mentioned, this place is really small, so the garage is full of all our stuff when we moved. It is probably more so a money factor. All of that has to be put towards the house or we will be stuck here longer. The storage container is a good idea. I will look into that. 

We are trying to make it as prep friendly as possible, we are planning for future improvements. Like most people, it all comes down to budget. Once the house is underway and the mortgage is finalized, I can then allocate money towards preps.


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## Caribou (Aug 18, 2012)

Check out local ordinances. Where I live I can stack as many as high as I want. My buddy can have one twenty footer. I have sometimes seen the forty footers for less than the twenty footers.


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## BillS (May 30, 2011)

QuasarZ said:


> I have been slowly prepping for about a year. My wife and I sold our townhouse and will be building in the spring. 6.5 acres with half woods, 45 miles from a big city.
> 
> We are currently renting in a small, crap house. Not many options that will allow a german shepherd out there for renters. The power went out last night and I got thinking. If something happened where it was long term, we would be totally hosed right now. We are so not prepared for anything like that at the moment. It was kind of like a 'holy crap, we are sitting ducks' moment. We cannot wait to break ground and get our house underway.
> 
> I'll keep slowly packing food away and updating my gear, but the heavy duty preps will have to wait until we move.


I think you'll still be too close to a big city. 45 miles isn't much. I guess it depends on how big the city is. 45 miles from Indianapolis isn't as bad as 45 miles from Chicago.


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## sailaway (Mar 12, 2009)

Interesting topic, I'm in ther process of moving out of an apartment unit I own into a small house I bought and in the process of rehabing. (post divorce) I will be moving in on the sailboat next month for the next 6 months. The house will be completed by the end of summer. Unfortunately it is located in the middle of a city of a city of almost 25,000 zombies. The boat is safe and secure though. I am also working at getting another location on land for a semi permanent BOL.

My main issue and it is a big one is moving preps. I could never pack my preps and be gone in 3 hrs. let alone one. I have decided to keep an area of the very basics for fast packing and leaving but would have barely a months worth of supplies. This would include shelter, food, water purification, security, dog food, change of cloths, just the very basics. I could probably move 3 truck loads before my year supple was moved.

This has made me begin to think about moving my preps to a safe location so not much would have to be moved. Then the issue of how secure will these preps be when I'm not there. ???? any thoughts ?????


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## QuasarZ (Mar 17, 2014)

BillS said:


> I think you'll still be too close to a big city. 45 miles isn't much. I guess it depends on how big the city is. 45 miles from Indianapolis isn't as bad as 45 miles from Chicago.


We didn't buy it solely for a bug in/out location, we have a far away place for that. My wife and I wanted a place to start a family away from the riffraff that the city offers, while still being close enough to amenities and a good school district. It is rural enough to give us a head start if something super major happened and we had to leave.


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## TheLazyL (Jun 5, 2012)

BillS said:


> I think you'll still be too close to a big city. 45 miles isn't much. I guess it depends on how big the city is. 45 miles from Indianapolis isn't as bad as 45 miles from Chicago.


A distance of 45 miles is a whole lot better then living downtown.


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## GrinnanBarrett (Aug 31, 2012)

We use a twenty three foot travel trailer and a 6x10 enclosed single axle trailer to go back and forth to our farm. I found out years ago that if you leave you place unattended it will be broken into as soon as you leave. In most cases it was neighbors stealing from us. I use game cameras on our property to track the ones stealing or just trespassing. WE can now live on the place with our trailers. Plan is to build more permanent dwellings. We have gone from several hundred acres in NW Arkansas to a more manageable place of around 30 acres nearer our home.


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## PurpleHeartJarhead (Mar 23, 2014)

GrinnanBarrett said:


> In most cases it was neighbors stealing from us.


Ain't nothing I enjoy more, (aside from, well, you know) than catching a thief red handed. And I am the vindictive type who would, if not able to track you down, I'm posting your picture and caption all over the community, website, police department, etc...

Humiliation is a good teacher, now.

230 grains of hot copper and lead is a better teacher when things are um, _less _civilized.


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## Dakine (Sep 4, 2012)

QuasarZ said:


> I have been slowly prepping for about a year. My wife and I sold our townhouse and will be building in the spring. 6.5 acres with half woods, 45 miles from a big city.
> 
> We are currently renting in a small, crap house. Not many options that will allow a german shepherd out there for renters. The power went out last night and I got thinking. If something happened where it was long term, we would be totally hosed right now. We are so not prepared for anything like that at the moment. It was kind of like a 'holy crap, we are sitting ducks' moment. We cannot wait to break ground and get our house underway.
> 
> I'll keep slowly packing food away and updating my gear, but the heavy duty preps will have to wait until we move.


we had a major power outage a couple years back, blacked out the entire region... ironically it was a sanctioned work order that went askew because of miscommunication and the purpose of the work order was to PREVENT a power outage!!! :congrat:

Anyway, that day and night I had the benefit of testing my comm's!!! It was also the hottest day of the year, which is pretty warm for us, but not really HOT like where I'm from in AZ.

After it was over, several guys at work were talking about it and reflecting "I should have had an emergency radio, I couldnt get any updates because there was no TV and there was no phones" And I was comparing which of my radios I liked better... 

at the same time, I don't think any of them actually acted on that and purchased, much less tested radios they bought.

Sucks to be them once the lights go out for a real emergency that isn't resolved in less than 24 hours.


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## biobacon (Aug 20, 2012)

Yeah, each time something happens you learn a little more and pray you can take care of it before next time.


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## QuasarZ (Mar 17, 2014)

Dakine said:


> we had a major power outage a couple years back, blacked out the entire region... ironically it was a sanctioned work order that went askew because of miscommunication and the purpose of the work order was to PREVENT a power outage!!! :congrat:
> 
> Anyway, that day and night I had the benefit of testing my comm's!!! It was also the hottest day of the year, which is pretty warm for us, but not really HOT like where I'm from in AZ.
> 
> ...


So which radio do you like better? Any recommendations one purchasing one?


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## LincTex (Apr 1, 2011)

QuasarZ said:


> So which radio do you like better? Any recommendations one purchasing one?


What is it exactly you would like to do with it/one?

Listen Only? Or transmit to others as well?


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## Dakine (Sep 4, 2012)

QuasarZ said:


> So which radio do you like better? Any recommendations one purchasing one?





LincTex said:


> What is it exactly you would like to do with it/one?
> 
> Listen Only? Or transmit to others as well?


exactly!

So at the time I had only two, I had a Midland basecamp which has transmit and receive and does the usual stuff with NOAA stations and has the hand crank... (notable mention: transmitting requires at least a GMRS license!)

http://www.amazon.com/Midland-XT511...76&sr=8-1&keywords=midland+base+station+radio

and I had an Eton with the solar charger and hand crank, basically many of the same features as the Midland above but without Transmit which is a pretty big difference.

http://www.amazon.com/American-Turb...7009348&sr=8-2&keywords=eton+hand+crank+radio

Ironically I got the Midland for cheaper than the Eton, for whatever reason REI was blowing them out, and it was marked down to $42 from 60'ish and then when the register rung it up, it was really only 20-something, so I got a great price.

Both radios did very well, the reception was fine for my place which is pretty close to the top of a hill, I'm not skylined but I'm overlooking a large part of the valley below.

If I was forced to pick between them I would have to take the Midland. If you dont have comm's you dont have jack! listening is okay, but it's not the same.

since then I've gotten my HAM license and CERT has provided me with 2 different Yaesu radios. The VX-170 and FT-60

The 170 in my opinion was superior in several regards, but I think maybe it's no longer produced? I'm not sure... anyway, it was WAYYYYYYY better at battery life, and at least in my limited experience transmit and receive were comparable.

The FT60 is dual band, 2m and 440 so you've got more options there, that may or may not mean anything to someone, if everything they want to do is clubs and stuff on 2m then having or missing 440 is irrelevant to them, but if you want it and dont have it, that sucks lol...

I've also purchased a couple inexpensive Baofeng UV-5R's one is a 5Rplus... and I have no idea what that got me, other than it was a couple bucks cheaper than the first one I got because of a lightning black friday sale after thanksgiving last year.

The yaesu is easier to use, and there's more support available, and if you're new to radios perhaps much easier to get your feet wet with factory support and documentation.... that being said.... there's ample documentation and youtube videos to support Baofeng and the cost is a fraction of the Yaesu's!!! figure $30-35 for a Baofeng and I haven't looked lately but maybe $150-175 for the Yaesu FT60

both are dual band, and if you dont mind geeking out, and doing a little more leg work digging up forums and support docs at all kinds of sites, including this one!!!  there's no reason to spend a TON of cash on the Yaesu unless you really like that brand and a feature set better.

I have a very basic setup and I practice once a week on a directed net when my CERT team does a radio program for our members, for people who really get bit by the radio bug, there are units that cost thousands of dollars, and then they install antenna's that cost, well I have no idea, but they aren't free either! 

I want to buy two more radios in the near future, I want a mobile for my truck(s) which will offer a LOT more power, transmit at 70W instead of 5W but I also want a VX-8DR which is another HT, (hand transceiver, the little belt clip models like the baofengs and 170/60 I was discussing above) but this one is submersible, it's 4 band, and it supports APRS which is packet transmission... you can use that radio to send packets over the internet to other radios, or to computers setup to interface with it.

Again though, you pay for geek knobs and buttons to push... so start adding features like those and the price starts going up considerably. The antenna for the trucks I will use a very nice magnetic mount which I can swap back and forth, I'll just buy a 2nd mounting bracket, and use wing nuts instead of screws or maybe some slick Quick Detach solution just to be cool!  and that runs about $250'ish for the model I was looking into I think, the VX-8DR is going to be $450 or more unless you find a good sale or something.

OHHHH Yeah!!! I also got a CB radio around here somewhere, but I never mounted that in my truck! I just remembered that. Hmmm maybe I'll throw that into the 'burb just so it's doing something besides occupying shelf space in the house. No reason not to...

Anyway, that's Dak's radio report, let me know if you have questions on any of that and I'll offer what I can, but there are *MANY* folks here that are far superior resources for knowledge than I am! :beercheer:


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## QuasarZ (Mar 17, 2014)

Thanks for all that. Yes I would like to transmit too.


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## LincTex (Apr 1, 2011)

QuasarZ said:


> Thanks for all that. Yes I would like to transmit too.


Get in touch with your local Amateur Radio Club, they will be a wealth of information!


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