Ice Storms

Thank Rusty 2 gens fueled and waiting I hate ICE !! I am sure there is some northerns getting a giggle out of this   :heater:  but I am serious I hate ice I have fell on that stuit more  than  I want to remember  kill the ice man     

Yea.. I've been keeping an eye on the weather today. I hope you two don't get hit too hard down there. Preparing is all you can do.

Best of luck!
Roddie

Ice is worse than snow. Ice sticks to things, pulls wires down, pulls trees down, makes the roads dangerous, and has to be melted off.

Snow is cold and makes the roads dangerous, but can be pushed.

Phil

Personally I think it's all overrated hype, just like the last snow we had here. I was out playing airsoft today with the neighborhood kids in the "freezing rain" without a problem.

We have a generator and about 10 gallons of petrol if the power does go out.

Our backup is a wood pile and a fine fireplace. And we'll still have hot water. Hot chocolate. I have a Coleman stove, lanterns and some fuel. Lotsa cans in the pantry and coffee, Holley bought a spare case of beer. We'll survive. Glad they made me come do an emergency dialysis run to hold me through till Friday. I didn't wanna go, but I'm glad I did now. Just blew a day not in the shop. Got a MIL with a rat dog, sort of a nookie killer combo. I'm betting it doesn't get as cold as they predict and it's much ado about nothing. So there, Ice Storm!
Bleary Rusty
G'night.....we'll see what morning brings.

getback wrote:I am sure there is some northerns getting a giggle out of this

Yes, we're chuckling over it!    

No, I understand you guys don't have all the road equipment to take care of the snow and ice on the roads. Plus you guys probably aren't used to driving in the crap, hell a good chuck of people here still don't seem to know how to drive in snow and ice. It took -50°F windchills to begin to shut things down around here, it takes A LOT of snow to fall and a blizzard condition before anything shuts down over the snow (solid ice covering everything would be another story though). We're supposed to get about 2" of snow by the morning, its just starting to warm up, was 15°F today and its supposed to be 30°F tomorrow.


You'll all be fine, don't drive if you don't have to (unless you want to go out and whip sh*tties). If the power goes out, hopefully you guys have at least one generator and some extra gas, full propane tank(s) and a propane heater...

Good Luck

I lived up Jacobs way during late sixties and never got a snow day off school as they are very adept at keeping roads clear

Normally down here in Central Texas the COLD blows out of Canada or from Alaska rarely makes it this far south...This year has been different. We have had 40, 50 to 60 degree shifts so many times now it is unreal.... The blow headed for Rusty n others out east just left here after bottoming us out at 18F right after a 75 degree day Sunday...Down here there is NOT ONE snow plow and very few spreader trucks for sand... no salt (Yea! I hated the rust from that crap)

Fort Hood is a BIG arsed Army post with a Corps HQ, 2 Divisions, and thousands of Civilian employees.... Funny how they only seem to shut it down to all but essential personnel AFTER everybody (50,000+) all headed to "work".... Makes a serious mess of our roads!

Normal years a cord of wood will last two or three winters of occasional "ambiance" fireplace burning.
This year I am half way into cord number two trying to keep the electric bill under $400 a month
Our houses here are cooling efficient but heating inefficient due to all forced air vents are in the ceilings

Hang tight Rusty we will send 80F air your way in 72 hours....

We had an ice storm in 2009 that took down everything -- electricity, water, all phone service. There were zero services and businesses were closed meaning no food, no fuel, nothing. We stored our food outside since it was more than cold enough to keep things frozen. Some folks were without electricity over 3 weeks. The cleanup took months and debris was stacked in massive mounds 20 yards wide and a 100 yards long in fields around the county.

This year's ice storm arrived Super Bowl Sunday --- while many roads have been cleared and I have electricity. there remains a mass of trees down and many trees are still carrying a load of ice since the temps haven't broken freezing for 10 days.

I can deal with snow, but ice storms cause much more damage in many more ways.

Hunker down, guys.

Two weeks ago all of our power company trucks were in PA. This week, the PA crews have come down here. Thanks Pennsylvanians, and others who came to help out.

We had similar tradeoffs of hay during the summer drought some time ago. One year the Midwesterners brought us hay, and a couple of years ago we were able to return the favor for them.

Still just sleeting now, they keep pushing the time for freezing rain back. Still forecast for that all night. I got my old 1980 Kerosun heater cleaned up. I bet 99% of everyone who bought one that long ago has thrown it away. It's a fine piece of equipment. Got a propane burner ready. Thought I had Coleman fuel, but was mistaken. Maybe we won't need it.
Rusty

I've been out sledding.   

I have a sled, an old one with narrow runners. Best for ice, but I'm not playing with it right now. I might offer it to the kids next door if i see them. The Dad and his boy were doing donuts in the Church parking lot. A new generation, I passed the torch!

microflitedude wrote:I've been out sledding.   

no sledding for me Matt I wish I could I really used to love it , we used to have some good times dog fighting to the bottom !! any way here s what s happen here time laps abut 2.5 hr into it     out my front door u can see that good old fire wood just waiting to keep us warm .  :heater:  ERIC's report of our best snow yet 2014!!!

It seems you've got all the cold on that side of the pond this year...

Here it has been unusually warm, and we didn't even have any snow around Christmas this year as the temperature stayed just above zero. We have a saying; "There is no bad weather, only bad clothing". That is sometimes very true. I went windsurfing when we had a big storm on the 22nd of Dec, and I ended up in the newspaper on the 23rd of Dec. (!)

Apparently not everyone thinks of surfing in December...?

RknRusty wrote:I have a sled, an old one with narrow runners. Best for ice, but I'm not playing with it right now. I might offer it to the kids next door if i see them. The Dad  and his boy were doing donuts in the Church parking lot. A new generation, I passed the torch!

I picked up these genuine Flexible Flyers that were made by S.L. Allen Co. in Philadelphia sometime in the 50's I think.. could be earlier. They have the "turned-up" safety runners that were introduced in the mid 1930's.

They are both Airline model 55H "Chiefs" (55" long) The nicer looking one has a cracked right side-rail.. a common problem with the longer sleds that weren't designed with a center-set of braces. These are "big kid" sleds... and one good "jump" with a heavy rider.. and you could break a side-rail. The "racers" were about 2-3 inches lower, and had 3 sets of braces supporting the deck. All the genuine Flexible Flyers with built with high carbon steel runners, and Yellow-Ash wood.

The weathered one's side-rails are both solid. The two sleds have production run letters on them. The weathered one has an "L" and the "prettier" one has an "H".. but they are both 55H models.

If you like old sleds.. look here  http://www.sledhill.com/

Here are my two..

I can't tell you how many times we rebuilt the ole flexible flyers! Even using 3/4 pine planking the wood would shatter on a good bump.

Phil

Also been driving my little truck around on the now-glazed-over ice. Lots of fun.

I found it at Goodwill, and replaced all the electronic hardware with hobby grade components.

Taking full advantage of the weather.   They say it's supposed to get colder tomorrow.

Surfing in December, nah not on this side of the Equator. Gotta be tough for that. I have been Surfing in March when the water was so cold I suddenly couldn't breath. Scary for a moment, but I caught a few curls before I turned blue.

My sled looks a lot like those, I'll look at it and see what it says.

We burned a whole lot of firewood today, and may have dodged the worst ice in my neighborhood. Power is still on for now and it's turning to snow through noon or so Thursday.

It was too cold in the shop to paint or glue, but I could solder. So I fixed my flap to bellcrank linkage that I was having trouble with. I had the right brass tube to adapt the wire to CF tube, so it's in place and awaiting warmer temps so I can JB Weld it. Then I got cold and came back into the house.
Rusty

I just woke up this am to another 12" of white stuff. We received 3-4" this past weekend not to mention the cold temps has kept the white stuff around. Schools just close prior to even seeing the white stuff. I recall standing at the bus stop in the cold waiting for the bus. Rule was, if the bus was late we could leave. All of us would be standing there listening for the chains on the tires in the distance.Once we heard them, we took off running.  You never witnessed 20 kids running home so fast. Everyone would agree that the bus was late so that we didn't need to go. Right when the excitement of staying home kicked in, a few of the parents had station wagons which they would drive us to school. Ken

Says we got 8.3 " i'll ck that at my house now ... 5" with the ice man on top    bout busted my a** on the steps , stupid bed room shoes!!?? My junkie back yard. ERIC

Yeah, I thought about you guys up there when I looked at the radar this morning. PA looked like heavy snow at the time. It was encroaching on Roddie, and I'm sure Bob in NY is getting it too. Eric in NC got plenty. We had a glassy hockey rink this morning, but it's been snowing, so that added some traction for the tennis shoes. I suppose I have an old pair of snowshoes somewhere. Lol.
Rusty

No Ice here in N. Smithfield, RI... yet... started snowing at about 7 a.m. It's 29F and we've got about 1 inch so far... on top of 12+ inches leftover from the last storm. It's stayed around freezing temps here all this past week.

I cancelled an 11:00 a.m. appointment that I had.. about 15 miles away. Why chance driving in it?

Roddie

Don't blame you Roddie its not worth it when you can stay home in the warm and play airplane {DUKE}    sorry man couldn't resisted , snowing again here was raining very lite should get 1-2 more they say . High 30 today , I don't care wood on porch warm inside , airplanes to work on    glad the power is still working though after I bout broke my neck getting other generator to the back. had to do it before the storm or would have never made it and was afraid a limb would fall on it out of that popular tree it was under   Eric out time to get with it

getback wrote:Don't blame you Roddie its not worth it when you can stay home in the warm and play airplane {DUKE}    sorry man couldn't resisted  , snowing again here was raining very lite should get 1-2 more they say . High 30 today , I don't care wood on porch warm inside , airplanes to work on    glad the power is still working though after I bout broke my neck getting other generator to the back. had to do it before the storm or would have never made it and was afraid a limb would fall on it out of that popular tree it was under   Eric out time to get with it

Update.. (about 2 hrs. from the last one..) now there's at least 5" and it's really coming down!   I don't have a generator.. but I do have a large deep-cycle battery and 2 inverters for 1000w total to run necessities. I know it's not enough.. but there's no ice yet... I worry mostly about the furnace and well-pump. I can't power those on my inverters.

I've got my workshop in the basement at about 78F. and am working on my "Bearcat" for the speed contest.   

Roddie