Avid Power Cordless Tire Inflator

Ever try to find an air pump that works at a gas station? When, and if you do, it usually requires $2.00 in quarters or a credit card, and the hose is a pain in the ass to loop around to the far side of your car before your time runs out. Tick-tock, you better hurry up before you need to feed it again... I hate it. That's why this Avid Power Tire Inflator is a must have device.

I have a really nice full sized air compressor; it's an older Sears model with a myriad of attachments that's really been worth its weight in gold over the years. It's just the ticket for running air guns or pneumatic tools, but it's big, heavy, and needs power. You also need to bleed the air tank before you put it away to prevent rust and prolong the life of the tank by removing accumulated moisture. The other drawback to it is that it doesn't have an automatic shutoff at a preset pressure, and that makes it a pain to correctly inflate tires, or anything where precision is important. You constantly need to stop and check the pressure with a tire gauge, and then either bleed or resume pumping. Great tool, but not for every job.

The Avid Power Cordless Tire Inflator is the right tool when you need portable precision. Power it on, preset your desired pressure, lock it onto the valve stem and squeeze the trigger. That's it, it shuts off automatically when the desired pressure is reached, and it's very accurate, I've checked it repeatedly with my tire gauge and it's always right on. It's dual powered as well; it comes with a 20V rechargeable Li-Ion battery and a 12V DC adaptor with a 9.8' cord so you can plug it into your car if its battery dies on you. Nice.

Battery life has been great so far. I bought it back in the spring and have used it on my yard and hose carts, two bikes, three vehicles (topping off all 4 tires on each, and a couple were really low), footballs, basketballs, and a plethora of pool toys, all on the initial 4-hour charge. Even though the battery still read half full, I recharged it this month. You don't want to completely drain Li-Ion batteries if you can help it, best to keep them topped off on a regular basis so they're ready to go when you need them.

But wait, there's more! This bad boy stands on its own, so you don't need to hold it all hunched over while it fills, and it's got an led light so you can easily find those valve stems in the dark. It comes with 3 different nozzles, the rechargeable battery, a battery charger, the 12V adaptor, a clear, concise user manual and a nice case to keep everything together and ready to go. It also comes in a variety of colors, but I like the safety yellow for portable tools from a visibility standpoint, these eyes are getting old lol.

One word of caution when ordering; The link supplied above is for the whole package I've described, and it's very reasonable at $59.99. There are other packages at lower price points, but don't cheap out. You need all the accessories, and the case.

So, pull the trigger, so to speak, and get one of these before the real cold weather sets in. You don't want to be confounded by thermal contraction as a direct consequence of the ideal gas law (PV = nRT). TB12 would be the first to tell you; It's science, man, you can't get around it. That is all.

NOAA Weather Radios and Why You Need Them

 

It sure seems like Mother Nature has lost her mind of late, or maybe she's found it, and She's trying her hardest to give us all the boot before we finish her off, like shaking off aggravating fleas, so to speak. Either way, it's a good time to remind everyone that they should have at least two good NOAA weather radios on hand, a tabletop and a portable model, both with battery backup and both with SAME technology.

A Weather Radio may seem like a low-tech and superfluous solution, but it's not. I can hear you saying to yourself as you read this; "No thanks, I watch the Weather Channel, plus I've got my phone for alerts, and that works just fine for me." Problem is that may not always be the case. Sometimes you're in an area with poor cell coverage, or even worse, none at all. Cell towers can be down in an emergency as they often involve extended power outages and destructive forces, and sometimes emergencies happen in the dead of night, when you're dead asleep. That's where these devices really shine, and why you need them. They’re loud, automatic, and work everywhere. Ours is so loud it scares the crap out of us even in a deep sleep, and that's what you want in an emergency. Plus, the broadcast is free, once you buy the radio, you're protected, no subscription necessary, unlike your phone.

So, now that I've proven to you that they're a necessity (I hope), here's what you need:

You should have a tabletop model for your home that plugs in to AC power and has battery backup, because you want it on all the time. You also want SAME technology, which allows you to tailor the reporting areas and categories, so the alarm/siren isn't going off for stuff that's either too far out of your area, or your area of interest. The Midland WR120B NOAA Weather and Emergency Alert Radio is a very good choice for this one. It's affordable, easy to set up and gives you very clear and readable information, both alerts and up to the minute weather reports for your area. It also has simple color-coded warning lights. There are no AM or FM bands on this one, but I'm good with that. If that's a deal breaker for you, the next model up, the Midland WR400, does have both AM and FM, plus a few other tricks up its sleeve. It's a little more expensive, and a tiny bit harder to set up and read, but it's a very good option as well.

For a portable, you want something like the Givoust 8000mah NOAA radio. This one makes the top of every camping and emergency preparedness list out there. It has excellent reception and battery life, plus the batteries are rechargeable via USB, solar and crank power. It also has SAME technology. and it has an "Alerts Only" setting, so you can keep it on without running down the power. It also has AM and FM bands, a couple of lights, and multiple charging ports for your phones. It's perfect for both travel and to have on hand at home for those really long power outages.

NOAA weather radios not only broadcast the National Weather Service (NWS) forecast but also the Emergency Alert System (EAS), so these radios will alert you to a myriad of things besides just severe weather: Natural disasters, AMBER alerts, terrorist attacks, chemical releases and spills, nuclear power plant emergencies, the list goes on and on, and that SAME technology I mentioned earlier allows you to custom tailor which ones trigger the siren feature, e.g. I don't want to be woken up for a Required Monthly Test, no thanks, lemme sleep, but a nuclear meltdown? Yes please, shake me and wake me. I'm not gonna lie, self-preservation and sleep are my things, and always in that exact order. Note: most of the emergency events are on by default and can't be disabled, but that's a good thing, as my friend Martha always says. The tailoring you do will be mostly area related. Here's a link to the list of EAS Alerts received by these radios, you can see it's pretty comprehensive and there are very few types you'd want to mess with: EAS Selectable Alerts

So, a tabletop and a portable Weather Radio will run you less than a Hundo combined, and I'd say that's a pretty cheap price for both safety and peace of mind. Order them now, don't delay, it's not nice to fool with Mother Nature, she always comes out on top.

That is all.

More Extreme Tech - Rigid VP2000 Wet Vac Pump

I found this baby at Home Depot this weekend while I was looking for a replacement squeegee head for my Rigid Wet/Dry Vac.

I love my shop vac, except when it’s full of nasty water and I need to empty it. I could drain it into the sump pit, but that would be kind of counter productive. Instead, we ladle some off with a bucket, and then we lift it up and pour the rest down the basement utility sink. Back breaking work. No fun at all.

With this baby, you pop it on before you start, and then when the unit is full you connect a hose and you can pump the water up to 50ft at a rate of 10gpm. Nice!

I know, I know, I should have done these last two posts before and not during Irene. Can’t be helped; busy, busy, busy.

Backyard Tech – Extreme Edition: Generators

Having a basement that’s prone to flooding, we were way overdue in adding a generator to our flood fighting arsenal. We’re fine as long as the sump pumps run, but if they stop working, disaster ensues. We finally bit the bullet after we remodeled Man Town this past year.

I knew nothing about generators when we started looking, but after a little research, and some professional electrical advice, we came up with a plan. Our main concern was the pumps, but we also wanted something that would help us out during those ugly winter Nor’easters that we’re prone to around here. There’s a great Wattage Estimation Guide on the Honda Power Equipment website that helped us out a lot.

We settled on the Honda EG5000. It’s big enough to hook up to your house via a transfer switch and run quite a few devices, and yet small enough to still be considered a portable. It’s from Honda’s Economy line, which means it has the power of the more expensive models, just fewer frills. No key start, no wheels, no fancy panels. It does, however, pump out 5000W (4500W rated) of power, both 120/240V, via a nice variety of outputs (two 20A 125V outlets, one 20A 125V locking plug, one 30A 125V locking plug and a 30A 125/250V locking plug).

It’s powered by Honda’s commercial grade 389cc engine, which is relatively quiet (73dB), and it has some great features that you won’t find on cheaper generators, like DAVR (digital automatic voltage regulation witch prevents power fluctuations) and Oil Alert (the unit shuts down the engine before you hit the add level). It also comes with a 3 year parts and labor warranty that’s valid for both commercial and residential use.

I bought mine from a Honda dealership (Parkway Cycle), rather than on line, because I wanted one that was assembled, bench tested, and ready to rock and roll. It has an important job to do, so I did it right, and you should too.

Backyard Tech - Aquabot Turbo T

Vacuuming the pool is one of those chores that you start off enjoying, but quickly run out of time and patience for.

Early in each pool season I’m gung ho to clean it by hand. It’s a great feeling to do something that shows such obvious results, and it can be an almost Zen like experience; standing quietly poolside, hypnotized by the rhythmic motions and the sighing, woodwind like sounds as the air escapes from the pole on each down stroke. It slows things down and gives me time to think and relax.

As the season goes on though, my thoughts increasingly focus on what a time consuming pain in the ass it actually is. The setup, the breakdown, the backwashing, the standing in the hot sun during the day, or trying to keep my focus while swatting mosquitoes in the evening, and as the summer heats up and the algae starts blooming, each vacuum becomes longer and more tedious. You never hit every spot either, no matter how much time and energy you put into it. Consequently the pool liner starts to get that slimy “Slip and Slide” feel to it, especially on the down slope to the deep end. It’s hard to put enough pressure on the pole to really scrub those deep angled places.

A couple of years ago I purchased a rechargeable pool “dust buster”, the Pool Blaster. It attaches to the end of your pole and does a great job. It’s a self contained device, so it cuts out the setup time and the backwashing part of skimmer vacuuming, but you still have to go over every square inch of the pool. It’s great, but it’s not the ultimate solution to vacuuming, it’s more of a spot cleaner.

We also thought about having the pool cleaned on a regular basis by our pool people, but that gets costly. We have them come by when we’re away and they do a great job, but its $70 bucks a pop, and that’s just too rich for my blood over the course of the summer, so we started to look for a pool cleaning robot. There’s a ton of them out there, but after much research we settled on the Aquabot Turbo T.

Aquabot has a whole line of pool bots, one for every type of pool and every budget. The Turbo T model is on the high end of the spectrum, but it pays for itself in time, chemicals and results. It motors around the pool like a little submersible Sherman Tank, scrubbing, vacuuming and power washing every inch of the pool, and leaves it sparkling clean. By the second use we started noticing that the vinyl liner felt like it did when it was new; firm and textured instead of smooth and slippery.

This baby is amazing. It even climbs up the wall and moves along the water line,defying gravity while it scrubs the liner all the way up to the coping. It picks up everything; sand, leaves, rocks, and I’m always amazed at the amount of debris inside the filter bag at the end of its cycle. I run it about twice a week, and the pool has never been so clean. I’m even saving money on earth and chemicals because I don’t need to backwash as much, plus I now get to do my Zen like thinking while seated and watching the bot clean the pool. Much better.

I got my Aquabot online from In the Swim, who I found via GoodSearch. GoodSearch provided me with a discount coupon and made a donation to the charity of my choice based on a percentage of the sale price. Nice. Check them out, they do great things, and check out the video below of the bot in action.

Backyard Tech – Part 3, Pool Opening Made Easy

Well, it’s that time of year again. Memorial Day weekend is upon us, and I’ve got the pool opened and sparkling clean. The water is a brisk 66 °, and I’m the only one that’s foolishly gone in (yikes!) so far, but I’ll bet there’ll be a nephew or two who will throw caution to the wind today and come out with chattering teeth and blue lips, professing to all that “It’s not really so bad”.

Ah, early summer in New England… I love it.

Opening the pool is the start of the summer countdown clock for me. Mid May to mid September is usually the best you can hope for in terms of pool weather up this way. That’s roughly 120 days, not a large return on all the time you spend opening, closing and tending the darn thing. Over the years I’ve found some little shortcuts to ease the pain, and the best investment I’ve made to date is our Loop-Loc pool cover.

We used to use a cheap plastic cover with water bags to keep it in place. If you’ve ever seen this type of setup, you know that over the fall and winter, leaves, rain and snow collect on the cover, and by spring you’ve got a nasty quagmire that needs to be “ladled” off before you can budge the cover, and if you don’t get it all off, whatever you miss ends up in the pool. Yuck. After a couple of openings, I decided that there had to be a better way, and there is.

Loop-Loc makes a great mesh cover that fits tightly over the pool, almost like a trampoline. When it’s on, the pool looks like a tennis court, allowing us to get a little more use out of the area in the fall. During the off season, rain and snow melt pass through, adding back the water you had to pump out to close it, and leaves, pine needles and the like stay on top, to be blown off by either Mother Nature or my Toro leaf blower. This saves me 2 or 3 days of backbreaking work, and saves on water usage. Sweet.

It also acts as a great safety cover. Step on it, and it gives just enough to get your feet wet. No steep drop off to a putrid swamp, like with traditional covers. I don’t know how many small animals I had to fish out of the old setup, and the thought of one of the kids falling in always scared the crap out of me.

Loop-Loc makes covers for in ground and above ground pools, as well as hot tubs and spas. They’re not cheap, as you have to have them custom made for the dimensions and configuration of your pool, but they’re well worth it. Also, if you’re going to do it, you should let a pool service company install it for you. If your measurements are off, or you install the pop up fasteners in the wrong spots, you could end up with big problems.

Check them out, and have a safe and happy holiday!

More Backyard Tech - Rain Barrels

Rain barrels are about as low tech as you can get, but they're a very effective and time proven way to conserve water and save money.

I'd been thinking about getting a rain barrel ever since I saw a rebate program on my local DPW website. With all the rain we've been having here in the Northeast lately, I thought it was finally time to stop thinking about it and start capturing some of that free water.

I decided on a flat backed, faux wood grain, 50 gallon barrel from Clean Air Gardening. I got one barrel to start with, just to get my feet wet, so to speak. The plan was to test drive the first one before I got any more. I wanted to know if they were useful, how long it took to fill one, and I also wanted to use it as a template to see where else I could fit them. There are a number of sizes and types, even small ones that double as planters, so I wanted to be sure of what I needed before I bought multiples of any one size or type.

Once it arrived, setup was a piece of cake. First I wrapped the threads on the spigot with Teflon tape before I screwed it in place. I recommend screwing it in partially before you tape it, to get a feel for it, and to make sure the hole is threaded correctly. Mine started to go in crooked, and when I backed it out I saw a chunk of plastic in the threads. Once I picked it out, it went in straight and true. Next I snapped the bug screen in place, and that was it, done.

I took some quick measurements and then built up the area where I would be placing it with patio block. You want the barrel to be high enough so that you have clearance to use the spigot, and also to improve the water flow, but not so high that it looks ridiculous, or is a tipping danger. Once I was happy with the placement, I started work on the downspout. Remember, you’ll need to put your downspout back together after you put the rain barrel away for the winter, so don’t hack up your existing stuff, start fresh.

I removed my downspout all the way up to the elbow at the top where it comes into contact with the house, and stored it away for safe keeping. Then I replaced it with a 1 foot straight piece, a direction changing elbow, and then a flexible elbow, so I could shape it right down into the barrel opening.

There are diverters available that redirect the water back down the existing spout when the barrel is full, and they're a great solution in most cases, but my problem is that I live in a low lying area and I've always had issues with my downspouts dumping water too close to my foundation and aggravating the situation, so I decided to rely on the overflow valve at the top instead.

Once I was happy with the feed, I covered the concave top of the barrel with polished river stones that I had leftover from another project. You can find them in 5lb bags at most garden centers. I also added a short 3 foot hose to the spigot to make it easier to fill watering cans.

That’s it, I was ready to start collecting water, and boy did I…

We got about 2 inches of rain that first night, and it was still drizzling a little in the morning when I went out to check on it. At first I thought something had gone wrong with my plumbing, and then I realized that the barrel was full and water was spurting out of the overflow valve at the top.

50 + gallons of water in 1 night! Wowzers!

So, it seems like I have an endless supply of water now, and the backyard is much drier. How cool is that?

You won’t get a lot of pressure when you hook a hose up to it, but it’s great for filling watering cans or just letting the hose run without a nozzle next to ornamental trees and shrubs. You can also hook a soaker hose to it and lay it out in your garden. Plus, now you have an easy way to run excessive rain water far far away from your house. Just hook up a hose to the spigot and run it out into the yard. Bonus.

If you have the space, and the need for more water, you can daisy chain barrels together using the overflow valves. That would be the only criticism I have of the barrel I got, the overflow valve hole isn’t threaded for a hose, where some of the other models have this feature. I traded off the threading for looks and the space saving flat back as the barrel is in a high traffic area.

Clean Air Gardening had the best prices, hands down, and the barrel arrived when promised and in good shape. Check them out; they have quite a selection, plus lots of cool stuff like high quality reel mowers and compost barrels.

Backyard Tech - Part 2, Bugs Bug Me

It's hard to enjoy your backyard on those warm summer nights when you're getting eaten alive by mosquitoes. The little pests rule from dusk to dawn, and even with bug spray on, they buzz around your head and drive you nuts!

I'm a skeptic, and I was slow to embrace mosquito traps. They sounded like a good idea, but there wasn't a lot of information on results, and they were a bit pricey.

Well, we finally got tired of being chased out of the pool at night by the little blood suckers, and decided to take the plunge. We looked at them all, and ended up getting the Skeeter Vac by Blue Rhino.

To my surprise, the thing actually works! Click on the picture above for a close up of a recent night's catch. When we first started using it, the haul was much bigger, but after a couple of seasons of operation we've effectively reduced the mosquito population in our backyard.

The reasons we chose the Skeeter Vac over the Mosquito Magnet were price and ease of operation. The Skeeter Vac models run entirely off of propane, there's no power cord required. Being able to locate these things where you need them is crucial to their success, so this is a huge factor. Plus you can get a top of the line Skeeter Vac for the same price as a mid level Mosquito Magnet.

Now this isn't an overnight cure, but after a few cycles, you'll really notice a difference. Placement is key, so spend the money and get a wheeled one if you can. It will make life a lot easier.

The unit needs to run 24-7 to be the most effective. A 20 lb tank of gas will last two weeks, and I usually change the bait and the tack paper every other tank swap.

I've noticed at the start of each season that it doesn't seem to perform at it's full pest killing potential until it's been running for a few days. I guess it has to warm up to the job. If you're still not catching much after the break in period, try relocating the unit. You want it near the source areas, and away from you.

Northline has a 30 day free trial program on some models. They carry both brands mentioned, as well as a few others, and have a nice comparison chart.

Backyard Tech

Here's a backyard gadget that will help to make your summer a breeze.

the Pool Buster is a rechargeable self contained pool vacuum that attaches to a skimmer pole or can be hand held. This thing is great and has cut down on my pool maintenance time considerably. Check out the video.

I enjoy cleaning the pool, it can be a relaxing way to spend a summer morning, but the setup is a hassle and the whole thing is very time consuming. With the Pool Buster, I just pop it on to a skimmer pole and I'm off. No hoses, no bot to lug around, and I'm usually done in about 20 minutes. I'm also backwashing much less frequently, which not only saves time, but also money.

I'm not just being green by not pumping out all of that water (and chemicals), I'm saving green. Al Gore would be so proud of me!

A charge lasts me through 2 or 3 cleanings of a 16' x 32' in ground pool. It comes with a 1 hour rapid recharger, but works best on a full 4 to 5 hour charge. I've seen some complaints about battery life, but I haven't experienced it myself. I have a buddy that has one also, and neither has he. It's important to give it a good initial charge of 5 hours, and to not keep it in your pool house. The temperature extremes will wreak havoc with any battery powered device. It's also recommended that you give it a full charge before you put it away in the winter.

The product was renamed this year to Pool Blaster (a little trouble with the folks at Dust Buster, perhaps?) and can be found advertised both ways. There's also a smaller Catfish model for spas and small above ground pools.