Show Me Your Pallet Projects!

[gtaus]

I went to athens yesterday. while I was there someone broke in my house and stole my tools. I am making new coops and really need my tools.

Sorry to hear that. I know what that feels like.

I hate it when my tools walk off on me. It's only happened a few times to me, and it was most likely someone stealing easy stuff to sell for drug money. That's what the cops told me when I made my report. Never got anything back. It's bad enough to have your stuff stolen, but I also felt a sense of violation that someone would come on to my property and take stuff.

Although I have almost all of my tools under lock and key, it would never stop a serious criminal. I live out in the country, so that is still my best defense from lots of traffic.

Anyways, I hope you are able to replace those tools you need to finish building your new coops. Best wishes.

 

[ChicksnMore]

I went to athens yesterday. while I was there someone broke in my house and stole my tools. I am making new coops and really need my tools.

Hope the tools were the worst of it.

 

[wrathsfarm]

I went to athens yesterday. while I was there someone broke in my house and stole my tools. I am making new coops and really need my tools.

Wow, that sucks. I'm so sorry this happened to you. Are you able to to get a list together and get a report filed? Possible to make an Insurance claim?
Unsure of your process being in Greece but around here it's a long shot at best, unlikely to recover anything and insurance is a joke.

 

[wrathsfarm]

Well, we are in the dead of winter where I live. Outside temps of -16F at night with daytime highs of -1F. My unheated attached double-car garage is sitting at 26F, too cold for me to do any work out there.

When I first built this house, I had off-peak electricity in-floor slab heating in the house basement and the garage. Unfortunately, the wires were defective and burned out in less than 7 years. So much for the contractor stating that the floor heat would last a lifetime. It sure was nice when it worked, but those days are long gone.

Anyways, I have been looking into other options for heat in the garage in the winter. I would really like to go out there and tear apart some pallets or even maybe build something, like those new pallet wood raised beds I have on my list. I am trying to find out the relative costs of sources of heating to see what would be my best choice.

I looked into getting a large electric garage heater, but they require a 30- or 40-amp service line for installation. I only have a 20-amp line service to the garage, so that idea went nowhere.

I have a kerosene heater, a diesel heater, a propane heater, and smaller 120v electric heaters. I'm thinking my small 120v electric heaters would be too small to heat the garage, and too expensive on regular rate electricity. the kerosene heater would have to run a long time to heat up the garage, and where I live, kerosene is probably the most expensive choice. I have a super big torpedo diesel heater that would heat up the garage fast, but am not too sure if that would be a good idea to burn diesel inside an enclosed space. I have a smaller hot dog Mr. Buddy heater that runs of a BBQ propane tank. That is what I used last year and it worked OK, but propane tanks are pretty expensive.

I don't want to burn wood inside my attached garage because of the fire hazard. It's against code in town, but I don't live in town. Still, I am not considering that option. Although I often think that would be the best option because as I break down the pallets, I could be tossing in the broken bits and pieces of wood that I don't want to keep into the fire and heat up the garage while I work. Also, I don't think my insurance company would like it if I installed a burning barrel out in the attached garage. If anyone knows of a safe way to burn wood in an attached garage, please let me know.

I had a wall mounted ductless propane heater in my old garage, but those put too much moisture into the air from burning the gas and everything feels wet after a while. Worse yet, you will rust out your metal tools and such because of all the moisture in the air.

I do have an electrician coming out next week to see if he can salvage any of my old in-floor slab heating, or if he has any suggestions for extra garage heating. Like I said, the electric heaters I was looking at require 30-amp service at a minimum, and currently all I have is 20-amp lines.

If anyone has some suggestions for garage heating options that work for them, please let me know. I hate waiting until warmer `50F April temps before I can start working in the garage again. It gets to be a long winter....

Your 2 best options are your torpedo and the wood stove. I would run the torpedo just be mindful of CO. Crack a window or door and watch for headaches.
For the long haul, I'd run the torpedo to bring it up to temp fast and fire up the wood stove in the process. Do what you gotta do to bring the garage up to code for a wood burner, ie...minimum setback, fire backer, stovepipe and check with your insurance for their requirements.
Being that your garage is attached it should have 5/8th" drywall installed in garage side all the way up to the the roof peak with one coat of mud minimum and 'fire block' caulk at all gaps where wiring pass thru required by code.

Disclaimer... Take any advise as it is and it goes without saying, this is life or death. Your talking to someone hundreds of miles away on the intrawebs. Do your homework, do it to code and whatever your homeowners insurance requires. My codes in my state may differ from yours.
Fire extinguishers, smoke and co alarms apply.
One final thought, burning pallet wood if made from Pine adds creosote to your wood burner. It burns hot and fast. Research this also.

 

[NanaK]

I went to athens yesterday. while I was there someone broke in my house and stole my tools. I am making new coops and really need my tools.

That's really awful. I am so sorry.

I remember when we never locked our house at night or to go to town. Now we lock everything. Still some people get things stolen. It's sad but true.

Hope you can replace enough to be able to build your coops.

 

[gtaus]

Your 2 best options are your torpedo and the wood stove. I would run the torpedo just be mindful of CO. Crack a window or door and watch for headaches.

Thanks for the comments. I'm leaning towards the torpedo heater option becasue that would be the easiest, but I guess I'll have to look for a Carbon Monoxide alarm to keep it safe. I think the garage might be leaky enough that I don't have to crack a window or door, but I'll keep that in mind. In any case, I think the reason for cracking a window or door is to let Oxygen in that is getting burned up from the heater, not to let the Carbon Monoxide out. IIRC, my torpedo heater has a low Oxygen sensor and will automatically shut down before the Oxygen level is unsafe.

I have about 6 pallets loaded up in my old Ford Explorer that I would like to take out and breakdown in the garage - if I can get the garage warm enough. I have some small pallet projects that I could do in the garage provided I can make it comfortable. Would be nice to knock a few of those projects off my list before spring if possible.

 

[chickengr]

Wow, that sucks. I'm so sorry this happened to you. Are you able to to get a list together and get a report filed? Possible to make an Insurance claim?
Unsure of your process being in Greece but around here it's a long shot at best, unlikely to recover anything and insurance is a joke.

I don't pay any insurance. it's a joke as you say. I reported it and let's hope they find fingerprints.

 

[gtaus]

I don't pay any insurance. it's a joke as you say. I reported it and let's hope they find fingerprints.

If I had an honest to goodness woodworking shop full of expensive tools, it might make sense to insure it as a separate rider on my insurance. But as part of my homeowner's insurance, it probably would not pay to make a claim.

I don't have much confidence that police will ever bother to investigate a theft crime. Maybe if you had cameras and caught a good picture of the thieves, they would take some action. That's the first thing our local police ask for, security camera footage. If you don't have security cameras, they won't do anything other than write up a report so you can reference it if you make an insurance claim.

There are a number of YouTube videos where people are putting some kind of iPhone locator tags hidden on their equipment. If that unit gets stolen, the location might show up on the phone app and you can alert the police.

Some thieves are just plain dumb. Years ago, a guy broke the front windshield and side window of my wife's car to steal her purse, in broad daylight, in the company parking lot. Then he went to a gas station and used her credit card to fill up with gas - caught him on camera at the gas station. Then he went to WalMart and used her credit card to buy a $600 TV and some other stuff - again, caught on security camera at WalMart. I had called the credit card company to report the theft of the card and they gave me all the times and locations of the credit card used. I called the store managers and asked them if they had security camera footage of those transactions, and they did. So, I reported it all to the police and they arrested the guy within a couple of hours. Obviously, he was a repeat offender the police knew, and he was mentally impaired on top of eveything else. He was on a rampage of smashing windows and taking stuff out of cars, not just my wife's. It took about 5 years, but we got paid back for the damage to the car's windows that had to be replaced. Basically, I had already solved the who, what, where, and when of the crime and with the security footage of the thief, the police did not have much leg work to do to catch him.

At any rate, I hope you are able to recover your tools. Good luck.

 

[fuzzi]

Easier Pallet Wood Nail Removal!? A different approach.

Here is a short YouTube video from Izzy Swan on one way to make nail removal easier for pallet wood. Instead of using the leverage on your short crowbar, reverse the process and use the length of the 2X4 for leverage instead....

Too cool. Now I just need a bench vise...

 

[fuzzi]

I went to athens yesterday. while I was there someone broke in my house and stole my tools. I am making new coops and really need my tools.

Oh, I am so sorry. That stinks.