Replies to This Discussion

Permalink Reply by Marklar on August 9, 2010 at 5:33pm

Not sure but I think I might start by making sure I know where the septic tank is before digging.

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Permalink Reply by LK on October 9, 2010 at 9:24pm

Well, if money is no object, you've got half the battle won. Research and gather ideas of what suits you. Wealthy people are either buying already made bunkers or having one built. Around your home....maybe not a good idea. If anyone comes to search your home would surely find it.
Stock it would like your home, only MUCH MORE of everything. People are buying the train cars (cannot remember proper name) and burying them underground. You can pipe in your oxygen from a crude set up to a very expensive system. They run electric and plumbing; everything just like a house. Just keep that in mind. Large blue barrels to store food and water; shelves for cans and jars of food. I am currently buying 50# of flour's, corn meal, rice, lentils and beans. We will need to re-learn how to cook from scratch. When the grocery shelves are empty, all you have to rely on is what you have in your home or stockpile. You will have nobody to rely on but yourself. I'm sure you already know that. Just research every aspect of surviving; I even read articles on survival in the wilderness, with no tools to survive and how to make do with what's "out there." I have spent more hours researching than I do sleep. Keep your eyes on the middle east, especially Israel. When our dollar value goes down the toilet, our hell on earth just begins.
Solar, solar, solar, solar! I cannot afford the large setup to run my entire house but there are tons of small solar's for electronics, lamps, anything electric. Go to eBay and just enter "solar" and you will get an idea of what there is. You will be very surprised. I am making a homemade solar oven (made out of boxes and foil). There are tons of ways to cook food; even in 16 oz. vegetable cans.
I am new to this site so I have not read everything here but I am sure you have read all over the internet to KEEP YOUR MOUTH SHUT! Stockpiling? Why your going solar? Why you are buying 50# of flour? Tell NOBODY. Not even your best friend if he does not agree with what is happening. Folks will think your just another conspiracy nut job. Let them think it and drop the subject. Don't try to convince them. KEEP YOUR MOUTH SHUT. When people's families are hungry, don't think for a minute they won't hurt or kill you to take what you have.
I am sure there are lots of people that can add much here and I am anxious to see their input.

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Permalink Reply by Snardley Farkus on October 10, 2010 at 10:46am

Allow me to share some of my experience on this. "Bunker" can mean many levels of defense. I live in the woods in the mountains. My needs run something like "A retreat where my presence would be unobtrusive and easy to hide. I want it comfortable to live in for any period of time, and I want it extremely sturdy and efficient to run so I needn't concern myself with repairs and upkeep. It should be open and airy but strong enough to withstand extreme weather events, and be positioned to be defensible from armed attackers. It also needs to be a design I can build myself at low cost."

After much study I settled on an earth bermed house set back into a hillside, about 40% below grade and above a small valley suitable for gardening. My plans are informed by the idea that a well equipped kitchen and productive garden will feed me, and provide medicine, long after the largest storeroom full of MREs runs out. The temperature constant in this region is 57f at three feet. This means I only need to heat the structure 5-6 degrees in the winter, and it is cool in the summer with no effort on my part. It was built as a domed structure with concrete and steel, and a good amount of field stone, all of which provide a large heating mass. Floor space is only about 600sq ft, but that makes it exceedingly easy to heat in the winter. Heater is a modified mass/rocket stove I built with mortar and field stone. I usually burn it for about an hour in the morning and once again as the sun falls. It serves as a cookstove as well. The roof supports about 4 inches of topsoil in which native plants and weeds are allowed to grow rampantly. So the house is almost invisible from the air. The soil and weed roots also filter rain water which is collected in a cistern to serve the house and water the garden in dry times. The cistern is essentially a cylindrical hole dug into the hillside with concrete poured on the floor, the walls plastered with chicken wire and concrete, and a concrete lid poured in place. A hand pump pressurizes a tank for the house. A root cellar dug into the hillside and roofed with cedar logs and dirt, provide food storage. Gunslit windows on all walls make it light and airy on summer days, and provide me with a 360degree field of fire. The walls above ground are steel reinforced concrete. A couple of alert mutts and a handy firearm, provide security. Unfortunately I have no easy answer for electricity, solar still costs too much, and I remain currently "on the grid." Same for communications. I've sacrificed a lot to be where I am, but I am not yet ready to forgo the Internet, and refrigerators.

I suspect that one day variations of this design will become quite common across America.

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Permalink Reply by LK on October 10, 2010 at 3:30pm

Wow. I thought you was just looking for ideas but it looks like you have already built your hidden survival adobe. For solar, as I stated earlier, you can purchase individual ones for different electronics. Sounds like you've got it altogether. I don't have enough time left in my life nor the money to do what you have done. Unfortunately, I am new to all of this. I only wish I had known a few years ago, I could be fairly prepared by now, but I am starting from scratch.
This site seems to have all the information you could possibly need to go "off grid" plus more. I am still reading, copying and printing. We do not know if we will have electric in the future so these wonderful computers will not be much use, except for solar.
I do have 2 questions though.
1. WHEN Obama pulls the switch on the internet, and it is coming, I was reading there are still lots of individual Internets' for folks to communicate. How do I find such a thing?
2. Without the internet, is there something in place now for Americans to communicate with each other. I know of the ham radios, cb's but if the government can scramble the airwaves to cut off free tv with antennas, don't you think they will scramble ALL airwaves?
It may be on this site somewhere, I just haven't gotten that far yet. Thanks for any input.

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Permalink Reply by Nathan Keith Kane on December 25, 2010 at 10:07am

 To #2

There are ways to cut through most scrambling, but they are very technically involved, and as I believe that the "Government" has longitudinal wave data transmission available to them, it would not surprise me if they merely staged an emp event to blow all the transmitters. Your best bet for com is still courier, unless you can figure out how to build a handheld longitudinal wave tranciever. I haven't. Btw, it would take an astronomical amount of power to jam everything in the lower 48 at once.

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Permalink Reply by TheLasersShadow on October 11, 2010 at 11:52am

Best not to bunker down with all your eggs in one basket. Populated areas are not good spots for "long term" bunkers. A fallout shelter with a few weeks of food and water, good waste disposal system and NBC positive air filter system is what you want. If you really get into reading a lot of scenarios the best option is to predeploy supply's to a very rural area about one full gas tank from an major or minor citys (500,000 people) and get there before the shit hits the fan or move there now with what you have now.

MOBILITY IS KEY, because you don't know whats going to happen. Research ground penetrating radar before you plan on hiding out underground. Also a solar power system will attract a lot of attention from a military heli patrol or from roaming refugees and troops. It won't take them long to follow the power lines to you ... getting away from people and being in the middle of nowhere is the safest option. You say you have some cash, buy a farm in the middle of nowhere and self-sustain.

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Permalink Reply by Dandy Andy aka flmkrdano on October 11, 2010 at 12:09pm

Look into connex boxes or the large metal storage containers. They are reasonable. Make sure of ventilation and septic areas. Seal it well and consider a lead secured area for EMP. You can go forever as for designing ideas. Let the imagination roam.

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Permalink Reply by LK on October 11, 2010 at 2:42pm

I completely agree with everything you say. I am having a very difficult time convincing my family that being out of town is necessary. I am sitting right in the middle of the city and I know this is not where a person wants to be when the time comes. I have decided on relocating to Texas for many different reasons. I want acreage with lots of trees for heating purposes. Definitely not in southern Texas due to the southern border problems, which will only get worse.
I did want to ask you what you meant by "ground penetrating radar"? I have not run across this information yet.
I am going with the house in the country mostly because of funds; I cannot afford to hire folks to do all the work that is required to go underground; plumbing, electrical, etc. I didn't like the idea of the large metal storage containers until I did research and saw what can be done with them. The security it offers is unbelievable. Not the most attractive but at a time like this, that's on the bottom of my list. A concern I had regarding this, who would you hire to dig this huge hole? You couldn't hire a local as you don't want anyone to know it's there. How would you go about that? To many of you, this may come easy for you but let me tell you a little about myself and you will understand. I am a 61-year old female and just do not have knowledge in any of this type of adventure outside of buying a house out in the boonies, which I feel is what I will do. My 40-year old son will come with me and he can do much but operating a large piece of equipment, and knowing how to dig something the size to hold a storage unit is beyond his abilities. Can anyone shine a light on that for me? I appreciate your input.

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Permalink Reply by Southern Patriot on December 24, 2010 at 11:18pm

Steel culverts work nicely and all you have to do is bury them. They can be used as tunnels or shelters if you seal the ends. There are a few sites devoted to this and even a company tat sells them ready made.

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Permalink Reply by Nathan Keith Kane on December 25, 2010 at 9:55am

As far as burying yourself in the ground goes, it seems to me that it would be bad for morale in the long run, but if you are interested in how to dig a big hole safely, look up the digging techniques used to dig basements for houses. To summarize, plan for a ramp about 3-4 times longer than the hole is deep, or use a track hoe and go from one end to the other. Just bear in mind the method that you intend to use to get the container/structure down into the hole when you decide how to do it. What I would consider the ideal setup for concealability is a metalic container buried under 18-36 inches of earth near a stream that you could wing dam for power, metalic cased well sunk inside the container with the casing welded to the container, and shielded wires running from the hydro unit to the container, shield grounded to the container and in the stream. Probably still be radar detectable, but it would look a lot smaller than it actually was. A round tank will give a lot smaller radar return than a square container. If you stay in one place for long enough, you will be found. If you stay on the move, you may be found, but you have a chance at doing the finding, and then dealing with the situation on your own terms. Either way, if you are set on a worst case, it might be good to be ready to die, because any way you go, it is a certainty sooner or later. Personally, I do not think that the situation is hopeless yet, so I am putting the bulk of my energy right now into salvaging it, and only a little bit into preparing for it's collapse.

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Permalink Reply by Leif Oldhart on December 25, 2010 at 10:22am

I certainly wouldn't get a building permit, or you've defeated much of the purpose of having such a hideaway. If prisoners can tunnel out of prison under the watchful eyes of their guards, you ought to be able to expedite this project without alerting the civil authorities.

 

Otherwise, as people have pointed out, there are different ways to build an underground or earth-bermed shelter, based upon location, materials, climate, and what's needed. However, here are several important related issues that will not change much from person to person.

 

WATER: can you install a well? Do you have access to a local spring? Otherwise, collected runoff from the regular house roof would be helpful. See online for free instruction.

 

FOOD: Store sprouting seed, do-it-yourself-packed in nitrogen to prevent weevils. You can find instructions for the nitrogen set up online, using sealed food-grade plastic buckets and a pressurized cylinder. Grains and beans. The latter can also be planted, as can radish and other seeds. Lacto-fermented vegetables, in large quantity, are a good way to go; you can make them well in advance and cycle them through your normal food consumption. Shelf life at ground temp. is at least one year (my experience). In Rumania, farmers allegedly fill a 50 gal. food-grade barrel with whatever is in season. There's much free instruction online!

 

WASTE DISPOSAL: Human feces plays a major problem in sanitation. Unless you are situated over an old mine-shaft, the HUMANURE system is hands down the best way to go. Especially if you must remain sheltered for some time. With a few venting adjustments for the bunker situation this would be the way to go to eliminate germs, mess and smell. There's no room here to explain it, but there's much free instruction onine. And it's basically free, so you can use the money saved for other things. Google "Humanure" for full details. Urine elimination is easily handled if you're situated on any kind of slope, via underground 4" pipe.

 

TOXINS: Something else to consider: Petro chemicals, including kerosene and paraffin give off poison that won't be healthy in confined situations. You might want to use vegetable oil lamps, with proper ventilation. The oil can also be consumed if you don't need it and you should store gallons of Olive Oil anyhow, in glass jugs. MiddleEastern stores usually have these at decent prices ($20 gal±). The heat emitted will help heat your bunker. Proper venting is necessary where ever fuels are burned for heat and light.

 

MEDICINE: Potent healing tinctures may be made at very low prices per gallon, using 100 proof vodka and locally or easily obtainable herbs Include at least Echinacea (angustifolia), Poke (Phytolacca americana), and Cayenne (use Habanero for max. benefit). Hawthorn would be a good bet if someone has heart issues. Shelf life if sealed in glass (wax over the caps) and kept cool and dark is many years. Garlic tincture should also be on your list and LOTS of fresh garlic, which you can cycle into your normal food consumption during the year. Did you know that in WWI the Brits used mashed raw garlic paste on moss dressings to treat severe wounds and prevent infection? Fresh garlic is one of the most potent antibiotics on earth, but it loses much of its potency when dried or de-skinned, so tincturing at least a gallon will be a 'must.' Info available online, free. 

 

ENTERTAINMENT: Frivolous as it may sound, entertainment and recreation are necessary, especially when you are under STRESS. If you've always wanted to play a musical instrument, why not assure that it will be available in your bunker, where you may have plenty of time on your hands? Jig saw puzzles, cards, and a few good board games should be high on your list of "necessities!"

 

All of the above may also be applied to non-bunker survival situations.

I have hands-on experience with everything except the nitrogen packing of sprouting seed, which is pretty simple, as are the other processes. I hope this helps!

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Permalink Reply by Nathan Keith Kane on December 25, 2010 at 11:01am

I have some experience with nitrogen packing. All we did was line a 5 gal. bucket with a plastic bag, put the grain in, stick the end of a hose connected to a nitrogen cylinder in and gather the bag around it, crack the valve until the bag is full (lighter or match goes out when brought near the mouth of the bag), close the bag, seal the bucket, store.

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