📘 Guides › 🛠️ Making & repair · 🆘 Emergency · 📇 Index A–Z

🧰 Make-Do Household Guide

How to make or replace everyday necessities when the store is gone — from basic supplies, things you can scavenge, and what grows around the Illinois Valley. Each section points to the detailed manuals in Homestead-Skills\ (especially Household-Make-Do\, Soap-Candles\ and Sanitation-Water\) and Electronics-Repair\. The links open each book on the drive at the right page.

⚠️ Rules that prevent the worst accidents

• Never mix cleaning chemicals. Bleach + ammonia (or urine) makes toxic chloramine gas; bleach + vinegar or any acid makes chlorine gas. Use one product, rinse, then the next.
• Lye (from ashes or the store) burns skin and blinds. Gloves and eye protection; flush any splash with plenty of water for at least 20 minutes (longer for an eye that still stings). Never use aluminum pots with lye.
• Label every container. Never store chemicals or fuel in food or drink bottles, and never reuse a container that held chemicals or fuel for food or water.
• Never put gasoline in a lamp, stove or heater, and never burn charcoal, a camp stove or a generator indoors (carbon monoxide).
• Never throw water on burning wax or fat — it spreads the fire. Cut the heat and smother it with a metal lid or damp cloth.

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🧽 Cleaning and disinfecting

• Most cleaning is just soap, hot water and scrubbing — it removes most germs along with the dirt. Homemade lye soap works fine (see the soap section below).
• Scouring powder: baking soda, fine wood ash, or fine sand on a damp rag.
• Glass and hard-water film: white vinegar mixed half and half with water (not on marble or stone, and never together with bleach).
• Disinfecting with bleach (for kitchen surfaces, sickrooms, after flooding): plain unscented household bleach, 5 tablespoons (⅓ cup) per gallon of water, or 4 teaspoons per quart. Clean first, leave it wet for at least a minute, and mix it fresh every day — diluted bleach loses strength. Drinking water needs a much weaker dose — use the table in Water\EPA - Emergency Disinfection of Drinking Water (p. 2).
• No bleach? Boiling water, scrubbing with soap, and drying things in full sun all kill germs.
• Wash hands with soap (how-to drawing; Hand washing) before handling food or eating, after the toilet, after cleaning up a child or caring for a sick person, and after touching animals or garbage. Hand sanitizer (at least 60% alcohol) only works on hands that aren't visibly dirty. (OSU Twin-Bucket Toilet, p. 4)

📚 Go deeper: WHO/WEDC Technical Notes on Water, Sanitation and Hygiene in Emergencies — chlorine, latrines and hygiene after disasters; Army FM 21-10 Field Hygiene and Sanitation — keeping a group healthy in the field; EPA Emergency Disinfection of Drinking Water, p. 2 — the bleach-drops table.

🧼 Soap from fat and ashes

1. Make lye from ashes. Use hardwood ashes (they make the best lye); ashes of paper, cloth or garbage won't work (VITA, p. 342). Fill a bucket with ashes (VITA's leaching drawing; Lye), pour on boiling water and stir, top up with ashes and water, then let it stand 12–24 hours and carefully pour off the clear liquid (Practical Action Soapmaking, p. 2).

A leaching barrel: crossed twigs and straw hold the ashes back while the brown lye drips out into a jar (VITA, p. 343).

2. Check the strength. Lye that floats a fresh egg or a potato is right. Too weak? Run it through fresh ashes again, or boil it down. (VITA, p. 343)

3. Make soft soap. Boil ½ cup of ash lye for every cup of clean fat until it is thick, rubbery and foamy. Age the brown jelly at least a month before use. (VITA, p. 344) Ash lye is potash, which only makes soft soap; hard bars need store lye (caustic soda), or boiled soap "salted out" with salt water (USDA 1940, p. 3; Practical Action, p. 4).

Hard soap with store lye (USDA): weigh 2½ lb clean fat, melt it and let it cool to lukewarm. Dissolve 5½ oz lye in 11 oz cold water (lye into water, never water onto lye), pour it into the fat and stir, heat and stir until smooth, stir in another 5½ oz water, and pour into a box. Cut into cakes after 24 hours; let them harden a week or more out of the sun. (USDA 1940, p. 3)

• Clean kitchen grease first: melt it with about an equal amount of hot water, stir, let it cool, and lift the clean fat off the top (USDA 1940, p. 3).
• Is it done? Cool a drop on a plate. Clear = ready. Weak and grey = needs more lye. A grey skin that slides on the plate = too much lye — add more fat (Practical Action, p. 3).
• New ("green") soap is still caustic. Wear gloves to handle it and let bars cure at least 3 weeks (Practical Action, p. 4).
• Keep children away and don't breathe the fumes. Splashes: water, lots of it (some old books say vinegar — use water).

Soap problem	Likely cause (Practical Action, p. 4)
Won't thicken	Not enough lye, too much water, too cool, not stirred enough, or too much liquid oil
Oily layer on top as it cools	Too much fat or not enough lye
Hard and brittle	Too much lye

📚 Go deeper: Practical Action Soapmaking — lye from ashes, soft and hard soap, recipes; VITA Village Technology Handbook, p. 342 — leaching lye and soft soap with drawings; CAWST Soap Making Fact Sheet — modern measured recipes; MSU Making Soap at Home — store-lye bars.

👕 Laundry

• Laundry soap: grate one bar of soap and mix with 1 cup washing soda (add 1 cup borax if you have it). Use 1–2 tablespoons per load, dissolved in hot water first.
• Make washing soda from baking soda: spread baking soda in a pan and bake at 400 °F (200 °C) for about an hour, stirring now and then, until it turns dull and grainy. It's stronger than baking soda — wear gloves.
• Ash water (old-time "lye wash"): soak hardwood ashes in water, let it settle, and use only the clear liquid for greasy or very dirty clothes. It's caustic — gloves, and never on wool or silk.
• Washing by hand: soak overnight, agitate with a clean plunger in a bucket (or a washboard), rinse twice, wring hard, and dry in the sun — sunlight helps disinfect.

Stains (USDA Stain Removal from Fabrics):

• Treat it while fresh, and try cold water first — hot water and soap set many stains. Test any remover on a hidden seam. (pp. 4, 6)
• Blood: soak in cold water until the stain turns light brown, then wash in warm soapy water. Strong salt water (about 2 cups salt per gallon) loosens old stains. Never hot water. (p. 15)
• Grease: rub in cornstarch, chalk or talc, let it soak up the grease, brush off (p. 8).
• Chlorine bleach destroys wool and silk, and rots cotton if left on more than a minute or two (p. 5). Skip the bulletin's gasoline and carbon tetrachloride — fire and poison hazards.

📚 Go deeper: USDA Stain Removal from Fabrics, p. 4 — an A-to-Z of stains; Household Discoveries (1909) — washing, soap and laundry methods.

🪥 Personal care

• Teeth: how you brush matters more than the paste. Brush twice a day with water, a little baking soda, or salt (or a 50-50 mix of the two). No brush? Chew the end of a fresh green twig until it frays into bristles (chew stick), or wrap rough towel around a finger. Use thread as floss. (Where There Is No Doctor, ch. 17, p. 2; Medical\Manuals-PDF\Where There Is No Dentist, p. 63)
• Deodorant: wash daily; dust on baking soda or cornstarch (baking soda can irritate some skin).
• Salve: melt 1 part beeswax with 4 parts oil or clean tallow (by weight) over low heat and pour into small tins. Lip balm is firmer: about 1 part wax to 2 parts oil.
• Hair: wash with soap, then rinse with a cup of water with a spoonful of vinegar in it to remove soap film.

📚 Go deeper: Where There Is No Dentist, p. 63 — gum care and keeping teeth without a dentist; Where There Is No Doctor, ch. 17 — teeth, gums and mouth.

🩲 Menstrual pads and diapers

• Reusable pads (photos): several layers of absorbent cotton (old flannel or towel) sewn or folded into a pad, held in underwear. Rinse in cold water first, wash with soap, and dry in the sun. See Where Women Have No Doctor (Medical\). Change pads several times a day; a homemade tampon must be changed at least 3 times a day or it can cause a serious infection (Where Women Have No Doctor, ch. 5, p. 4).
• A pad that buttons on: a sleeve of heavy cotton about 4½ × 9½ inches with two button wings, plus removable folded towel liners about 6 × 8 inches. Wash and add bleach if you have it; dry in the sun, never under the bed — damp pads mold and cause itching. (WASHplus pattern — step-by-step drawings)
• Cloth diapers: absorbent cotton folded in layers, with a wool or plastic cover. Rinse, soak in a lidded bucket, wash hot with soap, dry in the sun.

📚 Go deeper: WASHplus Making Reusable Menstrual Pads — sewing pattern with drawings; Where Women Have No Doctor, ch. 5 — periods and staying clean.

🧻 Toilet paper alternatives

More detail (water washing, washing cloth wipes safely, which plants to avoid) is in Paper, Ink & Toilet Paper.

• Water: a squeeze bottle of water, then wash your hands with soap — the cleanest option.
• "Family cloth": cotton squares, used once, kept in a lidded bucket and washed hot, separately from other laundry.
• Leaves: big soft thimbleberry leaves (common along roads and forest edges here in summer) or first-year mullein leaves.
• ⚠️ Learn poison oak first — it's everywhere in the Illinois Valley. Leaves in threes, lobed like small oak leaves, shiny or dull, red in fall. The bare stems in winter still cause the rash. (drawing) It grows as a shrub or a climbing vine, and the roots and stems carry the oil too (OSU EM 9184, p. 24). Also avoid stinging nettle.

📚 Go deeper: OSU EM 9184, p. 24 — poison oak photos and control; FM 3-05.70 Survival, p. 514 — poison oak and other plants to avoid.

🚽 Toilets when the water is off

• Don't flush if the sewer lines might be broken, even if your pipes look fine. A septic system can keep working if nothing leaks or backs up. (OSU Twin-Bucket Toilet, pp. 4–5)
• Twin-bucket toilet (Bucket toilet): two 5-gallon buckets marked "pee" and "poo". The poo bucket is lined with a heavy (3 mil or thicker) black bag; after each use, cover it with about ½ cup of sawdust, wood shavings, shredded paper or peat. Keeping urine out of the poo bucket is what stops the smell. (OSU, pp. 2–3)
• Emptying: dilute urine with wash water and pour it on the ground, a different spot each time. Fill the poo bucket no more than half, then double-bag it with gloves on and store it sealed, away from food and water. In the country you can bury it — never within 100 feet of a well, spring or creek. (OSU, p. 3)
• Hand-washing station: a jug of clean water with a spigot, a catch bucket, and soap in the toe of a sock tied to the jug — one by the toilet, one by the kitchen (OSU, p. 3).
• Trench latrine (drawing; Pit latrine) for longer outages: about 1 foot wide, 5 feet deep and 13 feet long, well away from and downhill of any well or creek. Cover each use with soil; fill it in when the contents are 1 foot from the top (WHO/WEDC, p. 56). Hot ashes tipped into a pit cut smell and flies (Practical Action VIP Latrine, p. 2).

📚 Go deeper: OSU Survival Basics: Sanitation — twin-bucket setup and supply list; WHO/WEDC Technical Notes, p. 55 — trench, family and borehole latrines; Practical Action Compost Toilets — longer-term options; EPA Composting Toilets — how they work.

🔥 Fire and light without stores

For candles, wicks, lamp oils and homemade lamps in detail, see Light Without the Grid.

• Fire starters: cotton balls rubbed with petroleum jelly; fatwood (resin-soaked heartwood from old pine or fir stumps — smells like turpentine and lights even when damp); dry bark and pine pitch.
• Char cloth (catches a spark): put squares of 100% cotton cloth in a metal tin with a small nail hole in the lid, set it in a fire until smoke stops coming out, then let it cool before opening.
• No matches: a ferro rod or flint-and-steel onto char cloth (drawing) (steel struck on flint, quartz or pyrite throws sparks); a magnifying glass in sun (drawing); touching a 9-volt battery (or two AAs) to fine steel wool (drawing); or a bow drill (drawing) — drill about ⅝ in thick and a foot long, of dry cedar, fir, cottonwood or basswood, on a board of the same wood with a notch cut to the center of the pit; tinder of dry grass with shredded cedar bark (Seton's Book of Woodcraft, pp. 192–194, and the Army survival manuals — FM 21-76, ch. 7).
• Oil lamp: a glass jar or tin, a wick of twisted cotton string or a cotton strip held up by a bent wire or a tin-lid holder, and any vegetable oil or melted fat. Keep the flame small. Never gasoline. Tallow candles: Soap-Candles\.
• Dipped candles: dip wicks in melted tallow, cool, dip again until thick enough (hand-dipping drawing) (Household Discoveries, p. 98). 2 parts beeswax to 1 part tallow is firmer than plain tallow (p. 99). Melt wax in a pot set in hot water, not over the flame (Practical Action Candlemaking, p. 3).
• Rushlights: peel rushes and dip the pith in tallow like a candle (Household Discoveries, p. 99).

Bow drill: a hand socket on top, the cord looped once round the drill, a notch into the pit; tip the hot dust onto tinder and blow it to flame (AFH 10-644, p. 234).

How much light you get (lumens, roughly — Practical Action Rural Lighting, p. 3): candle 1 · wick oil lamp 1–10 · hurricane lantern 10–100 · mantle lamp ~1,000 · a 1-watt white LED 25–50 in that old table — a modern 1-watt LED gives about 80–150 (Off-Grid Power guide).

📚 Go deeper: FM 21-76 Army Survival Manual, ch. 7 — tinder, fire lays and fire without matches; Seton Book of Woodcraft, p. 192 — the classic bow-drill method; Practical Action Candlemaking — dipping, pouring and molding; Practical Action Rural Lighting — lamps, LEDs and batteries compared.

🪵 Glue, patching and waterproofing

• Pine pitch glue: gently melt pine resin (pine drawing) (it's flammable — heat beside the fire, not in it), stir in powdered charcoal (about 1 part to 3–4 parts resin) plus a pinch of fine plant fiber, and use while warm. Sets hard — for hafting tools, patching containers and seams. Plain heated resin works as glue too (FM 3-05.70, p. 455).
• Flour paste: cook flour and water to a thick paste — for paper and labels.
• Casein (milk) glue — skim-milk curd mixed with slaked lime and two other chemicals — makes wood joints as strong as the wood — water-resistant but not waterproof. Full recipe: VITA, p. 313.
• Waterproof cloth or leather: rub in beeswax, tallow or a beeswax–oil mix, then warm it so it soaks in.
• Waterproof boots (USDA): melt together 1 lb petroleum jelly + 2 oz beeswax, or 12 oz tallow + 4 oz cod oil. Apply warm (never hotter than your hand can bear), working it into the welt and sole edge, where shoes leak most. (USDA Care of Leather, pp. 12–13)

📚 Go deeper: Henley's Twentieth Century Formulas (1916) — hundreds of glues, pastes and cements; VITA Village Technology Handbook, p. 313 — casein glue; USDA Care of Leather, p. 10 — oiling and waterproofing shoes and harness.

👟 Clothing and footwear

• Mending: running stitch for seams (drawing), backstitch where it must be strong (drawing), whipstitch for edges (drawing), and darning for holes (weave thread back and forth across the hole, then across the other way — drawing). Patch from the inside for strength. Needles from stiff wire; thread from unraveled fabric, dental floss or fishing line.
• Mend early — a few stitches on a weak seam or loose button save a big patch later. Shrink new patch cloth first and cut it on the straight of the weave. Darn with yarn raveled from a seam allowance, and don't pull it tight (it puckers). (USDA ABCs of Mending, pp. 4–8)
• Sandals from old tires: trace your foot on tire tread, cut with a very sharp knife wetted with soapy water (steel belts make it slow — choose worn tread with no wire showing), sand the edges, and tie on with straps cut from an inner tube or with cord through slots.
• Shoe care: work grease in well where the sole meets the upper, and let shoes dry somewhere warm, not hot. Re-sole before the welt and insole wear through — after that they're rarely worth fixing. (USDA Care of Leather, pp. 10–11)
• Stay warm: wool keeps you warm even when wet; wet cotton pulls heat away — avoid it in cold rain.

Darning: lay threads across the hole one way, leaving a small loop at each turn, then weave over and under across them the other way (Dillmont, p. 24).

📚 Go deeper: USDA ABCs of Mending — patches, darns and tears for every fabric; Bower Practical Shoe Repairing — soles, heels and stitching; Leland Manual of Mending and Repairing — fixing almost anything in the house; USDA Knitwear Make-Overs — reusing worn sweaters.

🔧 Simple plumbing

• Dripping faucet: shut the water off first, then replace the washer (cut-away drawing). A temporary washer can be cut from leather (cold taps) or rubber (hot taps). If the washer screw is stuck, put on a drop of kerosene and tap it; if the head splits, deepen the slot with a hacksaw. (USDA Simple Plumbing Repairs, pp. 4–5)
• Toilet tank keeps running: usually a leaky, waterlogged float or a worn flapper/ball (ball cock drawing; Ballcock). A tank should empty in about 10 seconds. (pp. 9–11)
• Clogged drain: put a little water in the sink and plunge hard; if that fails, open the trap under the sink (drawing) and dig out the grease and hair with a bent wire (p. 12).
• When you shut off the water for repairs, open the highest faucet so a vacuum can't suck dirty water back into the pipes from a tub or toilet (p. 12).
• Frozen pipe: open the faucet and thaw from the faucet end back toward the supply — never from the middle, where trapped water can burst the pipe (drawing). Thaw drains from the low end upward. (USDA Simple Plumbing Repairs, p. 14.)

📚 Go deeper: USDA Simple Plumbing Repairs in the Home — faucets, valves, tanks, clogs and thawing, with drawings; Oregon DEQ Reusing Graywater — using wash water on the garden.

🔌 Electronics: repair and salvage

Manuals are in Electronics-Repair\ (and device-by-device guides in the iFixit archive in Kiwix). Start with the Navy safety manual and the Kuphaldt multimeter and soldering guides. To protect spare radios and parts from an EMP or solar storm, see the EMP Guide.

Which book for what

You want to…	Read
Learn electricity from zero	NEETS 1 Matter, Energy and DC, then Kuphaldt Lessons in Electric Circuits vol. 1
Stay alive around it	Navy Electronics Technician vol. 1 Safety, p. 31
Fix power supplies, diodes, transistors	NEETS 7 Solid-State Devices and Power Supplies
Use a meter	Kuphaldt Multimeters, NEETS 16 Test Equipment
Find a fault logically	Kuphaldt Troubleshooting Strategy, p. 26, NEETS 21 Test Methods
Solder	Kuphaldt Soldering and Desoldering, p. 24, NASA Hand Soldering Workbook
Antennas and radio repair	Army FM 24-18, p. 55, NEETS 10 Antennas

Safety first

• Unplugged isn't safe. Capacitors hold a charge after unplugging. Discharge them with an insulated tool or shorting probe (drawing) across the terminals and to the metal chassis, and recheck. (NEETS 16, p. 31; NEETS 21, p. 33)
• Microwave ovens can kill: the capacitor holds about 2,000 volts. Short it out before touching anything inside, never run the oven with the cover off, and don't break the magnetron's ceramic parts (toxic). Old tube TVs and monitors (CRTs) hold high voltage and can implode — leave them alone unless you know how.
• Household 120 V can kill — especially with wet hands. Work with one hand when anything might be live. With a typical body resistance of about 1,500 ohms, 120 V pushes about 80 milliamps through the body — more than enough to stop a heart; wet skin lets far more through. Take off rings and watches first. (Navy ET Safety, pp. 32–34)
• If someone is being shocked, don't touch them. Cut the power, or push them free with a dry rope, belt or wooden stick, then start CPR if needed (p. 33).
• Lithium batteries (laptops, phones, tools): throw out any that are swollen, dented, hot, or below about 2.5 volts. Charge only with a proper lithium charger, on a non-flammable surface, never unattended. Heat, overcharging and age can set off a fire that spreads fast with toxic fumes — get out (Lithium battery FAQ, pp. 2–3).

Finding the fault — check the simple things first: power cord and plug, fuse, switch, batteries and their contacts, loose wires. Then measure voltages, then test parts. Test a part in the circuit before you desolder it. Bulging or leaking capacitors (photos) are the most common failure in power supplies and chargers.

• Look before you plug in — about 2 minutes finds most visible faults: loose or corroded connections, stray solder or wire bits (shake it and listen), charred resistors, and a white crust at an electrolytic capacitor's seal (how one is built). A discolored or leaking transformer means a short somewhere. If anything smokes or sizzles when powered, pull the plug at once. (NEETS 6, pp. 210–211)
• The simplest explanation that fits all the symptoms is usually right (Kuphaldt, p. 37).

Multimeter quick tests (touch the probes together first — the meter should read near zero ohms — Kuphaldt Multimeters, p. 30)

• Continuity (beep): fuses, switches, cords, broken wires.
• Diode (test drawing): conducts one way only — about 0.5–0.7 V on the diode setting forward, nothing backward. Both ways = shorted; neither = open. On an ohmmeter, a power rectifier should read at least 10 times higher backward than forward (NEETS 7, pp. 56–57).
• Transistor (ohmmeter test): test it like two diodes back to back (base-emitter, base-collector), and check collector-emitter reads high both ways. Avoid the lowest ohms range (R×1), which can damage small transistors. (NEETS 7, p. 111)
• Capacitor (discharged first): on the ohms setting a good one shows a brief "kick" then rising resistance; no kick = open, steady low reading = shorted. (NEETS 6, p. 171)

Resistor color code (chart): black 0, brown 1, red 2, orange 3, yellow 4, green 5, blue 6, violet 7, gray 8, white 9. Bands 1–2 are digits, band 3 is the number of zeros, the last band is tolerance (gold 5%, silver 10%). Example: yellow–violet–orange–gold = 47,000 Ω ±5%. (Kuphaldt vol. 5, pp. 26–27)

The example above, band by band: two digits, the number of zeros, then the tolerance (a diagram drawn for this guide).

Soldering: use rosin-core solder (never acid-core plumbing solder); a 25-watt iron for circuit boards. Make the wires hold mechanically first, heat the joint, not the solder, and don't move it while it cools (a good joint; a joint moved while cooling). Remove old solder with copper wick or a solder sucker.

• Put the iron's tip on the bigger piece of metal (the pad or lug), not the thin wire; a little fresh solder on the tip helps the heat flow. (Kuphaldt Soldering, pp. 24–26)
• 63/37 tin-lead solder is best for electronics; zinc-chloride (acid) fluxes corrode circuit boards (NEETS 14, p. 80; Navy 2M, p. 195).

Batteries (Practical Action Batteries):

• Run dry cells in a radio until it quits, then finish them in a flashlight. Don't mix old and new cells (pp. 3–4).
• A car battery is ruined after only about 20 deep discharges. Any lead-acid battery lasts far longer if you only use about half its charge before recharging. (p. 5; Rural Lighting, p. 5)
• Top up vented lead-acid batteries with distilled water or clean rainwater — never acid (Rural Lighting, p. 5).

What to salvage before throwing anything out:

• Radios and clock radios: power transformers, cords, switches, knobs, speakers.
• Computer power supplies: 12 V and 5 V power, fans, heat sinks, wire, connectors.
• Printers and scanners: small motors, gears, rods, belts, switches.
• Microwaves (after discharging!): fan and turntable motors, door switches, fuses, magnets.
• Cars: batteries, alternators (12 V charging), lights, wire, fuses, relays — see Army TM 9-8000 in Manuals\ArmyFieldManuals (charging systems, p. 304).
• Also: LEDs, magnet wire from motors and transformers, fuses, batteries, cords.
• Motor run capacitors can be reused; motor start capacitors can burst if used continuously.
• Insulators for antennas: plastic or glass is best (spoons, buttons, bottle necks), then dry wood, then rope. A broken wire antenna: clean, twist and solder the ends. (FM 24-18, p. 55)

Crystal radio — no batteries needed (NBS Circular 120, 1922): a long wire antenna (about 75 ft, on insulators), a ground wire to a water pipe (never gas) or a rod in damp soil, a tuning coil wound on an oatmeal box, a crystal detector (the 1922 plans use a galena crystal; a germanium diode salvaged from an old radio does the same job and is easier (rule of thumb)), and a high-impedance earphone. It picks up AM stations with no power at all (wiring diagram). The 1922 plans put the antenna at least 30 feet up with a lightning switch to ground it when not in use, and drive the ground rod 3–6 feet into moist soil. (NBS 120, pp. 5–11)

The 1922 set: a tuning coil on a 4-inch box with taps to two switch arms, the crystal detector and the earphones ("telephone receivers") (NBS 120, p. 12).

📚 Go deeper: Navy Electronics Technician vol. 1 Safety, p. 31 — shock, measuring live circuits, shorting probes; NEETS 7, p. 203 — how power supplies work and fail; Kuphaldt Troubleshooting Strategy, p. 26 — a method for finding any fault; NBS Circular 120 — build a crystal set.

🍲 Hay-box cooking (saves fuel)

Bring the pot to a full boil, then nest it tightly in hay, wool, newspaper or blankets in a box with a padded lid; it keeps cooking for hours on its own heat. Bring food back to a boil before eating if it has cooled below hot (food is safest kept above 140 °F).

• Building one (Haybox; cut-away drawing): a wooden box, old trunk or bucket with at least 4 inches of packing all round the pot, below it and in a thick cushion on top. Crumpled newspaper, packed hard, is the best cheap packing. Use a pot with straight sides and a tight lid, sized to the food — a big half-empty pot cools fast. (USDA FB 771, pp. 6–9) (The 1919 bulletin suggests asbestos — never use it.)
• Times: boil beans or meat 20–25 minutes first, then 2–2½ hours in the box; soft foods need only a few minutes' boil and about 25 minutes in the box. It cuts fuel use by about 40%. (Practical Action Fireless Cookers, pp. 2, 5)
• Meat and beans are the riskiest — don't leave them in the box too long, and reboil before eating (p. 5).
• A hot stone or brick under the pot cooks hotter, but then the nest must be metal-lined so it can't scorch the packing (FB 771, p. 6).

Packing (B) all round, under and over the pot (D); the metal lining (C) is there because a hot stone (E) sits under the pot (USDA FB 771, p. 9).

📚 Go deeper: USDA FB 771 Homemade Fireless Cookers — building plans and recipes; Practical Action Fireless Cookers — a basket cooker from scraps; Aprovecho Capturing Heat — haybox, rocket stove and solar cooker plans.

🫙 Containers and storage

• Food-grade buckets (recycling number 1 or 2 on the bottom, from bakeries and restaurants), glass jars and metal cans with lids. Wash with soap, then rinse with the bleach solution above. Never store food in trash bags, paint cans or chemical drums. Containers of 20–30 lb are easy to lift and get used up before bugs move in. (USU Food Storage in the Home, pp. 11–12)
• Keep mice out: metal cans or glass; hang sacks from wire. Set snap traps along walls. Seal cracks, keep food off the floor, and keep the store room between freezing and 70 °F — cooler keeps longer (USU, p. 9).
• Clay-pot cooler (zeer): a small clay pot inside a bigger one with wet coarse sand between, and a wet cloth on top (how it works). Evaporation keeps vegetables cool — it works best in hot, dry weather, which suits our summers. Keep it in shade with a breeze and wet the sand three times a day. (Practical Action Clay Pot Cooler, pp. 1, 6)

Wet sand between the two pots and a wet cloth on top: water evaporating from the outer pot carries the heat away (Practical Action, p. 2).

📚 Go deeper: USU Food Storage in the Home — containers, storage rooms and shelf life; Practical Action Clay Pot Cooler — making and using a zeer pot; WSU Root Cellars — storing vegetables and fruit without power.

💧 Clean water from plastic bottles (SODIS)

Fill clear plastic (PET) bottles of 2 liters or less with clear water, lay them on a roof or shiny surface in full sun for 6 hours (drawing; SODIS) (two full days if it's more than half cloudy). Doesn't work with cloudy water — let it settle or filter it first. Details: Sanitation-Water\ and Water\.

• Clear enough? Stand the full, open bottle on a page of large print (letters about ½ inch high) and look down through it. If you can read it, the water is clear enough.
• Fill ¾, shake 20 seconds, then top up — the air helps kill germs. Lay bottles flat, on metal roofing if you have it. Drink straight from the bottle so it isn't re-contaminated.
• Not green or brown bottles; replace scratched, cloudy ones (about yearly). SODIS does nothing for chemical pollution. (Eawag SODIS Manual, pp. 26, 86–87)
• In long rainy spells, boil or use stored or rainwater instead (p. 27).

📚 Go deeper: Eawag SODIS Manual, p. 26 — step by step, with a question-and-answer section from p. 85; OSU Survival Basics: Water, p. 3 — boiling and bleach; CAWST Biosand Filter Manual — build a filter for cloudy water.

🐜 Pests

• Roaches and ants (common roaches; German cockroach): powdered borax mixed with sugar or flour, dusted into cracks (roaches), or a sponge soaked in borax-and-sugar syrup in their trail (ants). Keep borax away from children and pets.
• Mosquitoes: screens, netting over beds (drawing), and smoke; homemade repellents are weak. Cover water barrels and screen their vents so they don't breed there (Practical Action Household Water Treatment, p. 2).
• Lice (drawing; head louse, body louse): comb wet hair with a fine-tooth (nit) comb (drawing) every day for two weeks; wash bedding hot. Body lice live in clothing seams — wash clothes and bedding at least weekly (FM 21-10, p. 96).
• Ticks (western blacklegged tick photo; Ixodes pacificus): check every evening, especially after brush; pull straight out with tweezers. Grip close to the skin and pull with gentle, steady force without crushing it, and protect your fingers with cloth or gloves (FM 21-10, p. 98).

📚 Go deeper: Army FM 21-10 Field Hygiene and Sanitation, p. 96 — lice, ticks, mites and other pests; USU Food Storage in the Home, p. 13 — pantry pests.

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For hundreds more recipes — cleaners, polishes, glues, inks, waterproofing, pest control and home remedies — see the classic formula books in Homestead-Skills\Household-Make-Do\. They are old: use their methods, but follow the modern safety rules above, and skip any recipe using mercury (bichloride), arsenic, cyanide, lead, benzene, carbon tetrachloride or carbolic acid, or any "remedy" taken by mouth that contains kerosene — those are poisons. The safe staples in the same books are soap, washing soda, borax, vinegar and absorbent powders.

🖼️ Pictures & diagrams

Look before you try it. 🖼️ = drawings in the books on this drive; 📷 = photos in the offline Wikipedia.

Cleaning, soap and personal care

• Washing hands properly — WHO/WEDC, p. 40; Hand washing
• Leaching lye from ashes — VITA, p. 342; Lye; Potash
• Washboard and washing soda — Washboard; Sodium carbonate
• Chew-stick toothbrush — Miswak
• Button-on cloth pad, step by step — WASHplus pattern; Cloth menstrual pad; Cloth diaper

Plants to know, toilets and latrines

• Poison oak — OSU EM 9184 photos, p. 24; FM 3-05.70, p. 514; Western poison oak
• Mullein and thimbleberry (soft leaves) — mullein, AFH 10-644 p. 91; Mullein; Thimbleberry
• Bucket toilet — Bucket toilet; Composting toilet
• Trench latrines — simple trench, WHO/WEDC p. 53; deep trench, p. 57; Pit latrine
• How a vented pit latrine beats smell and flies — WHO Vector Control, p. 163

Fire and light

• Fire lays — FM 3-05.70, p. 110; AFH 10-644, p. 237
• Bow drill — FM 3-05.70, p. 114; AFH 10-644, p. 234; Bow drill
• Flint and steel, battery and steel wool, lens — AFH 10-644, p. 229; p. 230; FM 3-05.70, p. 111; Ferrocerium
• Fatwood and char cloth — Fatwood; Char cloth
• Dipping candles and wicks — Practical Action, p. 5; wicks, p. 2; Candle
• Oil lamps and rushlights — Oil lamp; Rushlight
• Pine, for pitch glue — FM 3-05.70, p. 455; Resin

Mending and plumbing

• Hand stitches: running stitch, backstitch, whipstitch — TM 4-42.21, p. 75; p. 76; p. 22; Backstitch
• Darns and patches — TM 4-42.21, pp. 40–44; Dillmont, p. 24; Darning
• Faucet washer, toilet ball cock, sink trap, thawing a pipe — USDA FB 1460, p. 5; p. 9; p. 12; p. 14; Ballcock

Electronics

• Safety shorting probe — NEETS 21, p. 33; NEETS 16, p. 31
• Multimeters — NEETS 21, p. 17; Multimeter
• Testing diodes and transistors — NEETS 7, p. 56; p. 111; Transistor
• Electrolytic capacitors, and what bulging ones look like — NEETS 2, p. 99; Capacitor plague
• Resistor color bands — NEETS 1, p. 55; Electronic color code
• Good and bad solder joints — Navy 2M, p. 198; pp. 202–204; Soldering
• Crystal radio — NBS Circular 120, p. 12; Crystal radio

Cooking, storage, water and pests

• Hay-box (fireless) cooker — USDA FB 771, pp. 8–9; Practical Action, p. 2; Haybox
• Clay-pot cooler — Practical Action, p. 2; p. 5; Pot-in-pot refrigerator
• SODIS bottles in the sun — WHO/WEDC, p. 21; Solar water disinfection
• Lice and the nit comb — WHO Vector Control, p. 266; p. 271; Head louse
• Ticks — CDC tick ID, p. 4; WHO Vector Control, p. 278; Ixodes pacificus
• Cockroaches and bed nets — WHO Vector Control, p. 301; p. 85; Mosquito net

🔗 Related guides

• Light Without the Grid — candles, wicks, lamp oils and lamps in detail
• Paper, Ink & Toilet Paper — making paper and ink, and toilet paper alternatives
• Food From Scratch — flour, masa, sourdough, lard, syrup and storing food.
• Illinois Valley — Start Here — water, sanitation, carbon monoxide and local hazards.
• Radio Guide — receivers, antennas and staying informed without power.
• Engines, Motors and Generators — salvaged motors, alternators and generator safety.
• EMP Guide — shielding electronics from EMP and solar storms (Faraday cages).
• Medical — Read Me First — where the doctor, dentist and women's health books are.