Getting what you paid for.

I'll bet you don't like what your government is doing right now. I'll also bet that you do not approve of the way your culture is headed. I'll even bet that you get at least a little angry when you see the news on TV. What do you think of what they claim some celebrity has recently done or said? Why do you care? You say you don't? Then why did you pay to see their movies?

Well, Uncle Buildy says that you got all that because you paid for it. You pay your taxes don't you? You pay your cable. You support mega million dollar corporate systems that use the money to eliminate alternatives and competition. They have shaped your society in such a way as that now you think that you can't do without them. Now they are working in earnest on shaping you. It is time to escape. It was actually time to escape long ago. Now it will be more difficult, but can still be done. Uncle Buildy hates the system. Uncle Buildy holds grudges. Uncle Buildy is one bad enemy to have, because he is effective and hits hard where it hurts. Uncle Buildy wants to hit the system by helping people escape it.

Uncle Buildy said enough is enough long ago. I took a stand as best I could about 13 years ago, and have gone on from there. I did a rather extreme thing. I bought property in a country that had very little rural building regulation and couldn't enforce the little they had. I did that for a reason. I did it because I had ideas I wanted to explore and things I wanted to build that is pretty much not allowed in most places. There are other reasons as well. I saw evidence that it was only going to get worse. I am a poor working stiff. I get blown around by the winds of fate often enough, and now I am in a different country than the one I originally fled too. This one is more tightly regulated. (It is a long story, I'll tell it later.) But even here, a smallholder does have the right to shape his own property and build as he sees fit, so I'm still good. You may not be so lucky in your region. There are many ways to make it work though. It is possible things will soon change in those over regulated places. It will be a hard sell for them to issue citations for having crops and chickens when the food supply chain has been destroyed. Don't think they won't try it though. Even if you live in a tightly controlled area, you will get a lot of inspiration, enjoyment, and good useable ideas from this site. You will learn a way of seeing things that will help you in all areas of your life even if you live it in downtown Manhattan or London. In these articles, Uncle Buildy will offer ideas on effectively fighting the corporate way of thinking. First offensively in yourself, then defensively as regarding others. I'll show you how to calmly get around their absurdities, and better yet, stay off their radar. All without unnecessary risk or conflict. One of the many things I will offer is such advice, along with some strategies and consultation for members on this site.

I have spent over thirty years working on my designs for the various machinery needed to build and run your own homestead. When I say homestead, I mean much more than the word usually carries. My idea of a homestead is a home that needs no outside inputs from power companies, or gas and water suppliers. A home that heats and cools itself. A home that does not need outside waste disposal services. A home that has crops, some livestock, a shop with a very large kiln and equipment for processing clay, aggregates, polymers, glass, and charcoal. There must also be equipment for forming building blocks from soils or aggregates common to the area. There should be a fabrication area for tool making, some small machine works for turning and milling, a sand casting area, and a comfortable place to sit and think. It will not be expensive at all to build and acquire these things. It can be done easily by anyone with average skills and means. It can even be done during these crazy times we live in. I want to encourage and inspire you to believe that you can accomplish such a task.

In the ideal homestead, no waste disposal is needed. Nothing has to be taken away by others but finished products, and inspiration. In the ideal homestead, nothing needs to be brought in from outside but profit, happy guests, wind, and rain.

Uncle Buildy is an idealist.

If you have stayed with me this far, You're probably made of the right kind of stuff for this project. I'll explain to you my plans, and describe my systems, and it will be up to you to decide how much you want of it, and how much you want to be a part of it.

First I will inspire and encourage you. I can't stress the importance of this enough. You will need it to get through the difficulties you will encounter on your journey to independence.

Second I will teach you a new way of seeing things. Let's do a bit of that right now, with a little exercise.

In the unlikely case that the ordinary modern consumer desires to build their own home, let us picture how they will typically see things.

Biff goes to his newly purchased land with the contractor. The contractor will ask "Well, where do you want me to put it?" Biff was caught off-guard by this unexpected question. He just sees a jumble of trees and some rocks that are in the way. He can't even visualize a house sitting there. He replies "Where do you think I should?" The contractor is motivated by profit. He wants to make the maximum amount of money for the least work, and he is very experienced in what is needed to make his job easy and profitable. He gives an opinion in line with those criteria. But then Biff's wife Bun chimes in. "I want the big window to look at this view" she chirps, pointing to the West. Bun has no idea which direction she just located the house in relation to the sun's position through the various seasons. No thought whatsoever went into drainage, wind exposure, soil type, etc. The contractor works with standard universal designs, techniques, and systems. He just imposes them onto whatever land the developer or the client have. He doesn't care. He just makes a mental note to add some unexpected expenses to rotate the project in a way that might prove slightly inconvenient to his crew. Sorted!

Then comes the work. A few trees that were in the way are sawed up and hauled off. An excavator comes and removes rocks, clay, sand, and topsoil. The South facing incline that runs at an angle to where the house will sit has to be cut down and leveled. It is loaded in a big dump truck and hauled away. Then they put up reusable forms and bring in concrete. Then they bring in cinderblocks, and skilled laborers from Mexico lay them up for the foundations. Then they bring in wood beams and trusses and sheeting and studs. All made of kiln dried, farm grown pine that had been processed by a big corporation far away. Fiberglass insulation, foamboard, vinyl siding, sheetrock, shingles. Then in come some new trees from a local nursery, some rather pricy topsoil, and some decorative rocks. All done.

Now Biff and Bun have a house the bank will be proud of. They toiled not to bring it into being. In fact they had to go to the gym to stay in shape and not get soft and flabby.

They will work though. They will work for 30 years paying double what the contractor got to the bank. Now they are the proud occupants and caretakers of a house that will need outside electricity, gas, water, trash and sewer service for as long as it exists. It should also be noted that they can only expect it to exist no more than 60 or 70 years, and only then if it gets new appliances, paints, and floor coverings about every ten to fifteen, and new vinyl siding, roof and plumbing as often as every thirty years. A great legacy for their children. No doubt any smart financial advisor, if honest, can tell you that such a house is a liability and not an asset. Biff and Bun now own a house that they have to take care of, continue to spend money on, and It produces nothing.

Now lets look at how Uncle Buildy looks at a site.

A South facing slope with a few 200 pound rocks scattered about. They appear to be limestone. The slope is covered with young maple trees. The subsoil is a mix of clay, sand and more rocks. The sand is coarse, and of a rectangular grain. The clay is sticky and firm.

Uncle Buildy sees a wide variety of building materials, fuels, and conveniences in this property that just need a few adjustments, and the correct separation and recombining to become very useful.

Buildy has special tools for these separation and recombining processes that you've probably never heard of, and can't easily buy anywhere.

Bricks are pretty much universal, and are a most convenient building material. They can be made of clay and sand by either forming it then firing it in a kiln, or adding a stabilizer such as Quicklime and compressing it in a form. It is not difficult with a bit of knowhow and some pleasant work to produce massive amounts of your own bricks. If you knew how your great grandad's generation made them you'd be shocked. If you have some helpers you can make quite an industry of it. Once you get going, you can easily make way more than you think. You'll need a lot for your home, shop, fences, barns, cisterns, cellars, storage buildings, pathways, retaining walls, water tanks, and raised beds. Two people could do this with simple tools, a truck or trailer, a simple homemade trammel, a supply of water, and two or three weeks of labor. They can be fired well enough with old pallets, scraps, low grade firewood, old crates, forest debris, and other free fuel. There are two kinds of bricks that can be made from most soils and in most climates. You need different equipment for each method. If you have a creek or pond on your property it's a no brainer to go with fired clay brick just like so many buildings have been made of over the last two hundred years. I will go into detail about how to redevelop this lost art for yourself in these articles. If you have no creek, no worries. You likely have plenty of clay in your ground. It's just mixed with a lot of sand. in that case, you can make stabilized compressed blocks with a simple machine, and some lime or low grade cement to stabilize it. Once you've got the hang of it, your bricks won't be any weaker of worse looking than the ones you buy at the building store. You can easily test them if you're squeamish. You can also make fine roofing tiles with your little manufactory.

Modern corporate thinking people have been conditioned to think such a task is an overwhelmingly gigantic amount of back breaking work. It is not. Biff and Bunn likely burned more calories at the gym in two hours than you would barrowing, shoveling and jumping a brick form all day with your cousin. They have nothing to show for it except an aesthetically pleasing, but unhealthy muscle tone. You will be in better shape, and also have at least a few thousand raw bricks.

Uncle Buildy will teach you a way of thinking that will help you to quickly analyze the site and see the many possibilities for developing what you need. God's bounteous generosity is really hard for modern people to get their heads around. There are many routes that will get you all the building materials that you need. Some are just more appropriate than others. Some are easier than others. You don't have to start out hard core. You can buy a little cement and have a truckload of sand dropped off to get you "primed". If you are in a hurry and have some money, you may like to get a leg up on things by some judicious purchases. But the skills and methods Uncle Buildy will teach you are still good to know. Besides there are no guarantees these days that you will always be able to get manufactured products and cheap energy. When you think about it, there really never were. If things really get primative in the region where you live, You'll become a real VIP with these skills and knowledge.

If you like this way of thinking, and you want to be a part of the action here please join me and support my work. We can have lots of fun here online, and in the field. I hope to do this full time. Actually, I have to do this full time. Covid has pretty much unplugged my old career. I had been hanging on to it out of fear and laziness anyway. Perhaps the same phenomena has affected you. Maybe it has awakened you to the necessity of becoming less dependent on corporate systems, and inspired you to become responsible for supplying your own food, shelter and energy. So what do you have to lose? Let's get started.

For the most part I will begin by expounding upon all the methods and technologies I have to share in a particular order. the order may seem peculiar, but I designed it so that it facilitates starting with nothing, and going from there.

The first planning target will be an overall system map that locates all the necessary, optional, and possible systems and ways of interfacing and configuring them on our homesteads. I have made some hypothetical site depictions that contain an enormous amount of information on what is actually possible. It is both instructive and inspiring. It would take months to thoroughly examine all the details of each system depicted, but that is exactly what we will do over time, and each in its own proper turn. I have prepared the map and am putting the final touches on it this week. I will offer it free of charge in electronic form in order for the public to develop a clear idea of what kind of information will be purveyed here.

The first construction targets will be a cistern, a kiln and a sort of wheeled materials conveyance that can be powered, or operated manually if needed. It is similar to a concrete dump buggy, but longer and more versatile. It has tall steel wheels so it rolls easy on any surface. The power unit can be removed in minutes so it can be pushed or pulled by man or draft animals with a load if fuel and engine parts become scarce. It is sturdy enough to be used as a line tram with a block and tackle. It is sturdy stable and simple. I designed it for my own needs for my place. I have a public forest nearby with lots of free fuel on the ground, and the space between the trees precludes the use of trucks. Four-wheelers are a rich man's novelty here. Some of you may already have, or be able to afford a four wheeler or tractor, but I think you'll find this project interesting anyway. I already have detailed drawings. My designs are simple enough to be self evidently safe, useful and solid. They are sound designs. We'll explore everything holistically with text instructions, technical philosophy, pertinent entertaining stories, some harmless jokes, and some clear blueprints. Stories? Jokes? I'm not an engineering professor, I'm your Uncle Buildy. When I am all caught up with the text and blueprints, and when I hopefully get enough subscribers, patrons and whatnot, I'll be able to spend all my time on project and do lots of videos and photos.

I'm new at doing this as an online business, and I don't quite know how to market it. This is my first real website. I am a hopelessly analogue human. Screw the singularity. Please bear with me as I figure out how to use all the features on this page.

I'll give some information so you can donate if you like, and if you do I would like to hear your input on what to focus on, so unless you're shy, send me an email if you contribute. Once this takes off, I may be slow in answering people. I'm optimistic.

I aim to give free stuff often. The first prints will be of a block maker based on the common cinva ram design. I have made some block quality control, and build design improvements. These blueprints will be free so you can see the quality of my work. After that, all technical drawings and prints will be at modest cost, or by subscription.

Thanks for your time and interest;

Uncle Buildy.

George Pierce

Wells Fargo acct > 5011630893

rt. electronic pmts> 091300010

wire trans> 121000248