My Ice House/Fish House adventure begins

[AMGS3]

Hi Tav, good to hear from you. I DMd you back today. Sorry that took so long.

TX2sturgis-
Yup, they can get pretty fancy with the fully cedar paneled interiors. And practical too, with led hole lights on all the holes so you can fish at night and see what you're catching.
The bathroom in mine is a step up with the grey and black tanks underneath the shower and toilet, so no fishing and peeing at the same time for me, lol.

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[John61CT]

I really like the ability to drop a high-clearance rig right down on the ground.

Anyone know suppliers of just those suspension bits?

 

[AMGS3]

I just found these YT videos doing a quick search for "ice fish house suspension". Hope that helps.





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[AMGS3]

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[AMGS3]

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[AMGS3]

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[AMGS3]

Sorry everybody, turns out I don't know how to get Tapatalk to add more than one link at a time.

Also - there's a few different suspension systems on the commercial models for raising and lowering the house that I saw while I was shopping around for my house. They come in hydraulic and manual versions. I got a manual one. There were two different styles of manual suspensions I saw while window shopping. Unfortunately I don't have the mechanical vocabulary to know what the different types are called. The motion on the one I got is powered by a hand cranked winch. The other type was more of a lever type ( kind of like the kind of jack that you have to pump).

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[tx2sturgis]

Those Minnesotans must REALLY like their fish!

 

[John61CT]

I think sitting out on the ice in a howling blizzard is just as big a part of it.

Can take Norwegians and Swedes out of Scandinavia, but. . .

 

[John61CT]

Sorry everybody, turns out I don't know how to get Tapatalk to add more than one link at a time.

no worries, thanks.

Rather than SendTo on each one, just copy and paste via the clipboard into a single Reply message, just means a bit more flipping back and forth.

I'd actually bookmarked many of those vdo's before, even made a few phone calls, but so far's no one's interested in selling the suspension components for DIY, just to the manufacturers or their dealers for needed repairs.

 

[AMGS3]

^^John61CT

Thanks. I think I knew how to save the links and copy them into the reply message before but for some reason the Tapatalk messages keep clearing when I flip back to YouTube to grab another one. So when I save the next video link and go back to paste it into the reply message I find that the message is now blank. Maybe if I copy them into a "notepad" thing then copy the whole completed message into the reply in the Tapatalk app. Doing this on my phone has some things that weren't a problem when I was using the library computer. But it's still better than not being on the forum at all.

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[John61CT]

Yes, actually using a local text editor for involved posting is very good practice, just copy and paste the whole thing when done.

All too often I lose 30 minutes worth of work when depending on a web software-based remote editor.

Tapatalk's auto-save recovery feature sometimes works, but not reliably enough.

 

[AMGS3]

^^^^ TX2sturgis & John61CT
Yup, we love our fishing and hunting. And even those of us who don't LOVE the cold weather still like the bragging rights that come with surviving a MN winter. And you're right, being swedish, Norwegian, and German just makes us more stubborn. (Add Irish too, for me anyways) Scandanavians don't really shy away from cold weather activities, we invent new ones.

So I learned a little more about how common nomadic life is in MN.
I went in to talk to this woman who helps me with my paperwork for ss disability pmts/Medicaid. I had to update my address and she said there are actually quit a few of her clients "way, way more than you would think" who are living in RVs- what the govt classifies as "dwellings that are not meant for full time habitation". "They live full time up here in just regular old RVs, cars, familys even." I didn't tell her that I could have probably guessed that there were a lot of nomads stealth dwelling that go unnoticed, even in northern MN.

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[Spaceman Spiff]

Those Minnesotans must REALLY like their fish!

Try scheduling a family event during fishing opener (ice or spring).  Some of them might talk to you again . . . someday 

 

[AMGS3]

Very true. Deer season is just as bad. Don't plan anything you want anyone to come to if it's in the first half of November.

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[AMGS3]

So in an attempt to be a lot more frugal with my propane I've decided two things.

1) to not use my furnace any more 'til fall. I find that even though it still has been getting down to 40° overnight, the inside of my trailer doesn't get too cold. I make sure to have a few blankets on, esp since I have the window cracked.

2) I'm going to try to give thermal oven cooking (aka wonder oven, wonderbag, haybox, etc) a solid go. Looking into it there are a few reasons I want to try it. It cuts the amt cooking fuel you use to cook the same meals to between a quarter and a sixth of what was needed to cook conventionally. I am a sucker for a crock pot recipe, and to convert the stuff I normally crock pot is pretty easy. (Just reduce the liquid a little). The cooker itself is free if you make your own, or inexpensive if you buy one. It cuts down on open air pots of boiling water, and therefore condensation and moisture problems. It is non-electric, so you can cook a meal by boiling it then putting it in the wonder oven on the passenger floorboard and driving to the next adventure. Time it right and your chili will be done by the time you get there. If I have some success with this I'll post it in the Food/Cooking forum. I think I saw a thermal cooking thread cover there somewhere. I really like the idea of boiling my food for 10-15 min outside, then putting it in the thermal cooker and coming back 6-8 hours later to a cooked meal.

Peace,
Angie

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[Jillsjoy]

Very Nice!

 

[AMGS3]

So, I managed to wait until today to turn my furnace on. Last night it was 26°F, znd it snowed last night and off and on all day, so I figured it's finally furnace weather. I have the thermostat set at about 60°F and it seems to be working well. Nice and toasty.

I've been making a lot of soups and freezing them in wide mouth pint Kerr Mason jars. It seems to be working nicely so far. I've read, and heeded, many warnings on giving enough air space in the top of the jar to prevent shattered glass all over my freezer. I haven't had one break yet. I like that I can take the jar out of the freezer several hours before eating and either warm it up in a saucepan on the stove or microwave it.

Stay warm,

~angie



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[John61CT]

Homemade soup, yum.

Have you figured out bread yet?

 

[AMGS3]

^^^^^Not yet John, but I've got some ideas.

I used to love to bake bread often, until I had to cut wheat out about 3yrs ago. I made it both traditionally and by the no-knead method spelled out in the "Bread in five minutes a day" book. It really is that quick, but requires a fair amount of space in your fridge for the dough bucket. I did recently learn that the authors of the "five minutes a day" bread books wrote one that was all gluten free recipes. I'm going to have to look into that.

Lately I've been experimenting with the wonder oven for making lots of stuff. I ran across a YT vid that explains how to bake bread in those wide mouth pint jars I mentioned above. I haven't tried it yet, but I'm going to as soon as I find a gluten free recipe that looks promising.



Here's another vid, but I probably won't try it in cans like she does here, since I don't really like the idea of heating up the can liner.



I do have that little propane oven in my kitchen, but I like the idea of trying to conserve fuel by using the wonder oven. My wonder oven isn't even as fancy as theirs in the above videos is. It's a styrofoam cooler that's packed with towels and set inside of a plastic tote. And it really does stay piping hot in there for 8+ hours.

I'm thinking of starting a captain's log, since the subjects I seem to be covering here are not just limited to my icehouse itself.

~angie

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