Episode 255 - Tool of the Week: Jackery Power Station

We had a short power outage yesterday, and while I didn't have to use it, the Jackery power station is a great tool for charging electronics and running small devices.

Jackery Power Station

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:01):
Good morning. This is am I, and again I'm sitting
at the end of my driveway waiting for the traffic
and we might no, maybe not. It's coming from both
directions at at least seventy miles an hour, and that
would be assuming folks are driving the speed limit, which

(00:24):
they don't necessarily always do in Texas. It's kind of
we thinking of of it as a suggestion and not
a actual rule. So, and it's busy cause it's time
to go to work. I'm running a little bit behind,
and we are short on parking spaces at the office,
so I may be parking in the north forty we see. Okay,

(00:49):
so today is Tuesday, and that is tool of the week.
So before we get a tool of the week, we'll
talk about to get anything done. Well, yesterday I worked
from home, and one of the reasons I did that
was so that I could after right after I stopped working,
I could get some housework done, which I did because

(01:10):
Nie and sister had some place to go in the
evening early evening, so I took the golden opportunity to
have the house to myself so I could get some
housekeeping done. That was nice. I didn't get completely finished
because most of it I just need to do my
bathroom and dust in my bedroom. I didn't get the
bad porch. It needs to be done too, because it's

(01:32):
about I ain't gonna deepen dog care at this point
for short haired dogs by a dog and secy dog
shed a lot bless them. Anyway, we had an interesting
experience yesterday because while I was working, probably night between

(01:54):
nine thirty and nine forty five, I'm sitting there working
on my computer and I realized, oh, the router is
off well in my sewing room, which is where I
have my home office. It's I think I've said this before,
it's what was termed in the old days of sleeping porch.
So it is a room of that has windows all

(02:18):
the way around two sides, and so because of that
especially and it's on the north side of the house,
so the eastern sun, the morning sun comes in at
my back and it makes it kind of hard to
work until it gets up a little ire. But someday
and we'll get some blinds on these windows and that
will help anyway. Uh So I don't turn the while

(02:40):
I'm working in there with my computer and whatever. I
do not turn the light on because it's not necessary.
You've got so much light from the side, and it
was daylight, so you know, I couldn't tell from that,
And really and truly, the only way I knew that
the electricity went off is that the router went off. Okay. Well,

(03:01):
I also have a MAFI, so that helped, and I could.
In fact, I was running my computer off to my
file because we're using the wireless to stream and sister
was watching TV or something, so generally I do when
I'm working at home, I'll run my computer off my
my file, so I could still work, except a loss

(03:24):
of my two extra monitors, so that was kind of
a pain. And you know, got online to see and
my electrical cooperative has an outage map where you can
look and see based on your zip code, how many
people are without electricity at in your location. Well, you know,

(03:48):
first of all, check with Nie up at her house.
Do you have a power? No, I don't have power either, Okay.
So then I got on the map and I looked
and there were eight hundred and forty seven customers slash
meters out in our area, and then there was some
in anothers of got adjacent to that. So obviously it

(04:11):
was a power outage. Eventually we found out that it
was a bird that flew into a breaker. Okay, I
mean it's kind of like what they call those when
the planes get have birds that get into the engine,
they call it a bird strike. Well, apparently we had
a bird strike yesterday we at home in our own

(04:32):
personal transformers. We've had squirrels get in them, but I've
not ever had a bird in one, So that must
have been a pretty good sized breaker though, if that
were the case, because it took out a whole bunch
of people. It was out for about an hour, so
that wasn't bad, and I didn't have to do anything,

(04:53):
you know, except for look and see where how big
was this power outage and how far did it go?
So that was interesting. If it had lasted much longer,
I would have gotten out the eco flow and plugged
in the refrigerators and freezer in the house, the freezers

(05:18):
in the storage building we were. We didn't open any
fridge or freezer in that one hour, so that solved
that problem. We had water at least for a little
while because we have a two hundred gallon pressure take
on the well. Now, if it had happened later in

(05:39):
the day it would have been hot and uncomfortable. As
it was, the temperature on the thermostat went up a
couple of degrees. We keep it at seventy one, so
and went up to seventy three because it was in
the morning, so it wasn't hot yet. So as power
outages go, it was pretty non intrusive, except for the
fact that I lost my monitors when I was trying

(06:00):
to work. And if you are used to working on
a computer and having multiple monitors, having you know them
leave you and you only have one makes things much
more difficult to do because generally I have multiple applications
open and I may be doing something on one that's
affecting another one. So I didn't miss my monitors, but

(06:27):
I guess you could say, because there's a lot of
prepper channels that'll do, you know what, the five things
to do first, five things to do when there's power
outage or whatever, and so you know, kind of did that.
My biggest concern was how big was it. Was it
just our house or was it bigger. Well, obviously it
was bigger, but it wasn't widespread. It was just in

(06:50):
our particular area. So that means that it was a
problem with our providers, specifically station or some such thing,
and so that meant it would probably be fixed in
a reasonable period reasonable period of time, or hopefully they
would post something on They're good about posting on Facebook

(07:13):
and letting people know, you know, what's happening with an
electrical outage. So that was that wasn't too bad. But
I decided to do the tool of the week based
on the power outage because if it had lasted much longer, now,
my phone was charged up because I had it plugged in.
My mind, I was charged up because I had it
plugged in, so everything was battery on. My computer was

(07:37):
fine because it was plugged in, so everything that I
needed to work was okay and would be okay for
at least a little while. If it had gone much longer,
I would have needed to get the jaggery out, and
that's the tool of the week, My little jacker hour
bake and charged the electronic devices. And if it had

(07:58):
gone much longer than that, I would have needed to
get out the bigger generators like solar generator and run
the freezer freeze with the freezers and fridges, and then
at some point in time we had to start talking
about a fan. I do have battery operated fans. They're

(08:19):
in the storage building, so I had to go get them.
So it's a progression of things depending on how long
the power outage is. Fortunately, this was only an hour,
so that wasn't hardly Other than losing my two monitors,
there really wasn't much of a problem. It was daylight,
so I didn't have to worry about not being able

(08:39):
to see. I mean, there really wasn't a whole lot
of disruption. But the jackery is really nice. This is
a two hundred white jaggery, so it's little. It came
with its own little solar panel, so yes, you can
charge it on that. I generally keep it charged up
just from the outlet, and then if I needed to

(09:02):
charge electronic devices, that's what I bought it for, so
it'll charge the phone, it'll charge, it'll run the little
fan like the battery powered fan. If the battery runs.
It's a rechargeable battery, so if the battery on the
fan runs down, you can run your fan, run the
fan off of the jaggery and it doesn't take up

(09:23):
a lot. When we had the big power outage that
lasted five days. I was using the battery operated fan
at night to try to get some sleep. And when
I did, you know, the battery would last for a
couple of hours, because of course had it on I
because it was miserably odd and it would only last

(09:44):
a couple of hours. Well, then I would plug it
into the jaggery. Well the jaggery, charging my phone and
powering the little fan and powering my seapad machine. I
would still have thirty or forty percent left the next morning.
So I thought that was pretty good for the size

(10:04):
of it, because it's only two hundred watts, but it
did some really specific task and that's what I liked
about is that's the reason why I wanted to highlight
it as the tool of the week. I rarely have
to use it, but if I do, it's very handy
to have. So I will put a link to I
bought it on Amazon, of course, and so I'll put

(10:27):
a link to it in the description. You could get
different sizes, of course, the bigger the size, the heavier
the device is. For example, we started taking them with
us to conferences when we are doing exhibits, because renting
electricity in a conference hall cost a ridiculous amount of money.

(10:52):
We could buy several power banks, and you know, if
they're small enough with a handle, we can take them
back to the hotel room at night and plug them
in and charge them up for the day. And then
during the day we can use them to run the
lights for the booth, and we can also run our
devices off of the charge, our phones, charge our computers,

(11:15):
whatever we want to do. So they have worked really well. Now,
the other day one of my people decided they wanted
to get a bigger one, and I want to say
it was at least a thousand whats Maybe I have
to look and go back and look at it. But
the problem is the bigger they are, the heavier they are,
and obviously my eco flows away a ton. So I

(11:38):
have them actually on push carts so that I can
move them around. Now, yes they have they have wheels,
but they're still extremely difficult to maneuver around if you
have to do them with their wheels, and they have
the big ones have a like a handle that pops
out and you can set it up at an angle

(12:00):
and roll it on the wheels, but it's still very
difficult because they weigh a ton. This ego flow ultra
that I have two. I have the inverter and the
two batteries. It'll go up to five batteries. I can't
imagine what that's gonna weigh because just the two batteries
and the inverter is probably closed to three hundred pounds.

(12:22):
So it'll roll, but it doesn't roll well, so we'll
I don't move it much, but it's there so that
I could move it to another part of the house
if I needed to. Anyway, that's what I wanted to
do as far as tool of the week. I wanted
to highlight the jaggerie because and the little ones are nice.

(12:45):
They don't take up a lot of space, they're not
hard to deal with, they don't weigh a whole lot.
But being able to keep your electronic devices charged, or
even running a small fan or your cepath if you
need it to sleep, makes all the difference in the world. Now.
I did watch Speaking of Sleep, because that's the hardest

(13:07):
thing when it's hot. I watched a YouTube the other day.
I don't know, I have to think about whether or
not a one make this thing, but there is a
lot to be said for this. One of the things
that I have wrestled with the most is. Honestly, it's
harder here in Texas for us to be without electricity

(13:31):
in the summertime than it is in the wintertime. I
am more concerned about the heat than I am the cold.
First of all, if we have cold, it doesn't last long.
For example, when we had Snowmageddon in twenty one, you know,

(13:51):
as I said before, my temperature at my house got
lower than any tiperature I've ever seen. It was minus seven.
I've never seen that before in my part of the world.
But the next week it was seventy. So we don't
We may have a polar vortex and it may get
really really cold, but it doesn't last long. And then
the temperature goes back up. Now may not go up

(14:14):
to seventy, it may go up to fifty. But still
it's not as bad. Our cold weather does not come
and stay in Texas. The hot weather comes and stays,
you know, for like two months, three months, however long,
depending on how bad a summerre reven This one has
not been awful. But we are in August and so

(14:34):
we're seeing mid the high nineties and sneaking up to
one hundred every once in a while. That's an average summer,
that's not what But the last two back to back
have been brutal. So you know, I'm not complaining that
this one hasn't been as bad as the ones that
we had the last couple of years. But trying to

(14:56):
stay cool in the summertime is go to be much
harder to do than trying to stay warm in the wintertime.
First of all, none now is you put on more clothes.
But so that's the thing that I have wrestled with
the most is what kinds of things can I do
to provide us with cool air in the summertime. And

(15:20):
one of the biggest problems of being able to deal
with the summertime heat is being able to sleep. In fact,
as a child, that's the only thing I remember about
being hot. I don't ever remember being hot in the daytime,
although I'm sure we were very hot in the daytime.
What I remember is it being so hot at night

(15:42):
I couldn't go to sleep. And you know, now that
I'm older, sleep as really important. And if you don't
have electricity, as sensible prepper would say, the work you
have to do to keep everything running without the just
you know, privilege of electricity. You flip a switch at
your work, it you know, increases tenfold and you're exhausted.

(16:06):
So the one of the most important things in a
power outage is be able to get a good night's sleep. Well,
this I don't remember what this channel's name was, but
he had a really good idea, and i'd seen the
I guess they call him redneck air conditioners where you
take an ice chest or or some kind of holder thing.

(16:27):
Ice chest would be good because it is insulated and
you cut holes in it and one hole is in
the top for the fan and one hole is in
the side for the air to come out. And so
he did that with a five gallon bucket, so that
wouldn't even be a He said, you could also go
to like Goodwill or a you know, resale shop or

(16:47):
something and get a cheap used cooler, which is true,
you could, and then you so you wouldn't be actually
ruining a perfectly good cooler. He takes like two liter
soda bottles and freezes those, keeps those frozen, and I

(17:08):
want to say he put about four in this five
gallon bucket and he freezes those, and so he'd have
some frozen and then some others being frozen. And obviously
one of my number one priorities in a power outage
is gonna keep the freezers going, so uh. That provides
you with ice and keeps your food cold and all
kinds of stuff. So uh, the number one, the the

(17:32):
number one priority in a power outage is gonna be
the freezers in my house so well, and possibly water
that's important too. Uh. Anyway, so he freezes these bottles
and then he put four of them in this five
gallon bucket and put that. He cut a hole in
the lid for the fan, and he got a round

(17:55):
fan that was, you know, just like a small round fan,
and he laid it down on top of the hole.
And I want to say he kind of he had
a way he affixed it to the hole. Off have
to think about how exactly he did that, so it
you know, as it's vibrating, it doesn't vibrate itself off.

(18:16):
And then he got a hole in the side. And
I want to say, he said, you could either use
flexible gutter material, you know, the like the down spout stuff,
or you could use a dryer vent. I think the
dryer vent would probably and I think that's what he

(18:37):
uses drier vent So he put that in the hole
in the side and taped it up really good with
tape so that he sealed it off, and then he
took the other end, or he said, what to do
is you take the other end of the dryer vent
hose and you put it under the sheet and the
blanket or whatever you're sleeping with in your bedroom, and

(19:01):
it's blowing case. He said he had to put it
on low because high was too cold, and so he
said it blows cold air and it keeps it in
a confined space because it's in it's just like in
the bed with you. And he said it made being
able to sleep when it was hot so much easier.

(19:22):
And I never thought of that as an option, because,
as he said, the problem is when you make these
and now I had thought about that, especially as in
a house with twelve foot seisans, is that just having
one of those and having it in a room, it
only reduces the temperature a couple of degrees. But if

(19:45):
you can blow that cold air into a very confined space,
then you get better results from it. So I was
very impressed with his system that he had put together.
And that makes sense because as I said, the hardest
thing to do is to sleep when it's hot. When

(20:06):
I had the five day power outage, what I did
every night cause I was just miserable. By the time
I got everything situaiting for the night and whatever and
was ready to go to bed, I would go We
did have water, so I but we didn't have hot water,
so I would go to the shower. I would go
take a shower in the cold water. Now, the thing

(20:28):
about well water is well water is really cold in
the summertime. If you have just tap water, you have
municipal water whatever, it's running through pipes in the ground.
That's not far enough down in the ground to be cold.
We call that the less hot we we have hot
water and less hot water. Uh. But if you have
well water, you literally have cold water, cause it is

(20:51):
very cold. So I would take a shower in the
very cold water and get my hair wet, and then
I would go to bed with my head wet, and
then that would help me cool off so that I
could sleep. But his plan sounded like something to really try.
So I don't want to have to be without electricity
when it's hot and have to find out. But I

(21:12):
think that would be an option. I need to collect
these materials and at least have them available to be
able to do that. Anyway, I thought that was an
excellent plan, and I wanted to highlight the little jackery
because it serves a very specific purpose, but it's very

(21:33):
good at that. Now I want to say it's very independent.
Who says he has a jaggery, it must be a
bigger jaggery because he's had it for a long time
and he said he literally leaves it outside and it
still works, so that's pretty impressive. I didn't get bigger jackerries.
I tried to look and see what the options were,

(21:57):
and it seemed like the best option was the eco flow,
so that's what I went with. As far as being
able to have a bigger system for more appliances. The
thing is, you know, running a generator is never going

(22:18):
to give us as much power even now, a whole
house generator will, except that the problem with that is
the amount of consumption of whatever you're running it on.
At my house, it would have to be propane, and

(22:40):
according to my friend who has one at her fairly
new bornaminium, a five hundred gallon tank of propane would
last three days. Well, with my five day power outage,
i'd have had to do that twice. And so that's
a pretty expensive electricity bill at that point. So we're

(23:01):
gonna look for other options. That's why I've gone with
eco flows. They're not cheap, neither is a generac, but
I have it allows me to have other options besides that. Okay,
I have arrived at work and I will talk to
you tomorrow.