A Baja Adventure

Biggreentruck stayed in Jtree while I went to Baja. Here are a few photos.

Biofuels Packet Part 4- An Activity

Combustible oils can be found in many everyday 'feedstocks.' Here's an easy demonstration that's somewhat safer than the so called greasebombs I saw in Hidden Valley last weekend:

Materials- tea candle, lighter, whole orange or grapefruit
Time- about 5 minutes

Light the tea candle. Peel part of the orange or grapefruit (this is a good chance to talk about energy passing through the food web). With the white side of the peel toward you and the orange side of the peel toward the candle, squeeze the peel and watch the fireworks. If it doesn't work the first time, try a fresher piece of fruit.

Discussion- Does it work with other fruits? What other plants might contain similar oils? If you spray svo at the flame, this experiment doesn't work. Why not?

Rumors can be True

There was a rumor going around the natty world that one of our former colleagues was brewing or filtering or wrestling or doing something with vegetable oil. Last weekend our friends Shea and Amber came out to Joshua Tree in Amber's beautiful biodiesel powered Jetta wagon and set the stories straight (I didn't ask about the wrestling). Seems they've a little company called Happy Earth Recycling and a small filtering plant. I stopped by on my way to Malibu (the 'Big Lebowski' running through my head as I dealt with the LA area traffic). Shea connected me with really nice oil, some hands-on time with a myriad of 12volt pumps and several cubies worth of great biofuels science information.

Then I spent 3 fun filled days at the MASH film site (Malibu Creek State Park) with high energy 6th graders (they'd never heard of MASH) and again zen-ed my way through 5 hours of traffic to get back to the sanctuary of Jtree. I make long (4-56 hour) commutes to work every few weeks but I'm ever so glad I don't have a 2 hour commute every day. The best part of the creep along "the 10," as I-10 is known out here, was knowing that I was not burning fossil fuels.

Back in Jtree, I met the boys from the Mariposa-based bluegrass band The Tresspassers. I showed Andy around biggreentruck and he showed me his veggie-powered rig. Luckily, there was a full cubie I had yet to pour into the tank and I was able to share the Happy Earth oil.

Jtree means climbing to most folks I know and biggreentruck has witnessed a few new developments on that front as well. The etriers finally came out of the bag of gear last weekend with a draws-hung lead of Willit's Pillar (A1) followed by leads of the Beaver Boulder bolt ladder (A1) and the nerve-wracking copperheads of Lost Lid (5.9, A4?) all with fixed gear. The aid-stravaganza was topped off by the gear intensive Butterfly Crack (A1/5.11).
Two girls aid climbing raises a few eyebrows (which only motivates us more) and with the encouragement of Jtree master Todd Gordon, Sunshine and I are hooked on a whole new way of getting to the top of climbs we really want to toprope but are not gonna lead. Here's a photo of Sunshine all racked up.