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Ferrets are used to run electrical cables, interestingly enough.

If I were the power company I'd be inspecting the houses in the area to make sure the 2012 work was done properly....

yup... oops. Ok, I'll not worry about the "paltry" lifetime... they'll quite likely outlast me.

8hrs/day x 40 hrs/week x 52 weeks means 3 years of full time use. If it's only on the weekends, that's 7.5 years w/ no time off for holidays, chores, etc. What is a more expensive brand rated at, and how much do they cost?

Definitely go with the steel ****** welded into a plate; Beerhippie's suggestion of welding on both sides (if you have the room) is a good one. Another approach (if it's a street ell as shown) is to weld a steel coupling to the plate. If you need it as close as possible, welding a cut steel...

This is almost certainly malleable iron. Welding it is tricky, because it tends to convert to white iron which is quite brittle. A high nickel rod will help, as does tacking it. I've brazed these many times with no issues at all. You may also wish to consider screwing in a steel pipe ******...

I've been waffling about the plywood thickness; the horizontal girts are 24" OC, and the walls are a bit under 10' tall; the trusses are 12' apart, so unless I add blocking or **** strips of plywood there will be unsupported edges.

I really like that welder; all the copper makes for a really satisfying (and very analog) arc "dig". The only solid-state part inside are the diodes/rectifiers for producing the DC.

I've been busy welding up the first big door frame: Next up I bolt the door back to the welding table and unbolt the hinges, and paint everything. The outside of the door will be skinned with the panels I cut out for the door opening, and the inside will be 3/4" plywood like the...

A couple of fixed wheels behind the air intake should do it.... or a hard brush...

Take a look at for an example..... 36" may be tough w/ a regular shop vac. Of course, with typical GJ overkill, w/ a 240V 3 phase regenerative blower and a VFD one could really go to town...

I have the 16 gallon stainless Ridgid shop vac; it's not too noisy although I wear hearing protection when using it. It rolls pretty readily; one can pull it easily around w/ the hose. I use it to empty the water and steam lines on our steamboats when winterizing; it would also work on an RV...

I have many tools from Enco, including the 10" Phase II rotary table. Planning ahead, I'll have a hydraulic lift table to move these from a shelf to the mill. Back in CA, I welded up some heavy duty steel shelves behind the mill so I could move the table all the way back and slide those heavy...

I picked up some of these miter squares from Fireball tool. $32 for 3 different sizes; they're working quite nicely for laying out miter cuts for the door frames on our shop. It's pretty easy to hold 1/16" with an abrasive cut-off saw.

A 90amp load at 120V would be 450 amps at 24V or 225 amps at 48V (assuming 100% efficiency). All cables, connections, etc. need to be low enough resistance to prevent excessive voltage drop which will cause the inverter to reset or go into battery protection mode.

I've found the best tool for R-panel is my M12 nibbler; it does a bang up job and collects 95% of the sharp crescents in a little fabric bag. I also have the Bauer - it works well on flat stock like studs, but it's a pain on R panel.

The filter fabric, rock, and pipe form a footing drain above the concrete, which bulges out from the footing. The footing drain daylights some 150' away... Picture of pier forms under footing:

The wires are direct burial Southwire USE-2 XLP 2.5+' deep in a trench... the trench ends about 45' from the building. I'll need to put the end of the wire in conduit to bring it into the building. The 4/0 is .635" diameter, the 2/0 is smaller; the overall fill is just under 30% w/ 2" Schedule...

I like the rock idea; I have plenty of big ones handy that came out of ground for the foundation just a few feet away. I can move 'em (carefully) w/ the backhoe. There's a bunch of left-over concrete dumped (%$#]) in the footing as well, but persistence with the SDS drill + chisel has taken...

I coil the extension cord (never more than a 50' cord, of course) and plug the ends together. I then take a loop of rope and hang the cord on a hook.