What are your frugal and sustainable tips and tricks?

[Sally PB]

I live out in the country, and no way could I get by without owning a vehicle.

Same here. The nearest grocery store is about 12 miles away. There is no public transportation. When I lived in the city, I used the bus, rode my bike, and walked.

 

[Smokerbill]

Excellent point. I should have mentioned it. I keep all my supplies in the back of the SUV in one of those 27-gallon industrial totes that you can buy at Menards, Home Depot, etc... for less than $10.00 on sale...

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BTW, those industrial totes stack great in the garage, or you can make a rack for them. I organized a lot of things in my garage last year, putting them into those totes, and labeling the totes. I just have my totes stacked 3 or 4 high, but if you need to get the bottom one out, well you have to remove everything on top first. On my someday list is to make a rail rack storage system for the totes. Like this...

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If I do make one, I'll probably post it in the Show Me Your Pallet Projects! thread because I would be using pallet/reclaimed lumber for the project. Got to keep the costs down!

I like that rack idea, but unless I'm missing seeing it I'd say some diagonal bracing would make it much more stable. Maybe it's attached to the wall behind it for support.

 

[gtaus]

I like that rack idea, but unless I'm missing seeing it I'd say some diagonal bracing would make it much more stable. Maybe it's attached to the wall behind it for support.

There are a number of YouTube videos making these racks. Some of them are anchored into the wall, some on wheels, but I don't recall seeing any diagonal bracing on any of the designs. I suppose if the rack was not stable, you could easily add diagonal bracing anytime to tighten it up.

 

[saysfaa]

The next best alternative we'd thought of so far is to run a garden hose through the house to the toilet. Then plug the side jets, and the drain hole, around the end of the hose. And take the flapper off. Then turn the hose on up siphon jet.
...

Shop vac did not get it out.

But it no longer blocks the siphon hole and it didn't come back with a test flush....

Frugal tip - STOP soon enough.

I had so much fun working with dh to figure out how to try floating it out that I wanted to try that on Saturday even though it was sort of fixed. 4 flushes with no problems. I also didn't like it hanging there waiting to cause a problem. And I thought the worse case scenario was I would have to blow it back up to wherever it was. So we tried.

Ugh. Double ugh.

Floating didn't work. We could hear it bumping around in a space at the top back of the bowl. We tried slowly rising water first, then full force. It was knocked out of wherever it was and ended up back at the siphon hole. And I got surprised at one point and let go of the rag I used to block the side jets; it went down the drain. Hopefully, it will go all the way through the system.

I tried to blow it back up many times. I tried blowing it with the leaf blower while vacuuming with the shop vac.

And called a plumber.

I thought about the grabber thing but decided the odds of grabbing it were too low to justify trying that when I can't see it or the curved and branched path to get close to it. And dh's patience with this is completely used up. He wanted to call a plumber in the first place. Actually, he wanted to replace the toilet in the first place.

I expect the plumber might use something like the grabber with his experience to help. Or a shop vac or shop vac/hose pushing combination.

Even I am ready to be done with the issue.

 

[Molpet]

Frugal tip - STOP soon enough.

I had so much fun working with dh to figure out how to try floating it out that I wanted to try that on Saturday even though it was sort of fixed. 4 flushes with no problems. I also didn't like it hanging there waiting to cause a problem. And I thought the worse case scenario was I would have to blow it back up to wherever it was. So we tried.

Ugh. Double ugh.

Floating didn't work. We could hear it bumping around in a space at the top back of the bowl. We tried slowly rising water first, then full force. It was knocked out of wherever it was and ended up back at the siphon hole. And I got surprised at one point and let go of the rag I used to block the side jets; it went down the drain. Hopefully, it will go all the way through the system.

I tried to blow it back up many times. I tried blowing it with the leaf blower while vacuuming with the shop vac.

And called a plumber.

I thought about the grabber thing but decided the odds of grabbing it were too low to justify trying that when I can't see it or the curved and branched path to get close to it. And dh's patience with this is completely used up. He wanted to call a plumber in the first place. Actually, he wanted to replace the toilet in the first place.

I expect the plumber might use something like the grabber with his experience to help. Or a shop vac or shop vac/hose pushing combination.

Even I am ready to be done with the issue.

My elderly mom's system backed up. After getting the tank pumped, it had been 40 years so it needed it anyway, it was still plugged by a facecloth in the line between the house and the tank.