22 HACKS

[Scott Lance Smith 452]

TOP 22 SUPER SIMPLE PREPPER HACKS

 

1. The Vintage Doesn’t Matter We’re talking about wine here. Do you drink a lot of wine? What does this have to do with prepper tips? Well…did you know that your used wine corks can be repurposed as a DIY Fire Starter? All you need to do is throw a bunch of corks into a Mason jar bottle and top it off with rubbing alcohol. Let soak overnight and you have yourself your own fire starter.

Use them for your next backyard party in your fire pit – or pull them out of your bug-out bag when you’re in need of a fire should you find yourself with no means of warming yourself. Pretty cool right?

 

2. Water, Water Everywhere Except when you need it! If you’re stuck somewhere and can’t get to any drinkable water you need an easy solution to clean water. That’s where a DIY water filter comes in. Before you think this sounds expensive - all you need is a 2 liter soda bottle (you could also use a smaller water bottle), coffee filter, rocks, sand and some charcoal. The kind you kind find at your local pet store.

To assemble, just cut off the top portion of your bottle and invert it into the bottom bottle. Next add the coffee filter, charcoal, sand, and then rocks. Pour your untreated water in and then “voila!”…your filtered water collects at the bottom of the bottle. Neat huh?

A simpler method – should you happen to be carrying a jug of bleach with you – is to bleach your water. All it requires is putting nine drops of bleach into a gallon of untreated water and then waiting 30 minutes before drinking. This method comes in handy should your local water supply at home become contaminated.

 

3. Slippery Slope This tip comes in handy should you find yourself without your snow boots on in the middle of a snowstorm. Use your Paracord (we know you have one) to wrap around the bottom of your shoes for instant grip in snow and ice.

 

4. Not Just for Coffee Coffee filters can be used for more than just brewing your morning cup of joe. Keep them in your bug-out bag so should you need to collect water from a nearby stream, you can use a coffee filter to catch any sediment, twigs and leaves. Now keep in mind this is for the cleaner, cool spring water you can find in mountain streams. You’ll want to use the method described in #2 for your really nasty water.

 

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5. Don’t Bug Me This is a great tip when you’re camping out in wide open spaces. Keep some Cayenne Pepper in your backpack. When going to sleep at night sprinkle a line of Cayenne around your sleeping bag and the bugs won’t cross the line.

 

6. Fish Medicine Did you know that the stuff you use to cure your sick fish in your aquarium can also be used on humans? If you’ve ever had to use Fish-MOX in your fish tank but never bothered to look at the ingredients – well…the MOX stands for Amoxicillin: the same kind used on humans.

If you’re ever in a situation where help isn’t coming any time soon – think Hurricane Katrina – antibiotics are key because infections spread fast when these types of disasters occur. Since it’s unlikely in a situation like Katrina that you’ll have any access to medicines, you’ll need to turn to alternatives for ongoing treatment.

As you know you can’t get a huge supply of prescription antibiotics from your doctor – but no one’s going to stop you from stocking up on Fish MOX at the pet store. (Just be sure to check with your doctor before trying this out!)

 

7. Breaking Glass Have you ever wondered what would happen to you if you found yourself in a sinking car? You only have about 60 seconds to get out of a situation like that. Back in the day you never would have had to worry about what to do because there was no such thing as automatic windows. You had to use a hand crank to roll down your window. So if you were under water, you could just roll down the window and swim out.

But with all cars now having automatic windows, the first thing to short out should you find yourself skidding out of control into a river bed and quickly sinking underwater will be your electrical system. If your windows are up, then you’re screwed.

That’s where an emergency car tool comes in handy…it’s small enough to attach to your keychain yet powerful enough to break a car window in an emergency. It also has a blade attached to it should you need to cut yourself out of your seatbelt. The glass breaker is spring loaded and only requires you holding it up to your window and pushing a button for it to shatter the glass.

8. Recharging the Dead Batteries! Did you know that all those dead alkaline batteries you throw out can be recharged? Did you ever feel guilty about throwing them in the trash so you kept them in a box to recycle? Well, you can have a lifetime supply of live batteries by saving and recharging all your dead alkaline batteries.

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With an inexpensive recharging tool you can bring back all your dead batteries to life. We all know the one thing you always need but seem to be out of are batteries – now you don’t ever have to waste your money on that problem again. (Be sure to ask your friends and neighbors for all their dead batteries too!)

9. Don’t Forget Your Crayons! Need an extra light source and no candles on hand? Light up some Burnt Sienna and it will act as a candle. Just throw a box of 24-Ct Crayolas in your bug-out bag. And if you get bored? They serve a dual purpose!

 

10. Just Duct Tape It! The numerous uses of duct tape never cease to amaze. Try out this prepper hack should someone in your group break their arm. Use toilet paper to carefully wrap the broken arm and then use the duct tape to create a sling. This works beautifully until the injured person can safely get to a doctor.

 

11. Not Just for Baby’s Bottom Baby oil provides an extra layer of insulation should you find yourself stuck out in extreme cold. Toss some into your bug-out bag because when applied to exposed skin, it will help prevent frostbite.

 

12. Save the Lint! No, it’s not the latest charity – but a prepper hack using your dryer lint. Ball up some of that dryer lint and add petroleum jelly and you have an instant fire starter. For compact storage make half a dozen of these babies and store them in an old Altoids tin. We know we already gave you one fire starter tip but this one was too cool not to mention.

 

13. Not Just for Drinking You can use that jug of water and turn it into a lamp for additional lighting. Just wrap a headlamp around it, turn it on and you have instant ambience for your tent.

 

14. The Better to See You With If you’re fresh out of fire starters grab the nearest person’s eyeglasses and use the sun and the glasses to start a fire. Or use the glasses to reflect the sun to create a distress signal.

 

15. Don’t Forget Your Protection This is an unusual – but fun - prepper hack. Did you know a condom can hold a gallon of water? Or you can use condoms to store your matches to protect them from getting wet? Who knew right? Or rather – who would have thought? We won’t tell anyone what you do with the extras.

 

16. Are We There Yet? Use your wristwatch to find your way. When you hold a watch in the palm of your hand with 12 o’clock at the left and use your arm to have the hour hand point at the sun, the spot halfway between the hour hand and the 12 is South. Wristwatch turned compass indeed!

 

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17. Double or Triple A Don’t you hate when you need AA batteries but all you got are AAA batteries? Want to know a neat prepper hack for this? Tinfoil! Just scrunch up some tinfoil and put it in the gap between the AAA batteries and the contact point and you now have AA batteries.

 

18. Emergency Pizza When you’re in a pinch and need your pizza - create your own solar oven with this awesome hack tip. Take a pizza box, cut out a flap in the middle and cover the inside flap with aluminum foil. Tape clear plastic wrap over the cutout and cover the inside bottom of the box with more foil and top it with black construction paper. Prop the flap open with a stick – place it in the sun – and you have your very own solar oven. Now, will it really cook pizza? Probably not. But it can make some killer s’mores.

 

19. The Call of the Wild When you need to send out loud distress signals – create your own air horn. It’s super simple only requiring an empty 35 mm film canister, a balloon (we heard you can also use a condom) and a straw. Poke a hole in the bottom of the canister and drill another one in the side. Cut the balloon in half, cover it over the canister, put the top on the balloon and poke the straw through the bottom hole and then blow. You’ll be surprised at how loud it will blare.

 

20. Orange You Glad You Like Oranges? Maybe you forgot to pack the candles and the crayons in your bug-out back. But you’re likely to have a few oranges on hand for a snack. Slice one of those in half, scoop out the fruit and leave the pith (the white part) in the middle. Just fill with olive oil and light the pith – and you have your very own orange oil lamp.

 

21. Cool as a Cucumber You never know when you’re going to be stuck in the hot desert and no way to preserve your food…well that might be a stretch. But we thought it was really cool so we had to mention it. Create your own pot-in-pot refrigerator – also known as the Zeer Pot – with just a couple of terra cotta pots some sand and water you have your very own refrigeration unit.

The sand and water acts as an evaporation mechanism that cools the produce kept inside the pot. This method is used in dry, hot climates where refrigeration is scarce. The Zeer pots also protect against humidity as well as prevents fungi from growing on your foods.

 

22. Batteries Again? We couldn’t help ourselves but had to add another battery hack – as another fire starter hack. An old battery can be used to start a fire, a cigarette, or a campfire by taping an exposed wire to the negative end of the battery. Touch the other end of the wire to the positive end and the exposed wire in the middle heats up and starts your fire.