Forgive me for this rant.

2 days ago my Lightning stopped charging using the Tesla Wall Connector at our remote cabin.. It was midnight when it quit. I moved the truck to the shed area and used the Ford Mobile charger plugged into the RV 14-50 outlet to complete charging.

After troubleshooting it after the sun came up it I diagnosed as a failed 50 amp breaker in the breaker panel. One leg was open. A 70 mile round trip to Home Depot and I was back in business a few hours later. Then I finished the day cutting the 3 acres of grass at the property.

A few days earlier I had to repair wire harness on my Tesla where mice had eaten up the harness that attaches to the outside air temp sensor

A few weeks before my Kawasaki Side by Side wouldn稚 start. Mice had chewed through the wires to the fuel pump. I repaired the harness soldering in a length of Tefzel aircraft wire I had and heat shrinking the solder joints.

Tonight we are at our main home and my alarm system sends me a power monitor notification that the outlets that feed the 2 refrigerators in the garage lost power. Troubleshot it to a failed GFCI receptacle. I replaced it with a spare i had in my electrical stash parts box.

Every day it seems that something breaks. I知 in my late 70痴 and fortunately I can still troubleshoot but the physical tasks are getting harder to do.

A few years ago I gave up crawling in the attic to run wiring. I no longer do my own tire rotations or wheel bearing repacks.

What do people who can稚 troubleshoot and repair anymore do? I am not looking forward to the day I have to give up taking care of the properties since I enjoy the sense of accomplishment. Old age sucks. It gets to everyone.

I have an appt at the VA tomorrow. The nurse called Friday with questions. You know you are old when they ask these questions.
Do you still drive?
Have you fallen in the last 3 months?
Do you need help getting dressed?
Can you shower without assistance?
Do you need assistance with your medication?
Do you have trouble peeing or leak urine?

Those are questions you ask if you are below 4 years old or more than 75 years old. The cycle of life. Enjoy your health while you can still enjoys it.

A few years ago I gave up the 2 activities I loved, I no longer ride motorcycles or fly airplanes. It was tough to give up but my reaction time is slowing down too much.

 

Do you have kids and grands? Clearly you're a smart man with skills to match, teach them and they can help and then they can help themselves.

 

My Dad last year before he got really bad told me that after 80 everything goes to pot.

He lived till 88 though and was quite active till he was 85. He fall and sat down and that was the beginning of the decine.

Do yourself a favor and take the rocking chair to the dump so you dont sit in it.

 

I feel for you. It gets old when one thing after another needs repair (pun intended with 'it gets old'). It sounds like the mice really need some attention. Run multiple bucket traps, the kind where the bottle spins on the wire. The other thing you can do you are already doing, keep updating to new equipment. You are so wise to have your extra freezers on an alarm. Last fall my brother had a couple hundred pounds of elk meat go bad after the garage freezer died and was not noticed for two days. I hope these constant little repairs are the biggest troubles you face.

 

I never use GFCI breakers on things that power surge. They will eventually trip, and/or fail.

I'm sourcing out things I used to do myself. I hate it. The people never do it to my satisfaction. The things I still do now takes all day, all week, or weeks, depending upon the job.

I'm getting ready to finish up the trimming of the front shrubs I started Saturday. There are only three large hollies. I used to do the shrubs for the whole house plus all the shrubs and trees on the property in one day.

I have removed more than I left, and cut the ones left way back in order to make trimming easier, but it still takes about three plus days to do all.

At least I'm still here to be able to do what I can do.

 

GFCI are a pain in the ***. They have a purpose and I respect that, but they are very temperamental.

On the subject of age... My humble opinion is if you make it to 70, you have done very well. Any day past 70 you wake up to see the sun rise is borrowed time.

We live in the country and have always said that when the trimming, cutting and regular grounds maintenance becomes too much work, we will let mother nature reclaim it.

 

Well, I finished all the trimming I'm going to do this go round. It took three tries today, and I'm soaked with sweat, but, it's done for another few months.

 

Ain't that the damned truth! Had one drive me bonkers until I realized what I was dealing with when every outlet in my garage went dead.

 

I have cellular/internet monitored alarms on both the house and the cabin. The insurance cost savings more than pays for the central station monitoring fees. Plus I have it set up to text and email me when there is anything faulted.

If we stayed at one house there wouldn't be much of an issue, but we go back and forth several times a month. A tripped GFCI normally wouldn't be that big a deal even if I'm not there. I could call a neighbor or my daughter and have them reset it. I can open the garage door remotely with MyQ. BUT if a GFCI totally fails, like last night with my not being home, that would be a problem.

Here is the Alarm notification Sunday at 8:14 PM it tripped. I replaced the Failed GFCI and respored power at 9:04 PM. I got it fixed 50 minutes later. Fortunately I had a new GFCI in my spares box.
Sun Jul 28 2024 8:14:13 PM 24 Hour Non-Burglary Alarm 01 REFRIGERATION POWER MONITOR
Sun Jul 28 2024 9:04:12 PM Restore 24 Hour Non-Burglary Alarm 01 REFRIGERATION POWER MONITOR

I'm considering replacing the single gang box with a double gang box in that location and install another outlet before the GFCI only to be used for the refrigerators. That way if the GFCI false trips or fails the new outlet would still stay hot. Not to code being in a garage but I'll risk it. When I sell the house I can easily connect the new outlet on the load side of the GFCI to meet code.

Below is a pix of the ourlet and the power monitor setup. There is a black 120vac to 12vdc transformer plugged into the outlet. It feeds a 12v relay (top left) and with loss of power it opens the contact on the relay, The contacts re monitored by the 5816WMWH transmitter (top right) sending a wireless signal the the Honeywell Vista alarm panel.

I'm a bit of a technology nerd. That is one of the reasons I bought the Lightning.

 

Flyct, deal with the mice. Mice love to screw up Saunas too. I used to have squirrels that would store stuff up under the frame of My XL F150. I trapped them, took em out into the country 60 miles away and presto no more stuff burning up by the exhaust on the frame. It was easy, a trail of Sunflower seeds and they run right into the trap.

 

I have relocated countless opposums and ground hogs from my backyard. couple cats too now that I think of it.

some food and a trap and then relocated about 20 miles away near a wooded stream.

 

@Papa Tiger @senix

Thanks for the advice.

We have 2 dogs that have free roam of the property. I would love to have a few cats but they are not an option because of the dogs and we are gone sometimes for weeks. Neighbors have barn cats that do a great job of eliminating rodents.

I have been parking under a tree due to the shade, at the edge of the cleared area where the RED X is.... I now keep the vehicles in the open in the paddock /pasture area where the RED Circle is. Hopefully the rodents will not want to cross the open area and stay in the wooded section.

 

I would suggest you have a control Co. take care of the insects and mice in the wooded areas.
I'm not a expert on Fla. & Orlando area is very busy place. Maybe protective equipment and DIY ?

 

I’ve been away for the last few days, so late to this thread. I don’t have any helpful advice with the mice, but I know how frustrating it gets when fixing things gets much harder than it used to.

I had severe neurological problems take much of my hand use about five years ago, which ultimately ended my career far earlier than I had planned. At one point, it got bad enough that I had to move in with my parents for five months before a doctor found a treatment that made things better. It’s been slowly getting a bit worse, so I’m not sitting around waiting for the “right time” to do something. I’m constantly on the road to see something I haven’t, flying out to see my east coast family, or coming up with new ways to make memories with my boys.

I’m 38 years old and might have lots of time to travel around, see the country, and spend time with family. OR maybe not…this could keep getting worse and it’ll all be a memory five or six years from now. I lost my daughter at age 6 back in 2018 without much warning, which taught me that each day is a gift and tomorrow is promised to nobody.

It hurts a lot more these days, but I still enjoy playing with my unreasonably large pile of tools and fixing things. I don’t enjoy electrical work, but love getting the opportunity to learn new things. I’ve only had to replace a few GFCI outlets over the years, but they’ve all failed at inconvenient times.



This!! Don’t stop because it’s harder. Do it because you still can, and that’s awesome!

 

The hits keep coming
So far last 30 days things that failed and I needed to fix

• Kawasaki Side By Side fuel pump wiring chewed by mice
• Tesla Outside Temp wires chewed up by mice
• GFCI for Garage Refrigerators died and needed to be replaced
• Gutter downspout clogged and needed to be removed and cleaned out
• Outdoor Camera failed and needed to be replaced
• RV Propane / CO monitor chewed end end of life and needed to be replaced
• DISH TV Remote died and needed to be replaced and reprogrammed
• Batteries for UPS died and needed to be replaced
• 50 AMP Breaker for EV Charger failed and needed to be replaced
• WIFI wall switch for Pool light failed and needed to be replaced
• MyQ wireless switch for motion lights failed and needed to be replaced
• Garage door outdoor keypad died and needed to be replaced and reprogrammed

BUT, I'm not complaining, IT COULD ALWAYS BE WORSE!!! Hurricane Debby drenched us but WE didn't have any damage.
My Son in Laws parents live 5 miles from us. They got flooded with 5 feet of water in their house. They had to be rescued by boat. SEE ATTACHED SHORT VIDEO Taken 2 days ago.