aeronuts and termite control

[franksolich]

http://www.psifly.com/cr2/index.php?topic=16402.0

Man, talk about "weird."

siguie
Kooties: 667
Posts: 16666

Termite Control
« on: December 10, 2007, 08:22:23 PM »
   
I tend to get a lot of questions about insecticides and chemicals in home products so I thought I'd just mention a couple of things about Termites.

The "Best" Insecticide for killing termites is Fiprinil followed closely by Imidacloprid and both of these generally require that you be a trained insect killing professional or a chemist to get.

Fiprinil: can be found in a product called "Termidor" by BASF at 9.1% which is then diluted to ~0.09% and will last for 4 to 8 months. It has very low mobility in soil so will not pose much of a hazard to ground water.

Curiously, fiprinil is the main ingredient in Frontline and Regents and is applied direclty to pets at 9.8% concentration to kill fleas. It can also be found in MaxForce and Combat brand insecticides.

Imidacloprid: can be found in "Premise" by Bayer and I believe is the same as "imidaclorid" but don't quote me on that. It has a half life of 30 days and can be both photolytically and microbially degraded, plus it is fairly mobile.

Imidacloprid is also used in the flea killer "Advantage" and was part of the bee death controversey. It didn't do it BUT some people prefer to believe it did.

Both are very good for killing termites, require a hired professional and are really expensive rolleyes If you want to do it yourself you "can" get these off ebay and a few places that are willing to look the other way

One of the best and cheapest termite killers available to the public is "Disodium Octaborate Tetrahydrate" There are many brands selling this stuff and it's only cheap if you realize that it is common household borax. So you can pay $10 a pound for Timbor or $0.50 for a pound of 20 Mule Team Borax whistle Oh and the 20 mule is actually better yes

Anyways, for wood treatment you want a 20% by weight solution so 2oz barox dissolved in 8oz of water.

As a "dust" you can just powder it or add any anti-clumping agents like talc ... found in baby powders

Do not confuse "Disodium Octaborate Tetrahydrate" with Boric Acid ... boric acid is good too especially as a dust but it doesn't penetrate wood as well as the sodium salt and is generally more expensive anyways.

Siguie's number one anti-termite cure is "honey" ok you can use sugar too but if you know where the termites are honey will attract ants and when the ants find your termites they'll go through and take them out for you faster and better than any insecticide

My number 2 "cure" is a homemade "electrogun" ... real ones are 90W 120,000 to 200,00V Tesla coil like wands that zap at very high frequencies. These things are good for up to 6 feet but wont work with subteranean termites. My homemade one is a 500,000V stun gun that I tweaked ... let me know if anyone is interested in making one ... it's really easy to do but there are a lot of "Cautions" and "Warnings" like don't set your house on fire, wear thick non-porous rubber gloves, unplug electronics or they'll fry etc.

Incidentally I use a smaller 200,000 V one to make my instant colloidal gold smile Everyone needs a stungun ... they are worthless for self protection but have oodles of other uses

Okay, for someone for whom wood-eating insects has never been a problem, is this advice legit or not?

siguie
Kooties: 667
Posts: 16666

My homemade one is a 500,000V stun gun that I tweaked ... let me know if anyone is interested in making one ... it's really easy to do but there are a lot of "Cautions" and "Warnings" like don't set your house on fire, wear thick non-porous rubber gloves, unplug electronics or they'll fry etc.

***Just how do you use that in general?

It's really pretty simple, I just use the 1/4 inch black plastic irrigation hose to insulate the probes of my KL-609 stun gun then attach a alligator clip to one probe and the other end to a piece of copper wire which is my "electro wand".

Now when I press the trigger the stungun cannot discharge unless the wand is near a grounding source. As it turns out termite runs are better conductors than wood, and even if the runs are not grounded themselves the charge wants to spread out and dissipate over the larger area. So all you do is press the trigger and wave the wand over the termite runs and the electricity will do the rest

This method is most effective for dry wood termites. It will zap the bejeezus out of subterraneans too but unfortunately the main colony lives underground and the charge will dissipate at ground level before finishing them off.

The main warning here is just be careful ... and don't use this on extremely dry days and by "dry" I mean relative humidity and don't try using the biggest baddest stun gun ... yes it will kill more termites BUT you start running the risk of igniting the termite tubes which would be very bad

The electro guns I'v seen work at between 90k and 200k but because of variations in stun guns I go with a nice 500k model. My 200k one barely works and 1 million volts went through all my insultaion including my glove and is remarkably painful

Oh and obviously keep the system away from sensitive electronics and anything obviously metal like window frames ... nails are fine

siguie
Kooties: 667
Posts: 16666   
   
Re: Termite Control
« Reply #16 on: April 16, 2008, 05:21:38 PM »
   
Quote from: ~Silent Grace~ on April 16, 2008, 07:59:57 AM
I can buy a stun guy pretty easily, should I sig?

It really depends on what you want to do with it. If you have dry wood termites I'd recomend some of the chemical erradication methods first especially fiprinil. Then give the buggers a week to spread the chemical throught the nest and then zap them. The fiprinil will exterminate the little buggers within 3 months but the zapping will prevent them from doing damage over that time.

Zapping alone will often kill small infestations but it's good to have some chemical backup

If you hire someone to electrogun your house they'll have a device made for the job and can cover a large area fairly quickly. The siguie zapper on the other hand is really for smaller trouble spots since the stunguns are not really meant to be run continuously. In spring through summer I'll zap two or three windows a week (one every other day). It takes 2 or 3 minutes per window and I zap for maybe 30 seconds at a time then give the gun a rest. I just do this as a precaution and because it's pretty easy to do.

If you are trying to get rid of subterranean termites you need chemical help, the zapper wil kill them in areas you know about but can't kill the colony. Zapping daily will keep the damage down but they'd eventually infest another area.

To answer your question ... assume the homemade electrogun is for small infestations or to help reduce damage. If this is what you want to do then "yes" buy a stungun they are very useful for a lot of things ... security not being one of them ... otherwise could you give me some specifics on what you want to accomplish?

siguie
Kooties: 667
Posts: 16666

Re: Termite Control
« Reply #18 on: April 29, 2008, 04:13:27 PM »
   
Quote from: ~Silent Grace~ on April 29, 2008, 06:54:39 AM
I just want to kill some drywoods that chemicals haven't eliminated. Dang but you are clever Sig!

Nah but thanxz!

If you have "dry wood" termite issues, keep in mind that even if you do kill them one year they'll likely be back the following year unless you replace the wood or in some way seal off their tunnels. If you replace the wood, be sure to paint the new wood and any wood you can reach with a solution of borax. It's dirt cheap and will basically prevent any future infestation

Oh and it's also good for preventing molds if you live in a humid area ... but that's another DIY post

LC EFA
Kooties: 26
Posts: 288

Re: Termite Control
« Reply #28 on: July 27, 2008, 08:42:14 PM »
   
I had some pretty bad damage caused by termites, cost me 20K and a few months of hard work to rectify.

These were subterranean ones and the nest site was unknown. I located the entrance point into my house  and attempted to put in a chemical barrier using a couple of different consumer chemicals (creasote and things without success. Additionally I'd have needed to maintain this barrier once every few months, and more often in the wet season.

Given the nest site was unknown (and living in a fairly green part of town, was potentially anywhere) I called in the professionals and they put down a bait system from this stuff

http://www.termitefree.com/images/Requiem_MSDS.pdf.

It's a chemical that is pretty much harmless for most things. The 'mites take back to the nest and it somehow prevents them from correctly forming an exoskeleton and thus kills the nest.

Termite Problem solved.

siguie
Kooties: 667
Posts: 16666

Re: Termite Control
« Reply #29 on: July 27, 2008, 09:06:11 PM »
   
Hey EFA

I think the worst part is that it's actually pretty trivial and cheap to termite proof a home with borax as it's being built but builders never do it

[LC EFA]

Problem with home done remedies is exactly that.

I've tried permetherin, creasote, borax and a number of other fairly nasty chemicals in putting down "barrier" systems and found that they don't work.

One Must kill the nest.

I sold a rental property (that I'd called "The Termite Mound" and considered to be "land value only") to a close friend of person that runs the pest control company that I nowuse (It's a small town and who you know still counts for something here).

That property made it into their product demonstration guide, as a success story.

Shortly after that I hired them to get rid of the termites that had eaten parts of the house I live in. now 36 or so months down the track, there's not a termite anywhere near the house.

It's well worth the grand or so per year for regular maintenance, monitoring and baiting (if there's ever a recurrence). Far better and cheaper than having to remedy termite damage.