Hey everyone. First post 
I've read the rules and I don't think I'm violating any here but I apologize if I'm wording my questions in a way that goes against them. Just wanted to share my experience procuring gas and ask a few questions about equipment. Nothing at the extreme end of the spectrum happened but I just wanted to document it step by step for others who share similar fears of the unknown. If you want to skip to my hardware questions I'll split the post up.
I couldn't find much information about how the interaction would go online (as I hadn't found this forum yet) so I wanted to share what happened when I went in hopes it might help someone else. I have extreme anxiety issues and, it was mortifying to me thinking about trying to go walk into intimidating places in the industrial park and get parts when I have no experience with hardware components or stores like these. It's quite stressful for me just to run out to get routine things from the grocery store. I'm sure there are others here living in the shadow of GAD like me so I hope this finds someone and can be of some use to someone someday.
I did a few hours of research trying to come up with a story that sounded plausible. I was initially going to try to get pure helium as it seemed like it was still available at places and I planned to go in saying it was for a small welding project. You save 50-100 USD on the regulator so I figured I'd start there. Online I read that people have used He for seam welding so if the clerk wanted to know more, I was going to say I was helping my father (may his soul rest in peace) with a couple of smaller projects. If they wanted more granular detail, I was to say we were doing some bodywork around seams on an older car and that I wasn't that knowledgable but more of an assistant to him. I'm a very honest person so I was also very anxious about being forced to lie.
I'm sure people who are knowledgable about this subject are cringing right now but as someone who has never touched any of this, it was the best I could come up with. I wasn't sure what sizes they would have, if I could just bring something up to the counter to pay at a store like this, if I would be able to just carry it out to my car myself, etc. It's probably best if I keep the businesses unnamed but they were two of the largest national brands so you've probably come across the names if you're looking into it.
The first place I went to was a very small building that didn't appear to have any identifiable storefront but the pictures on google showed there was a showroom. There was only parking in the rear so I walked upfront, and there was a sign that said to go in through the back. There was just an open garage door along with another small door leading into the same garage and there was a guy unloading stuff from his car so I asked if that was where I went in. I was feeling quite uncomfortable about just waltzing in because it didn't look like a place I was supposed to be in and, in my head, they're gonna yell "what are you doing back here?!" The guy said I could and told me to walk through the hallway. There was a sales agent waiting at the counter who I told I said I was looking for pure helium. He seemed to give me a strange look and said they only had "balloon helium" and that it was "dirty." Not being familiar around the terms, i didn't know precisely what that means (is "dirty" .1% other gas? 10%? 50?) He brought me over to some cylinders along the garage wall and let me look at them but told me it wouldn't say the mixture on the tank. I'm not gambling with this obviously so I said I was only looking for a pure concentration and I think he was getting suspicious. He said you can only get 99.99% concentrations from labs now and that it's really hard to acquire (I wish I found someone saying this online beforehand), then asked again what I was using for. I told him the story I prepared and that I was just helping out my father which he seemed to accept. I thanked him and went back to my car. I started freaking out quite a bit because I immediately saw visions of me not being able to pull this off, having wasted all my money thus far, making a fool out of myself, being doomed to another half-century of great suffering and self-loathing; all that. I didn't think I could try again right away so I went home to decompress and figure out where I was going to go the next day.
I decided not to keep trying for helium, and reread the Final Exit book I purchased where it said nitrogen was also an alternative. I repeated the steps of researching online to come up with something in the ballpark of credible but I was struggling to find any application a random citizen might have other than welding. It seemed like most uses are industrial food processing. I found a few sites that generally said "nitrogen can be used itself for niche welding applications" but I was having trouble finding much information deeper than that other than information on mixtures of it. I figured I would just go with the above story: "I'm assisting and picking up so my dad could keep working on projects" and he gave me money to get it for him.
The next place was much more consumer-friendly with a big display area like a normal store right upfront. I went early so I had to wait for someone to poke their head out of the back. I wasn't really performing as well as the other place because of how nervous I was after having no luck and being more desperate so I was stammering and tripping over myself a bit (having my mask make my face overheat and sweat did not help to soothe my anxiety). I told this sales agent I was looking for pure nitrogen and wanting to buy a tank, again for welding, and he asked if I knew what size I wanted. He said he could show me if I didn't know so he took me under some yellow tape around to the side of the building where there was a corral with some cylinders. I went with the 20cf one and he said he'd have to go price check it. He grabbed it and walked me back, confirmed to me that I would be the owner of it, not renting it, all responsibility would lie with me, and so on. He just left the tank by the door outside and I hesitated a bit in confusion at which point he said to just leave it (f me, I hate being awkward so much). He went to the computer and started asking me about my story again, at which point I told him I wasn't really very knowledgeable and I was just asked to pick it up. He stared at me for a few seconds and said "this is the first time I've ever heard of anyone using nitrogen for welding..." so I just kind of shot him a "don't shoot the messenger" look and shrugged (as my internal panic meter was going mental). He said it'd be about $100 for the steel and $20 for the gas. He had me sign an invoice receipt and told me to just grab the tank outside so I thanked him and went back home more relieved than I can possibly convey here.
It was a bit more stressful and anxiety-inducing than I was hoping (I didn't even mention how physically ill it was making me feel) but in the end, I managed to secure a tank without anything traumatic happening like, I don't know, having the cops called on me? As I said, I just hope my account is able to assuage someone else's fears so they have an idea of what they might be able to expect.
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As for the questions I want some help with, I've skimmed through every page of this thread a few times but I still just wanted to get a little more clarification. I got myself turkey bags, some vinyl tubing (10', inner diameter of 3/8" and outer diameter of 1/2" like the other book I purchased suggested), and a 20cf tank of nitrogen with a CGA580 inlet. I just need a regulator/flowmeter and I'm good to go. I was looking at the Max Dog kit but that takes six weeks to ship which I do not have. I have maybe a two-to-three-week window at best before I'll be found. I'm planning to get something with fast shipping off amazon and do it as close to the deadline as I can so that the decay will be minimally disturbing for those two people to find (also, I'm unsure if I need to put any protective material or towels under/behind me for the post-mortem decay and the muscles down there loosening). I saw the harbor freight CO2/Argon flow gauge regulator earlier in the thread which doesn't have a hose barb fitting. I do not see any relevant size or fitting listings in the specs on their website, so I'm not sure how to go about getting a hose barb and what type for the size of tubing I already got according to my book.
My other question is that the aforementioned book says to tuck the turkey bag around a headband for the neck, but I saw that someone said not to do that in this thread. I don't know how to sew or do a hem or anything like that so I would like some more input on how that is supposed to be done.
To all the people on the board working to help those like me who are really struggling and having a hard time finding the right information on their own, thank you so much. It's a better thing you're all doing than you probably know. It's hard to imagine living as a person who needs to exit before these books were written and there were online anonymous boards. It seems like all other methods would be unimaginably painful or just slightly less horrific than living out the rest of a miserable life. Real-life can be far worse than any horror movie so to anyone helping alleviate suffering of that magnitude in the world, you're a saint. Also, love all of you strangers out there who are struggling and feeling alone too. Hang in there.
I've read the rules and I don't think I'm violating any here but I apologize if I'm wording my questions in a way that goes against them. Just wanted to share my experience procuring gas and ask a few questions about equipment. Nothing at the extreme end of the spectrum happened but I just wanted to document it step by step for others who share similar fears of the unknown. If you want to skip to my hardware questions I'll split the post up.I couldn't find much information about how the interaction would go online (as I hadn't found this forum yet) so I wanted to share what happened when I went in hopes it might help someone else. I have extreme anxiety issues and, it was mortifying to me thinking about trying to go walk into intimidating places in the industrial park and get parts when I have no experience with hardware components or stores like these. It's quite stressful for me just to run out to get routine things from the grocery store. I'm sure there are others here living in the shadow of GAD like me so I hope this finds someone and can be of some use to someone someday.
I did a few hours of research trying to come up with a story that sounded plausible. I was initially going to try to get pure helium as it seemed like it was still available at places and I planned to go in saying it was for a small welding project. You save 50-100 USD on the regulator so I figured I'd start there. Online I read that people have used He for seam welding so if the clerk wanted to know more, I was going to say I was helping my father (may his soul rest in peace) with a couple of smaller projects. If they wanted more granular detail, I was to say we were doing some bodywork around seams on an older car and that I wasn't that knowledgable but more of an assistant to him. I'm a very honest person so I was also very anxious about being forced to lie.
I'm sure people who are knowledgable about this subject are cringing right now but as someone who has never touched any of this, it was the best I could come up with. I wasn't sure what sizes they would have, if I could just bring something up to the counter to pay at a store like this, if I would be able to just carry it out to my car myself, etc. It's probably best if I keep the businesses unnamed but they were two of the largest national brands so you've probably come across the names if you're looking into it.
The first place I went to was a very small building that didn't appear to have any identifiable storefront but the pictures on google showed there was a showroom. There was only parking in the rear so I walked upfront, and there was a sign that said to go in through the back. There was just an open garage door along with another small door leading into the same garage and there was a guy unloading stuff from his car so I asked if that was where I went in. I was feeling quite uncomfortable about just waltzing in because it didn't look like a place I was supposed to be in and, in my head, they're gonna yell "what are you doing back here?!" The guy said I could and told me to walk through the hallway. There was a sales agent waiting at the counter who I told I said I was looking for pure helium. He seemed to give me a strange look and said they only had "balloon helium" and that it was "dirty." Not being familiar around the terms, i didn't know precisely what that means (is "dirty" .1% other gas? 10%? 50?) He brought me over to some cylinders along the garage wall and let me look at them but told me it wouldn't say the mixture on the tank. I'm not gambling with this obviously so I said I was only looking for a pure concentration and I think he was getting suspicious. He said you can only get 99.99% concentrations from labs now and that it's really hard to acquire (I wish I found someone saying this online beforehand), then asked again what I was using for. I told him the story I prepared and that I was just helping out my father which he seemed to accept. I thanked him and went back to my car. I started freaking out quite a bit because I immediately saw visions of me not being able to pull this off, having wasted all my money thus far, making a fool out of myself, being doomed to another half-century of great suffering and self-loathing; all that. I didn't think I could try again right away so I went home to decompress and figure out where I was going to go the next day.
I decided not to keep trying for helium, and reread the Final Exit book I purchased where it said nitrogen was also an alternative. I repeated the steps of researching online to come up with something in the ballpark of credible but I was struggling to find any application a random citizen might have other than welding. It seemed like most uses are industrial food processing. I found a few sites that generally said "nitrogen can be used itself for niche welding applications" but I was having trouble finding much information deeper than that other than information on mixtures of it. I figured I would just go with the above story: "I'm assisting and picking up so my dad could keep working on projects" and he gave me money to get it for him.
The next place was much more consumer-friendly with a big display area like a normal store right upfront. I went early so I had to wait for someone to poke their head out of the back. I wasn't really performing as well as the other place because of how nervous I was after having no luck and being more desperate so I was stammering and tripping over myself a bit (having my mask make my face overheat and sweat did not help to soothe my anxiety). I told this sales agent I was looking for pure nitrogen and wanting to buy a tank, again for welding, and he asked if I knew what size I wanted. He said he could show me if I didn't know so he took me under some yellow tape around to the side of the building where there was a corral with some cylinders. I went with the 20cf one and he said he'd have to go price check it. He grabbed it and walked me back, confirmed to me that I would be the owner of it, not renting it, all responsibility would lie with me, and so on. He just left the tank by the door outside and I hesitated a bit in confusion at which point he said to just leave it (f me, I hate being awkward so much). He went to the computer and started asking me about my story again, at which point I told him I wasn't really very knowledgeable and I was just asked to pick it up. He stared at me for a few seconds and said "this is the first time I've ever heard of anyone using nitrogen for welding..." so I just kind of shot him a "don't shoot the messenger" look and shrugged (as my internal panic meter was going mental). He said it'd be about $100 for the steel and $20 for the gas. He had me sign an invoice receipt and told me to just grab the tank outside so I thanked him and went back home more relieved than I can possibly convey here.
It was a bit more stressful and anxiety-inducing than I was hoping (I didn't even mention how physically ill it was making me feel) but in the end, I managed to secure a tank without anything traumatic happening like, I don't know, having the cops called on me? As I said, I just hope my account is able to assuage someone else's fears so they have an idea of what they might be able to expect.
----------------
As for the questions I want some help with, I've skimmed through every page of this thread a few times but I still just wanted to get a little more clarification. I got myself turkey bags, some vinyl tubing (10', inner diameter of 3/8" and outer diameter of 1/2" like the other book I purchased suggested), and a 20cf tank of nitrogen with a CGA580 inlet. I just need a regulator/flowmeter and I'm good to go. I was looking at the Max Dog kit but that takes six weeks to ship which I do not have. I have maybe a two-to-three-week window at best before I'll be found. I'm planning to get something with fast shipping off amazon and do it as close to the deadline as I can so that the decay will be minimally disturbing for those two people to find (also, I'm unsure if I need to put any protective material or towels under/behind me for the post-mortem decay and the muscles down there loosening). I saw the harbor freight CO2/Argon flow gauge regulator earlier in the thread which doesn't have a hose barb fitting. I do not see any relevant size or fitting listings in the specs on their website, so I'm not sure how to go about getting a hose barb and what type for the size of tubing I already got according to my book.
My other question is that the aforementioned book says to tuck the turkey bag around a headband for the neck, but I saw that someone said not to do that in this thread. I don't know how to sew or do a hem or anything like that so I would like some more input on how that is supposed to be done.
To all the people on the board working to help those like me who are really struggling and having a hard time finding the right information on their own, thank you so much. It's a better thing you're all doing than you probably know. It's hard to imagine living as a person who needs to exit before these books were written and there were online anonymous boards. It seems like all other methods would be unimaginably painful or just slightly less horrific than living out the rest of a miserable life. Real-life can be far worse than any horror movie so to anyone helping alleviate suffering of that magnitude in the world, you're a saint. Also, love all of you strangers out there who are struggling and feeling alone too. Hang in there.
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