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Over here I can't get my hands on christmas lights with replaceable bulbs (or diodes).
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Dec 15, 2021 05:22
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https://www.acehardware.com/departments/home-and-decor/holiday/christmas-lights/9046565 These are good. The c9 shape is the same as the old imcandescents. The blue is an unnatural color but it's only noticeable if you look right at it, not like those weird infra-purple ones.
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Dec 15, 2021 05:26
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Dejan Bimble posted:Is there a "good" brand of LED xmas lights, meaning something more like incandescents, not blinding blue-white stuff? https://youtu.be/cQgcTkXacAc
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Dec 15, 2021 10:21
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cruft posted:I just got a reply from my morning email to the HVAC guy asking if he's heard back from the Electrician subcontractor. I didn't fully appreciate that buying a house means volunteering to be a project manager, even if you're paying someone else to be the project manager :/ I'm still just trying to find people to even sign on to the latest project here. I maybe have a carpenter, still need a roofer. They're all fully booked, lucky if they answer the phone, none have showed up. If I manage to get one to look, I'm certain they'll ghost. "Yes we have work above and below yours, so need you on a tight time table, also need really good attention to detail, oh and it's a tiny roof, just on a small addition." Maybe I can offer sexual favors?
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Dec 15, 2021 14:30
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I had pretty much that same experience when we bought earlier this year. We were gonna just do a mini split installation and some insulation blown into exterior walls and attic, then we learned that we had knob & tube in the walls after the insulation work was scheduled, so I had to reschedule that. Halfway through I was like "drat I didn't wanna be a project manager but here I am. And I've just given up on my roof flashing job for the year. I had one guy come out and look and said it would barely be a half day job and then never found a crew that would do it. I figure my best chance is to just wait until things calm down (which might be... years?)
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Dec 15, 2021 15:06
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Dejan Bimble posted:Is there a "good" brand of LED xmas lights, meaning something more like incandescents, not blinding blue-white stuff? Regardless of brand you just want to check the colour temperature, 5k is annoying blue, 3k is warm.
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Dec 15, 2021 15:33
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cruft posted:I just got a reply from my morning email to the HVAC guy asking if he's heard back from the Electrician subcontractor. Ugh. After wrangling to get a plumber to install a pump and sink in the basement, I decided that I was more on board with DIY than project management. My minisplit was only for the garage, but the Mr Cool set worked pretty well, we'll see how it lasts.
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Dec 15, 2021 16:10
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Glad I'm not the only one who went there. The ones he mentions near the end are Tru Tone and they look awesome, but holy gently caress they are expensive.
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Dec 15, 2021 16:22
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Alarbus posted:Ugh. After wrangling to get a plumber to install a pump and sink in the basement, I decided that I was more on board with DIY than project management. I enjoy maintenance as a hobby/DIY, but I'm pretty maxed as is, and even if I had all summer I'm not sure an epdm roof is something I could execute properly. They don't sell it at the hardware store, I'm guessing it's a more advanced job
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Dec 15, 2021 18:46
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I do not care for cleaning up fallen branches from these trees
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Dec 15, 2021 21:11
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 Ever seen an electrical box mount, to allow it to be away from a stud? I hadn't until I replaced the doorbell tonight! I took the low voltage wires out of the box, because I read that was required by NEC, and I believe Motronic when he said you just do what NEC says even if you don't understand why.
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Dec 19, 2021 04:59
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Yeah used all the time to run other low voltage things like Ethernet. https://www.menards.com/main/electr...44451151067.htm
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Dec 19, 2021 14:20
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cruft posted:I took the low voltage wires out of the box, because I read that was required by NEC, and I believe Motronic when he said you just do what NEC says even if you don't understand why. So if you want to know why in this case it's largely that low volt isn't treated the same was as line voltage. Nobody "respects" it all that much, and obviously it's all too small to be running line voltage. The devices its connected to can't handle line voltage/amperage and probably aren't fused. If it's in the same box or conduit it can become energized by line voltage by someone's mistake, or, more terrifyingly by any number of interesting ways that make two wires touch. Anything from mechanical damage, age/insulation coming off to rodent damage. It's in the book because it's happened and somebody died because of it. falz posted:Yeah used all the time to run other low voltage things like Ethernet. That is a low volt ring. What cruft has is an actual proper box that can be used for line voltage.
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Dec 19, 2021 15:14
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Motronic posted:If it's in the same box or conduit it can become energized by line voltage by someone's mistake, or, more terrifyingly by any number of interesting ways that make two wires touch. Anything from mechanical damage, age/insulation coming off to rodent damage. Ah, that makes complete sense, i wouldn't want a 2.4kW doorbell. I'm glad I took the time to do it right, instead of kludge it, which was my initial urge.
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Dec 19, 2021 15:36
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cruft posted:Ah, that makes complete sense, i wouldn't want a 2.4kW doorbell. I'm glad I took the time to do it right, instead of kludge it, which was my initial urge. Maybe you wouldn’t.  Basically the amplifier scene from Back to The Future, but every time Amazon makes a delivery.
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Dec 19, 2021 15:52
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MrYenko posted:Maybe you wouldn’t. 
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Dec 19, 2021 16:03
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Motronic posted:That is a low volt ring. What cruft has is an actual proper box that can be used for line voltage. Oh I thought you wanted low voltage box. You just want an Old Work box. https://www.menards.com/main/electr...44444967457.htm
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Dec 19, 2021 16:07
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falz posted:Oh I thought you wanted low voltage box. I think we missed each other. I though you were commenting on the type of box he has in the wall. ("Ever seen an electrical box mount, to allow it to be away from a stud? I hadn't until I replaced the doorbell tonight!). What appears to be there is a fan/brace box. It's certainly creative, and may even have been/still is to code.
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Dec 19, 2021 16:16
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I bought a new fridge recently. Naturally, when that happened, the old fridge that came with the house (a garbo tier top-freezer kitchenaid) became my glorious garage fridge. I have noticed, however, that the freezer doesn’t really stay frozen since we have done that. I was puzzled by this for a while but now have a half baked theory that I’d like holes to be poked in. I live in a cold (winter) climate so my garage isn’t very warm. Uninsulated but a big slab mediates heat reasonably well. A fridge like that only has one compressor, yeah? Is it perhaps the case that with just the one compressor and ambient temps hanging out in the 30s-40s in the garage that the fridge can’t keep the freezer frozen without also freezing the fridge, and it prioritizes fridge temp control? And therefore keeps fridge temp in the high 30s but as a result doesn’t cool the freezer enough to keep it properly low?
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Dec 22, 2021 04:03
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Would this be the place to ask about window treatment purchasing? We just bought our first home and want to update the window treatments. For the most part we want roller shades because we'd prefer not to have curtains and the windows are too shallow to mount cellular blinds without letting a lot of light through the sides. So essentially I think we're looking for: *Motorized blackout roller shades *Non motorized room darkening roller shades *Room darkening panel track blinds for a west-facing sliding glass door (want to block the sun in the summer since we don't have air conditioning) Is there a general good recommendation for the above? A certain brand or store? Normally I'd start with the Wirecutter but I've been trusting their recommendations less and less, and their top pick Select Blinds, gets a lot of negative comments around the internet. I've been pouring over the internet for days and I don't feel like I have a good handle on where to go.
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Dec 22, 2021 06:27
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Steve French posted:I bought a new fridge recently. Naturally, when that happened, the old fridge that came with the house (a garbo tier top-freezer kitchenaid) became my glorious garage fridge. I’m guessing you may be overthinking this. Fridges, like AC units, have minimum operating temps where the compressor/refrigerant will function properly. You could google the model number and see if you can find a manual with the temp listed. Refrigerant just won’t boil and do its thing correctly at a certain point IIRC.
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Dec 22, 2021 07:43
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Seems to me, the old freezer boxes from the 70s and 80s earlier, had zero problems sitting in unheated rooms or barns in the winter. This is a very common setup where I live and people look for the old freezer boxes for said reason, you need a lot of space to freeze all the berries and stuff you harvested during summer. Anyway more modern ones could not deal with those kind of temps. It's not until recently I've started seeing freezers that again say they work below freezing temps. Our current freezer box was bought in 2019 and works down to -15C. Though we keep it indoors. I assume it's the refridgerant which determines this. Old freon freezers I guess work over a bigger range and the replacements could not handle the lower temps as well and I guess it took a while to develop alternatives with similar working temperature ranges. His Divine Shadow fucked around with this message at 08:29 on Dec 22, 2021 |
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Dec 22, 2021 08:26
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Inner Light posted:I’m guessing you may be overthinking this. Fridges, like AC units, have minimum operating temps where the compressor/refrigerant will function properly. You could google the model number and see if you can find a manual with the temp listed. Refrigerant just won’t boil and do its thing correctly at a certain point IIRC. Edit, I was bored so I googled it quote:most refrigerators have one thermostat, in the fridge part. When the temperature there gets too high, air is sucked out of the freezer section bring it down. Then, the compressor (the noisy motor in the fridge) turns on to keep the freezer frozen. Slugworth fucked around with this message at 12:54 on Dec 22, 2021 |
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Dec 22, 2021 12:49
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Steve French posted:I bought a new fridge recently. Naturally, when that happened, the old fridge that came with the house (a garbo tier top-freezer kitchenaid) became my glorious garage fridge. So like above, the thermostat in the fridge is sensing that it’s cold enough so the compressor isn’t running. The fridge and freezer do not have separate thermostats or compressors. One solution is to warm up the inside of the fridge compartment enough that you raise it above the ambient temperature. Having the lightbulb on full time inside the fridge might be enough. Try disabling the door switch so the light stays on.
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Dec 22, 2021 13:05
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Motronic posted:So if you want to know why in this case it's largely that low volt isn't treated the same was as line voltage. Nobody "respects" it all that much, and obviously it's all too small to be running line voltage. The devices its connected to can't handle line voltage/amperage and probably aren't fused. If it's in the same box or conduit it can become energized by line voltage by someone's mistake, or, more terrifyingly by any number of interesting ways that make two wires touch. Anything from mechanical damage, age/insulation coming off to rodent damage. Ah the ol spicy doorbell. You rat!
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Dec 22, 2021 13:19
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IOwnCalculus posted:Glad I'm not the only one who went there. I bought tru-tones and they are everything I hoped they would be.
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Dec 22, 2021 16:09
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Thanks folks; that's all helpful. I'm actually not particularly looking to fix it; I already have a chest freezer in the garage so between that and my new larger fridge in the kitchen I don't really need more freezer space; more interested in the extra fridge space, so I care more about the fridge staying at the right temp. I was more curious and wanting to make sure it didn't indicate the thing being about to poo poo itself (seems fine) In fact, if there were a way to just keep both compartments at fridge temperatures that'd be preferred above all else.
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Dec 22, 2021 17:24
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Involuntary Sparkle posted:Would this be the place to ask about window treatment purchasing? If you can trust yourself to do accurate measurements, go with Blindster.com. They are a pain in the rear end to install, there will be much cursing as you stand on a ladder and try to get things level, but they work.
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Dec 22, 2021 17:32
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Steve French posted:I bought a new fridge recently. Naturally, when that happened, the old fridge that came with the house (a garbo tier top-freezer kitchenaid) became my glorious garage fridge. Treat yourself and get a garage heater if you live in a cold as gently caress area. I did last winter and it certainly is a lifestyle improvement to not have a freezing rear end car whenever you leave your house. (warning requires power outlet, gas run, vent to outside as well as insulated garage sides and ceiling, so a lot more cost than the $500ish you see them for on Amazon)
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Dec 22, 2021 17:47
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Qwijib0 posted:I bought tru-tones and they are everything I hoped they would be. Yo can you share a pic or two here please? They have too many options so I’m not sure what to get
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Dec 22, 2021 17:52
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Inner Light posted:Yo can you share a pic or two here please? They have too many options so I’m not sure what to get not the best exposure, it's hard to capture what it looks like to my eye but here's the c9 tru-tones outside  and my string of vintage GEs inside  The red, yellow, and green are spot on to my eye. The blue is definitely warm and worlds better than ones lit with a blue LED. Its color is more like modern ceramic blues though, rather than the more lavender blue from the 40s. edit: found this image again, a better look 
Qwijib0 fucked around with this message at 20:50 on Dec 22, 2021 |
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Dec 22, 2021 20:44
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Inner Light posted:Yo can you share a pic or two here please? They have too many options so I’m not sure what to get Looks like everything is sold out anyway!
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Dec 22, 2021 20:50
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falz posted:Treat yourself and get a garage heater if you live in a cold as gently caress area. I did last winter and it certainly is a lifestyle improvement to not have a freezing rear end car whenever you leave your house. Not a cold as gently caress area; just a normal wintery place (though we get a fuckload of snow); daily highs rarely go below mid-20F and overnight lows rarely below 0F. It's also a rather large detached garage, ~1000 square feet with high vaulted ceilings (high enough for a four post lift in there). It's got baseboard heat that I've never used and probably never will. And we don't have to commute anywhere so usually if we're driving in the winter it's to go do something outside anyway. Very much on the nice to have list! Just a low priority.
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Dec 22, 2021 20:53
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Steve French posted:Not a cold as gently caress area; just a normal wintery place (though we get a fuckload of snow); daily highs rarely go below mid-20F and overnight lows rarely below 0F. It's also a rather large detached garage, ~1000 square feet with high vaulted ceilings (high enough for a four post lift in there). It's got baseboard heat that I've never used and probably never will. And we don't have to commute anywhere so usually if we're driving in the winter it's to go do something outside anyway. Very much on the nice to have list! Just a low priority. Keep in mind that there's still chance anything in the fridge compartment could freeze. The fridge is insulted, so if it was at, say, 35-40 and it's colder than that outside, it can keep it above freezing for a time, but too long below 32 F and eventually the inside temp of the fridge will match the outside and you might have beers or sodas frozen solid. BigFactory has a good idea about the lightbulb getting rigged to stay on (just don't put anything that's temp sensitive DIRECTLY under the lightbulb) but wouldn't hurt to put a small wireless thermometer in there and just monitor the temps to be sure the lightbulb isn't heating it too much or too little.
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Dec 22, 2021 21:00
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Is there an HVAC thread, or can I get general advice in here on improving airflow? My 1991, central Texas house has just garbage airflow to the far end of the house where the master bedroom is and one of the guest bedrooms/offices. The plenum out of the furnace/airhandler/whatever you call it has two ducts that come out feeding two halves of the house, with the master bedroom duct coming from two distribution boxes in the attic and I think at least two steps down in duct size. In addition, the main duct feeding the far end of the house has a sharp right angle turn in it that i imagine really restricts airflow. I have had two ideas about improving this: First I think the previous owners of the house may have smoked, or just didn't care of it, so from a cleanliness perspective I want to just replace the ducting and in doing so I'm sure whoever installs it could do a better job about not kinking it. Second, I was thinking that possibly adding a return duct to the master bedroom might reduce the load on the system and improve airflow a little more. I think that will be a little awkward since my return for the system is in a little crawl space in the living room, and to add that return will require running a duct from the back of the house, through the ceiling, the HVAC/hot water heater closet, and into the crawl space. I'm sure it's possible but I don't know how beneficial that will be. I had an HVAC guy come to the house to see if he could provide any suggestions and quote me for some improvement. I explained that when I bought the house I replaced the 25 year old HVAC system, but at the time couldn't afford the models with variable speed compressors or blowers. He s aid that there was a range of improvements he could do, but they would be expensive, and not necessarily ideal without being able to have a variable speed system. His proposal, that he said he didn't really like, as a stop gap was to redo the plenum and convert it to a zoned system with a second thermostat in the bedroom. This was going to run me about $6,000, but the guy hasn't sent me a quote/proposal yet. After talking to an acquaintance that also does HVAC installations, he said that zoning was a bad idea unless the system was upgraded to a variable speed model, and that the best solution would probably be to replace the ducts and add adjustable dampers to the distribution boxes to try and tune the airflow for the rooms we spend more time in. This seems like a reasonable suggestion, but I'm not sure how much that will cost or improve it. I'm not sure where to go from there, but it seems like zoned systems are finicky and bad.
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Dec 22, 2021 21:33
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Qwijib0 posted:not the best exposure, it's hard to capture what it looks like to my eye but here's the c9 tru-tones outside I cannot thank you enough for this. Who knows how much time & treasure this saved me from buying LED strings & being disappointed. I have a Douglas fir at the left front corner of my yard that finally took off after five years of being a runt (think the taproot finally hit the water table); for the past 8-years or so I've been using these older incandescent pearlescent lights on it, that I first got at Frank's in the last century (I've been using the same small bulb sets on my indoor tree since probably 1996).  Well, Frank's is long gone, as are these pearlescent incandescents; they cannot be found anywhere online any more. I picked up six sets on Amazon in 2019. The outside tree, at about 12', is just about too big for them, but too small for c9s; so c7.5s appear to be the best fit for the next several years. I have a ton of c7.5 strings but not that many bulbs, and wanted to go LED. Your post has just persuaded me to pick up these strings & bulbs whenever they are available (summer is a good slack time). PainterofCrap fucked around with this message at 02:10 on Dec 23, 2021 |
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Dec 23, 2021 02:08
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There's some on ebay, I make no warranty about the seller: https://www.ebay.com/itm/224706593959?hash=item34518e84a7:g:tfIAAOSwaXlhnDuu
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Dec 23, 2021 04:36
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They do look nice. Seems like LEDs have a really difficult time reproducing amber, but these are pretty good. I'm of course saying this based on a photo taken with an RGB CMOS, and displayed on an RGB LED display.
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Dec 23, 2021 04:58
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MetaJew posted:Is there an HVAC thread, or can I get general advice in here on improving airflow? Yes, yes there is: HVAC: No returns, supplies are limited
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Dec 23, 2021 20:24
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FISHMANPET posted:In the vein of the thread title, I had my attic insulated yesterday, but before that, I had to get all the old nasty (chewed up and peed on by squirrels) batt insulation. I literally couldn't pay the insulation company to do it (at least not in any reasonable time frame) so I spent the weekend bagging and hauling insulation out of the attic. Quick follow-up question on this - were the measurements for the bottom "Lower Leg Doubler Approx. 8.5" Long" actually 8.5" long? I cut all those pieces at ~10" just in case I needed a moderate amount of extra length there, but am just wondering. Happy holidays home zone thread, I hope everyone gets the power tool that they want and that next home project is completed in half the time!  Edited cause I forgot what topic I was in! Johnny Truant fucked around with this message at 17:19 on Dec 25, 2021 |
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Dec 25, 2021 17:11
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