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Yeah I figured that's what I'll need, just worried about someone walking into it. Guess I can't plan for every idiot customer though
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Oct 1, 2022 15:39
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Opopanax posted:Need some build advice. Long story short I have a door and a door frame that I need to be free standing, but will still be used by people so I need it to be sturdy without having too many tripping hazards. You appear to be asking about a stage set. There are several methods for this, all depend on whether you need it mobile or not, what has to be around the door and what direction the door is facing. Unless you can mount it to the stage or support it from above it requires substantial support on either side of it. Especially if it's intended to be operable. E: Opopanax posted:Yeah I figured that's what I'll need, just worried about someone walking into it. Guess I can't plan for every idiot customer though Customer??!?!!? Yeah, don't do this. If you need someone else to tell you not to do this call your insurance company and tell them about your plan.
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Oct 1, 2022 15:49
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We run an escape room and it's for a pop up location, I'm just going to rig up curtains for "walls" but wanted to have a real door to pop open when they solve it. I'm going to double check the layout when I'm in there though, now that I'm thinking about it I may be able to shift things over a bit and mount it to a wall instead
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Oct 1, 2022 15:59
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Opopanax posted:Yeah I figured that's what I'll need, just worried about someone walking into it. Guess I can't plan for every idiot customer though Ahh be careful with this, doors/thresholds/entryways for public spaces are well-defined and regulated so any incidents associated with them can be a "big deal". Or at least that's how it was explained to me. In other words, any changes or anything 'different' without an engineer and/or architect involved, code inspection performed, etc to cover your rear end is a lot of legal risk. Maybe that wouldnt apply to a "theatre/roleplay" type situation since its not really a door but i dunno .. lets say people are hyped up from the escape room and bump into it or slam it hard and it falls over & paralyzes someone and thats all she wrote  ... I'm usually a "bolt it up and let it ride" type of guy but i think you should keep brainstorming in this case
BIG-DICK-BUTT-FUCK fucked around with this message at 19:57 on Oct 1, 2022 |
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Oct 1, 2022 19:54
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Is there a good way to get the smell out of a house that was previously inhabited by a smoker? My parents are interested in buying a place, and its one downside is that the previous owner clearly smoked a lot. The place has new carpet and fresh paint, but it still reeks bad enough to have made my wife nauseous after being in there for 15 minutes. Not exactly the kind of place where we’d be able to visit my folks for long.
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Oct 1, 2022 19:58
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Zugzwang posted:Is there a good way to get the smell out of a house that was previously inhabited by a smoker? Good way or a cheap way? Literally every wall and subfloor needs to be coated with a stain and odor blocking primer (like Kilz). It has to be treated like a fire reno job. And like a fire reno job if you skip anywhere you're gonna get whiffs of it from time to time. Yeah, I'm talking about things like the attic, bottom of the first floor if there's a basement, etc. These things will start stinkining under different and various circumstances, like the first time the heat turns on (oh yeah, you probably need to tear out all the ducts since you'll never get the sticky niccotine tar out of them), when it's too humid in the house, when it gets too dry in the house, when the sun shines the right way to heat up the attic more than the rest of the house, etc, etc. That's a material defect and I wouldn't even consider buying a place like that. Just like I wouldn't buy a cat/dog piss house. At some point someone in this process, likely a real estate agent on either side of the transaction, is going to suggest that professional level ozone generation will fix this. And it will. For about a month or two, which is plenty long enough for them to have cashed their commission checks. Motronic fucked around with this message at 20:11 on Oct 1, 2022 |
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Oct 1, 2022 20:08
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Motronic posted:Good way or a cheap way? It is quite small, like 1000 sq ft and 1 floor, and with no attic or basement, so there aren’t a *ton* of rooms that would need to be treated. Though I understand that thoroughness would be of the essence.
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Oct 1, 2022 20:22
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Motronic posted:Good way or a cheap way? Dog and cat piss sucks. We moved into a rental where the landlord admitted his dog had some accidents in the walk-in closet, but don’t worry because he had a maid service clean the carpet. It lasted until a day after we moved in and the urine smell was noticeable. He hired. A steam cleaner, etc…three times. Finally he gave up and had the carpet replaced and the guys sprayed the subfloor with a bleach/water solution. That ended up working for us and we didn’t have an issue for the next two years. Smoking though? gently caress that. At least pets can piss in a certain, traceable area. Smoke just goes anywhere and everywhere.
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Oct 1, 2022 20:25
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Zugzwang posted:Sounds like a lot! Would probably explain why the place has sat on the market awhile, and why the company selling it (one of those commercial house-flippers) is probably willing to sell it at a loss. If it's still on the market that means they aren't offering a sufficient "discount" to cover the costs of remediation. It very well may be cheaper to tear it down than to remediate it, especially if it's that small. nwin posted:Dog and cat piss sucks. We moved into a rental where the landlord admitted his dog had some accidents in the walk-in closet, but don’t worry because he had a maid service clean the carpet. It lasted until a day after we moved in and the urine smell was noticeable. He hired. A steam cleaner, etc…three times. Finally he gave up and had the carpet replaced and the guys sprayed the subfloor with a bleach/water solution. That ended up working for us and we didn’t have an issue for the next two years. That's not a dog/cat piss house. That's a house where somebody's dog had a few accidents. What I'm talking about are the nightmare scenario houses like the one some goon bought that had multiple cats pissing and making GBS threads everywhere for years owned by an end stage alcoholic hoarder.
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Oct 1, 2022 20:37
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Zugzwang posted:Is there a good way to get the smell out of a house that was previously inhabited by a smoker? Call serv-pro and ask for a bid. My parents bought a 2-pack-a-day-since-i-got-back-from-the-war house and paid serv-pro like $10k or $15k in like year 2000 dollars (so just double it lol) to fix the problem. As Motronic suggested, you basically use a grease cutter on the walls to get the base layer of smoke oil off, then you seal everything, and you replace any fabrics. They shouldn't have wasted their money on carpet because it likely needs to go now but serv-pro can answer that question. You also run ozone generators that have ventilation warnings on the side for a week or two post everything. God help you if you bash up a wall though, and you need to be careful about it like lead. Your paint is laced with nicotine among other things.
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Oct 1, 2022 23:51
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Also replace all of the receptacles and switches. It lurks in the wall that way. If you want a hail mary, try having Servpro or Servicemaster estimate to run an ozone generator on each floor, with just enough fans to stir the air, for at east 2-3 days. It probably won't work - cigarette tar is molecularly heavy and is a bitch to remove even with TSP, and the odor will likely come back - but it's the cheapest thing that might, so might be worth the bet. My late mom's house has dog piss & crap issues. She lost her sense of smell, and had Lewy body dementia that took six years to take her & housekeeping went to hell as she "didn't want strangers cleaning my house" (typical dementia issue). There are areas where the hardwood floor is black. I told the relative that bought it out from the estate that those areas have to be cut out & replaced & the hardwood all sanded/refinished to get rid of it. She's electing to cover it with vinyl plank. 
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Oct 2, 2022 00:52
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PainterofCrap posted:Also replace all of the receptacles and switches. It lurks in the wall that way. I would not buy a house hoping this will work. The ozone will help get rid of the remaining nooks and crannies serv-pro missed but in a week or two your house will reek again. Now if I were selling a smoker house I would crank ozone machines right up until the open house and any time someone was going to come by to look at it.
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Oct 2, 2022 01:24
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Posting in hopes that someone knows a source for some fence brackets that I'm failing to find. I have a bunch of fences constructed by means of steel panels between cinderblock posts, using what I would normally call 'pool fencing' - except this seems to be a bit larger than what I've seen before. At least one fenceline has been getting sprayed by sprinklers on both sides for 20 years and, unsurprisingly, the fences and brackets are rusty as hell and starting to fail. Long term plan is to replace the fence panels entirely with something else, but short term I need a solution that doesn't cost nearly as much in either time or money, meaning I limp the current panels along. The brackets they attach to the post with look like these:  However, when I went to check these out in person, they are far too small for my fence panels. I suspect the fence system they're designed for uses 1" OD square tubing because these are nowhere near 1" across. My fencing uses horizontal rails that appear to be more like 1-3/8" OD, and possibly 1-1/8" ID? Things are rusty enough that if I take a panel down to measure for sure, there's a good chance it won't go back up unless I have replacement brackets ready.   So... where on earth can I find a bracket that looks like the one HD sells, but slightly bigger?
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Oct 2, 2022 05:00
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IOwnCalculus posted:
I'd start here: https://www.mcmaster.com/brackets/
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Oct 2, 2022 10:38
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I have some light switches that turn off and on before an audible click with some light pressure. Is this a safety concern at all?
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Oct 4, 2022 14:07
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Tonight on MacGyver   Wound up just shuffling everything over to the wall, added several pieces in between to give it all something to grab and then latched it to the pipes (which are both decorative with no water or anything in them, and also very firmly attached). It's not pretty but by God it's sturdy. Thanks for the advice Opopanax fucked around with this message at 19:54 on Oct 4, 2022 |
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Oct 4, 2022 15:00
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Bioshuffle posted:I have some light switches that turn off and on before an audible click with some light pressure. Is this a safety concern at all? I've seen that in dimmer switches where it has a mechanical seat (for lack of a better or correct term) and then the rest of the travel is smooth so as to provide dimming control. If you have a dimmer switch on a regular light fixture, I'd replace that switch simply so I didn't have to worry about any weirdness.
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Oct 4, 2022 15:19
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I managed to fix my sodastream! I first tried replacing the o rings I had the right sizes for but there was one I didn't have a match for, so it seemed like it was no good until I just tried putting a larger o ring in the hole where the canister screws into, figuring it was maybe leaking from the gap between the middle plate and the sides. This worked! The three different packages of gaskets and o rings comes out to probably 70$ so I didn't save a lot but still cheaper than a whole new sodastream 
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Oct 4, 2022 15:28
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Opopanax posted:Tonight on MacGyver Nice work!
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Oct 4, 2022 16:17
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I have a miss 80s Jenn Air cooktop. It got rewired a few years ago and works great but the downdraft section in the middle is missing some paint and has some rust. I am try to clean it up. How do I find paint that isn’t going to kill me.
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Oct 4, 2022 16:46
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Calidus posted:I have a miss 80s Jenn Air cooktop. It got rewired a few years ago and works great but the downdraft section in the middle is missing some paint and has some rust. I am try to clean it up. How do I find paint that isn’t going to kill me. Wire brush and this? https://www.homedepot.com/p/Rust-Oleum-Specialty-12-oz-High-Heat-Satin-Bar-B-Que-Black-Spray-Paint-7778830/202315061
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Oct 4, 2022 16:52
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BBQ paint makes sense thanks
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Oct 4, 2022 17:08
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I have two separate unrelated things I’d like to do in the house that I seek advice on. Project 1: I have a home wifi network with 3 APs covering the house, but there’s a kind of dead zone on the second floor that I’d like to install another AP in. Mesh networks are kind of not great so I want to do a wired backhaul, same as for all the other APs. To get a network cable to the closet in the basement, I would need to drop it down the inside of an exterior wall, and then once it gets to the basement pull it about 10 feet laterally. What should I be aware of before trying to do this? Do I need to worry about homewrap? Is there going to be some sort of discontinuity between the floors that will hinder the drop? Project 2: There are a lot of doors in this house that stick, like they’re hard to close during the summer or they get stuck on the floor or part of the door jamb. Some of the doors are new-ish doors that were installed during the renovation, and some of them are old doors that are probably original to the house. My general plan here is to identify the door surface(s) that are making contact and sticking, use a hand planer to take a couple mm off, sand, test to see if door still sticks, primer and repaint once all is well. Is this a reasonable plan or should I be doing something else?
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Oct 9, 2022 17:21
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Before you plane any poo poo make sure the jambs are square and the doors have an even reveal or else you doorways will look like something from alice in wonderland.
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Oct 9, 2022 17:34
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Mr Fish posted:Before you plane any poo poo make sure the jambs are square and the doors have an even reveal or else you doorways will look like something from alice in wonderland. Oh, on the old doors, they’re definitely not square and already do look like Alice in Wonderland doors. Eventually replacing them all and squaring the jambs is something I plan to get done, but for now I just want to fix the most egregious issues (e.g. the closet doors that don’t even close).
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Oct 9, 2022 21:18
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Old doors are rarely as square as new pre-hungs. As the owner of a 90-YO house: you have the right plan. Make sure the hinge plates are all securely fastened/tightened down. Plane until they don't stick in high humidity. They'll always be loose during the winter months. PainterofCrap fucked around with this message at 02:14 on Oct 10, 2022 |
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Oct 9, 2022 23:53
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Also before you cut wood, double check all the fasteners and frames for looseness. my basement door was constantly hitting the frame on closing but I noticed that the top hinge was able to move. turns out the whole frame had come loose from the studs and just throwing a couple screws above and below the hinge pulled the whole door square enough to close like new.
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Oct 10, 2022 01:47
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Hey guys my clothes dryer(It's a older Whirlpool, just pretty basic/cheap) is on the fritz. It doesn't start sometimes. once it does though, it keeps running fine. I'll just list out what's going on with it - firstly, I usually keep that breaker flipped off when I'm not using it out of paranoia, just in case the stupid thing blows up on it's own when I'm gone. I know thats probably dumb, but the breaker thing might be related so I'm mentioning it. The past few times I needed to use it, I'll flip the breaker on, the dryer won't turn on, fiddling with the door switch, shaking the dryer a bit, etc didn't help. I went and turned the breaker back off, to fiddle with it more and see if it looked like the wiring in the back was loose or something. It didn't seem to be. Turned breaker back on, and this time it came on. I think it's happened exactly like that the past 3 times I've used it, with me turning the breaker on to get read to use it and it not turn on, flipping it back off to fiddle around with it, and then back on. I don't see why the breaker part would have to do with it but it may be relevant. can't say for sure exactly what I did that gets it to eventually work, it's either cycling the breaker, opening and reclosing the door/lint trap, or shaking it(not really shaking, more like just shifting it a bit if that makes sense) Anyway, is there any common issues I could check into with something like this? Going to google it, but I figure there will be a lot of "the dryer is completely broken" type posts/articles I'll have to sort through. I reckon the hose needs to be taken off and checked to make sure it's not clogged with cat hair or something but I'm not sure if that could be the issue either. The lint trap isn't full either. One of the first things I assumed was some kind of loose power connection, but surely if that were the case, as it shifts around and moves a little bit while it's on, it would cut itself off and it doesn't do that. It runs well once it gets going. e: oh yeah, anytime I go to check the clothes when it's running and have to turn it back on, it always behaves then as well. The issue is only between loads(which I do about once a week at most usually), which seems a little odd. Maybe it does have something to do with me keeping that breaker turned off. Drunk Driver Dad fucked around with this message at 21:57 on Oct 10, 2022 |
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Oct 10, 2022 21:44
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LloydDobler posted:Also before you cut wood, double check all the fasteners and frames for looseness. my basement door was constantly hitting the frame on closing but I noticed that the top hinge was able to move. turns out the whole frame had come loose from the studs and just throwing a couple screws above and below the hinge pulled the whole door square enough to close like new. 100% this, first replace ~1/2 of the screws in the hinges on the jamb side with 3+" deck screws. The doorjamb is fastened to the frame with nails and can come a little loose with time, a couple long screws ought to draw it in tight again works for most--not all--door issues
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Oct 10, 2022 23:12
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Drunk Driver Dad posted:Hey guys my clothes dryer(It's a older Whirlpool, just pretty basic/cheap) is on the fritz. It doesn't start sometimes. once it does though, it keeps running fine. I'll just list out what's going on with it - firstly, I usually keep that breaker flipped off when I'm not using it out of paranoia, just in case the stupid thing blows up on it's own when I'm gone. I know thats probably dumb, but the breaker thing might be related so I'm mentioning it. The past few times I needed to use it, I'll flip the breaker on, the dryer won't turn on, fiddling with the door switch, shaking the dryer a bit, etc didn't help. I went and turned the breaker back off, to fiddle with it more and see if it looked like the wiring in the back was loose or something. It didn't seem to be. Turned breaker back on, and this time it came on. I think it's happened exactly like that the past 3 times I've used it, with me turning the breaker on to get read to use it and it not turn on, flipping it back off to fiddle around with it, and then back on. I don't see why the breaker part would have to do with it but it may be relevant. can't say for sure exactly what I did that gets it to eventually work, it's either cycling the breaker, opening and reclosing the door/lint trap, or shaking it(not really shaking, more like just shifting it a bit if that makes sense) Have you checked the dryer connection for power with a non-contact tester when it doesn't turn on after flipping the breaker? It's possible that this isn't the dryer's fault at all. PremiumSupport fucked around with this message at 16:19 on Oct 11, 2022 |
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Oct 11, 2022 16:17
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Does anyone have good suggestions for "ceiling shelves" for DIY? I've done some googling but I'm not looking for "shelves near ceiling" and I also don't need garage ceiling shelving either. I'm looking at something like this:  But thinking 3 shelves with less than 7" of height each, maybe max height 24". This is in a loft so there's some vertical space I want to take advantage of. I'll have to figure out where the studs are, I don't expect to put very heavy things on this, mostly storage of things I'd like to get off the ground, maybe some pull out trays kind of a thing. Maybe at most 12" wide boards, max 4' long, don't need/want more than that. A lot of these solutions don't seem so modular or cost an arm and a leg. Do I just need mount points as wide as the stud? Or do I need to find the stud and screw in a wider board into that, then secure whatever hangs the shelves into the wider wood?  Something like this with multiple levels? Or maybe something like this will do, put down a board across it, and then put some sort of pull out trays? (the ceiling here is 6'10.5" so there are places where no one will bump their head that I'd like to put things) edit:  This too...I guess I could find a longer bar and put like sterlite pull out storage trays on itGreenBuckanneer fucked around with this message at 20:19 on Oct 12, 2022 |
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Oct 12, 2022 19:53
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GreenBuckanneer posted:Does anyone have good suggestions for "ceiling shelves" for DIY? What "systems"? This is 3/4" black iron pipe. You can get it from any building supply store and cut/thread it to length as well as pick up all the rest of the pieces. Yes, you will want to mount the escutcheons to a stud as just the weight of the pipe itself without shelves or contents will be enough to pull it out of the ceiling otherwise.
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Oct 12, 2022 19:59
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OK I dunno if this is really DIY but there's experts here. Also I apologize in advance, this is a disgusting problem. In a corner next to the front porch, under a roof overhang, is a patch of dirt and the sewer cleanout for my house. The cleanout has overflowed repeatedly since 1957 when the house was built, because there's a sycamore tree over the ceramic sewer line and it slowly infiltrates tiny roots that have to be removed by a company with a nice big powered snake and a blade on the end. Since we bought in 2009 I think we've done this about three or four times, so it's not a horrendous expense and not enough to justify the $10k+ it'd cost to replace the line. Anyway, I've "mitigated" the gross mess in the "overflow zone" by shoveling out some of the dirt, and the smell goes away after about a day. We don't walk around in that spot, it's just a patch of bare dirt. But this past weekend I was power-washing the underside of the eaves, as well as the walls, a window, etc. in prep for painting everything and the ground became saturated. And it smells. It's an old smell, not like a fresh outhouse, just like the region near where outhouses have been for decades? As the earth dries it's getting marginally better. But I imagine the old "sewer contents" if we can use a nice phrase have soaked deep into the dirt there so I don't think shoveling off another inch or two is going to help, and I don't want to actually undermine the foundation. Short of doing that - is there anything I can add to the area that will kill the stink? My wife suggested dumping a bunch of activated charcoal. I was thinking maybe sawdust. One complication is that we have plans to dump some gravel, tamp & level, and put pavers down to make this sort of an extended porch area, so I don't want to add anything that would make that more difficult - so nothing that will decay over time. Just covering the whole area with concrete is maybe a last-ditch option. Of course the cleanout could overflow again some day but we're gonna actually do preventative maintenance by having our plumber company come out and snake it every 2 years to hopefully stay ahead of the root intrusion. e. A little googling suggests treating soil with lime? Leperflesh fucked around with this message at 23:25 on Oct 12, 2022 |
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Oct 12, 2022 23:22
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I think lime is what you want. And you should just put on the calendar once a year to jet your sewer because that's gross as hell. Also lol I just saw your edit.
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Oct 12, 2022 23:28
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It's like $250 each time, and yeah it's gross, but since it doesn't need to be done annually it's harder to remember to do it in time. Seems like ~3 years is an unsafe interval so ~2 years should do it.
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Oct 12, 2022 23:35
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If you think an overflowing sewer cleanout next to your old porch is bad, wait until you have an overflowing sewer cleanout underneath your new porch.
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Oct 12, 2022 23:37
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Leperflesh posted:e. A little googling suggests treating soil with lime? You can do that, but if you want this to happen fast get some enzyme cleaner. That's the new hotness.
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Oct 12, 2022 23:43
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Yeah we're not building a porch, we're putting down pavers. There will have to be a little spot for the cleanout to stick out of. It's going to let us like, put some potted plants, maybe a bench. Obviously we do not want it to stink. It actually would be much easier to clean up in the future if we poured a little concrete "containment area" around the cleanout but I have no idea if fixing a cast iron cleanout in concrete is a good idea, maybe it needs to be able to move a little? e. "enzyme" is mostly coming up with drain cleaners. Can you recommend an enzyme product for use on outdoor soil? Leperflesh fucked around with this message at 23:48 on Oct 12, 2022 |
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Oct 12, 2022 23:44
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GreenBuckanneer posted:
Most big hardware stores have black iron pipe (first pictures) and all-thread (last picture) in the right lengths. You can literally mock it up in the aisle and screw pieces together to see how they fit. Both are also relatively mild metals and "easy" to hacksaw (and rethread, in the case of the pipes) to the right lengths, too. I would make sure the flanges (the flat pieces against the ceiling) are LAG BOLTED to a joist (like studs but in your ceiling). Do NOT gently caress with drywall anchors for this; it will not work and will cause your ceiling to sag, at best -- at worst it will come out of the ceiling in a big dangerous mess. You want all the flanges to line up to the rafters, so base your plan off that. Wasabi the J fucked around with this message at 23:56 on Oct 12, 2022 |
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Oct 12, 2022 23:48
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Leperflesh posted:e. "enzyme" is mostly coming up with drain cleaners. Can you recommend an enzyme product for use on outdoor soil? First result, not a recommendation, etc, but this is the class of product I'm talking about : https://www.amazon.com/Eco-Strong-Outdoor-Eliminator-Outside/dp/B08WM34ZDR
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Oct 13, 2022 00:17
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