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I guess I am the odd one out, but I don't have a garage door opener, I open it by hand. Like a caveman.
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Feb 25, 2024 10:45
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Botnets? In my garage?
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Feb 25, 2024 12:41
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Slugworth posted:Botnets? In my garage? It's more likely than you think! I also have a botnet garage.. it's great every night it closes at 10pm.. because then I don't have to get out of bed and go to the kitchen window to see if I remembered to close it. It's a grad feature.
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Feb 25, 2024 13:02
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I have a Wi-Fi garage door opener like idk 6-8 months ago and it's the poo poo, highly recommend
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Feb 25, 2024 14:52
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You can give it’s passcode to uncle Jeff and he can open it for you to leave his discount warehouse packages.
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Feb 25, 2024 15:12
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Costco had a smoking deal in-store that ended today, so I ended up buying a Chamberlain that even has a battery backup for $320  https://www.chamberlain.com/ca/corner-to-corner-lighting-led-wi-fi-ultra-quiet-battery-backup-garage-door-opener/p/B6713TCMC e: that model doesn't seem quite right, as mine has a camera but this one doesn't. Oh well, mostly looks like that. I do like the camera idea and the wrap around LED seems like a nice feature. I don't expect it to be great but anything is better than the 2 awful CFLs that the last one had. I really hope I can re-use the existing mounts and rail kit, but if not it's not a huge deal.... although the more I think about it having a whole new setup including belt would probably be the pro move since I have everything anyhow. Unfortunately, I will need to move my car which is parked for the winter just to the side of this, because otherwise I just know I'm either going to drop tools or the entire garage door opener on it. slidebite fucked around with this message at 17:25 on Feb 25, 2024 |
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Feb 25, 2024 17:14
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In the past I left my garage door open overnight and had nicer bikes stolen, so when I bought the house I was determined to do something about that. I did end up with a WiFi garage door opener, but it turns out what's been far more valuable is the programmable keypad that comes with it, which I can set to auto close the door after 5 minutes of being open. It's awkward to ask Google if the garage door is Open "Hey Google, ask MyQ if the garage door is closed" but just knowing it will auto close has been enough piece of mind. I got Schlage smart locks for the doors, and it's been invaluable for for my wife that I can say "Hey Google, are the doors locked?" and get an answer. I can lock them from Google, but unlocking requires a PIN or something that I've never setup so I'm not worried about them accidentally unlocking.
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Feb 25, 2024 17:24
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I don't have the smart locks but I do have a code lock. It's great. Made the contractors who were doing some work the code.. have a nice day, delete when they're sone. Need my brother to check on the house here's a code.. it's great when cycling too just leave my keys at home hop on bike and go. Would recommend a code lock. I'm sure there's a security flaw but so are my picture windows
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Feb 25, 2024 18:23
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We bought this house during COVID, though we were renting it for years before we bought it. So during COVID I was fully WFH so I just didn't go anywhere, and if I did I was probably driving there and would need my keys. But now I've got a new job where I take the train so I have been leaning the keys at work, since the locks also have a keypad. And it's very nice to just have one less thing to worry about when I leave the house every morning. My wife actually lost her house keys in the house years ago and it just hasn't mattered at all. What's really funny is I chose my locks for the fact that they could still use a key in addition to the keypad, thinking I'd be a luddite about the keypad, and then immediately just started using the keypad instead of the keys.
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Feb 25, 2024 18:39
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Is there any good way to patch popcorn ceilings? I had a leak in my tub upstairs which wrecked the ceiling downstairs. The leak has been fixed for some time and the drywall patch has been set, so I grabbed a tub of the popcorn ceiling compound and it was a completely different shade than the ceiling-much lighter than the house. No surprise since the ceiling is from 1986. Then the tub had another leak (the first was the drain-i fixed the gasket and new plumbers putty and it’s good). This second leak was because i was loving around with the symmons temptrol valve and didn’t seat everything correctly. So now the drywall was patched. Again. It no longer leaks (it’s been a few months), and I’m trying to figure out a better way to patch the popcorn so it’s a little more seamless. The texture wasn’t the same using the stuff in a tub. I know the color won’t be exactly spot on, but is there any method to this madness? I used a small putty knife, like a 4” wide to apply it, but maybe that was the wrong tool for the job. Maybe a trowel would work better? It’s just hard since it’s upside down applying it to the ceiling. 
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Feb 25, 2024 18:56
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My new house has a bunch of chandelier lights that hang down low, such that I'm constantly bumping my head on them. Where do folks go to shop for lighting fixtures these days?
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Feb 25, 2024 19:50
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H110Hawk posted:It's not you hackers are after, it's absolute count. Things like the Mirai botnet (which probably is what caused California to enact the "no default password" law) trivially jumped from network to network. Or the Hue hack. All you need is one payload to be a cryptolocker and you're in for a bad day. As with all of these you can be perfect and know the best practices, but if there is a zero-day botnet spreading and your neighbor has it now so do you. my garage can do whatever it wants in its off time as long as it closes the door when I tell it to
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Feb 25, 2024 20:05
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There are a variety of canned aerosol products that you can try. https://www.homedepot.com/p/Homax-14-oz-Ceiling-Popcorn-Easy-Patch-Spray-Texture-4094/202061372 From my experience, the only way to truly patch it (especially when it's old) is to scrape it all off and
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Feb 25, 2024 20:06
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Does locking double hung windows seal them significantly better than just leaving them closed? Had a pressure test done and it wasn’t a significant concern but it seems like it would matter. My windows are only a few years old.
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Feb 25, 2024 20:08
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tuyop posted:Does locking double hung windows seal them significantly better than just leaving them closed? No. Or, it shouldn't. If you're needing to exert a lot of pressure to operate the locks, more than a small child could trivially do, they're probably not installed correctly. nwin posted:I grabbed a tub of the popcorn ceiling compound and it was a completely different shade than the ceiling-much lighter than the house. You need to paint it regardless. Ceiling white is the default color, get some color change stuff - goes on purple dries white. You don't need a thick coat on the rest of the ceiling but definitely put 2 on the patch. I would brush/dust it first. Then scrape it off. https://www.lowes.com/pd/Valspar-Ceiling-Flat-Ultra-White-Interior-Paint-Actual-Net-Contents-128-fl-oz/50438562 H110Hawk fucked around with this message at 22:03 on Feb 25, 2024 |
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Feb 25, 2024 22:00
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Random silly thought: my house has very standard vinyl siding, in a boring neutral color. How much of a pain in the rear end would it be to replace it with varicolored vinyl siding to create e.g. a rainbow effect?
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Feb 26, 2024 23:46
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Does such a product exist? Are you taking like chameleon paint? I can't wait to see where this goes.
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Feb 26, 2024 23:50
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TooMuchAbstraction posted:Random silly thought: my house has very standard vinyl siding, in a boring neutral color. How much of a pain in the rear end would it be to replace it with varicolored vinyl siding to create e.g. a rainbow effect? Anything is possible, with enough money! A coworker just spent like $30k to reside his <2000sqft home. The hardiboard quote was like $70k. Also it is possible to paint vinyl siding! You'll be limited on colors since darker shades will trap heat and warp the siding.
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Feb 26, 2024 23:55
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On the topic of siding and insulation. 1. Can individual planks of wood siding be removed and replaced with new pieces? (This seems like an obvious yes but asking anyway) 2. Can I copy I think it was PainterofCrap who cut holes into their exterior walls to fill them with insulation? 3. Can I combine these two things and possibly fill the wall cavities with insulation with the damaged planks removed? Seems like it'd be more efficient is why I ask. Final question related to the above, since I have a 2 story house and don't want to faff about that high up, what type of contractor should I try and get a quote from for this work? Siding Company? Insulation Company? General Contractor? I would also get the house repainted after all of this work so perhaps a GC runs it all, or I just have a painting company come in after the insulation/siding work is done? tangy yet delightful fucked around with this message at 01:24 on Feb 27, 2024 |
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Feb 27, 2024 00:40
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Verman posted:Does such a product exist? Are you taking like chameleon paint? I was imaging actual different colors of plastic siding pieces, not paint. I don't know if such a thing is possible, hence why I asked. It'd be a total vanity project for sure, but I do want this house to be more colorful than it is currently.
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Feb 27, 2024 01:04
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TooMuchAbstraction posted:I was imaging actual different colors of plastic siding pieces, not paint. I don't know if such a thing is possible, hence why I asked. It'd be a total vanity project for sure, but I do want this house to be more colorful than it is currently. lol that seems more doable. I was thinking it would look like a fast and the furious car from 2001.
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Feb 27, 2024 01:34
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TooMuchAbstraction posted:I was imaging actual different colors of plastic siding pieces, not paint. I don't know if such a thing is possible, hence why I asked. It'd be a total vanity project for sure, but I do want this house to be more colorful than it is currently. Yeah there's no reason you couldn't do this while residing your house, you'd just buy a bunch of different colors of the same product and have the installers put it up in your desired color combination/pattern.
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Feb 27, 2024 01:39
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tangy yet delightful posted:On the topic of siding and insulation. Blown insulation is extremely common. To the point I would start with a "energy efficiency" company or insulation company. See what they say about repair and not drilling the siding. Make sure you get it in writing that they will remove and re-set the siding. If that's not a thing they do, talk to a company that does siding. Ask around until you get descriptions of work that make sense in your head - it might take a while, especially on the insulation those are volume businesses. I wouldn't bother with a GC for this unless you truly have no time on your hands, it just makes the project cost 10% more. They will of course already know who to use for these projects and be able to coordinate. Remember you need a hole per stud bay - so one per ~4'x24" (for 2x6 studs) or 4'x16" (for 2x4 studs) assuming you have 8' ceilings and there is some kind of blocking in the walls. This effectively means all the siding comes off regardless if you don't want to drill.
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Feb 27, 2024 02:19
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Home Zone: Insulation is a volume business
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Feb 27, 2024 02:27
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TooMuchAbstraction posted:Random silly thought: my house has very standard vinyl siding, in a boring neutral color. How much of a pain in the rear end would it be to replace it with varicolored vinyl siding to create e.g. a rainbow effect? Seriously: It can be done, but It's a a lot of labor. Vinyl siding is held against the wall at the top of each section by nails, and the bottom snaps in to the head that runs along the section below it. They make a tool to pop it off - or you can try popping it off with your hands, of a body trim removal tool. Whether or not this will be feasible for you largely depends on how fragile the siding is. The older it is, the more UV exposure it receives, the more brittle it gets. If it's really cheap crap, it'll crack pretty easily after about ten years. The time varies with the quality of the material as well as UV exposure. You also need to get the same brand and possibly style so the locking bits line up properly. Once you pop a couple apart, you use a flat-bar or cat's paw to remove the nails holding the run you want to change out, then nail up a new one, and pop 'em together. Repeat as wanted. tangy yet delightful posted:On the topic of siding and insulation. Wood clapboard siding is installed from the bottom up, so removing the top run should be easier than, say, further down the elevation. See if there's sheathing behind it (there usually is) so be prepared to cut a ton of 2" holes. Also be sure the bottom of the wall inside your house is closed at each chase, or you'll be filling your basement with insulation. You could get a carpenter, siding guy, or roofer.
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Feb 27, 2024 03:22
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TooMuchAbstraction posted:Random silly thought: my house has very standard vinyl siding, in a boring neutral color. How much of a pain in the rear end would it be to replace it with varicolored vinyl siding to create e.g. a rainbow effect? If you live anywhere that it gets hot, do not have any color vinyl siding besides white, or close to it. I'm in Texas and the only homes with vinyl siding I've seen that are not warped are colored white.
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Feb 27, 2024 05:07
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Thanks for the siding/insulation answers, appreciate it!
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Feb 27, 2024 07:12
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TooMuchAbstraction posted:My new house has a bunch of chandelier lights that hang down low, such that I'm constantly bumping my head on them. Where do folks go to shop for lighting fixtures these days? I bought most of my new fixtures from wayfair, but i also scoured the local Home Depot and lighting stores to try to find stuff that fit the style i was looking for, and get a general of size. Be careful when ordering online without looking, it’s very possible to end up with huge or tiny fixtures if you don’t get a good sense of the size of the things.
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Feb 27, 2024 12:50
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alright, thanks for the advice, y'all! I'm in Philadelphia, so it does get fairly hot in the summer, but not like southern desert hot. PainterofCrap posted:Whether or not this will be feasible for you largely depends on how fragile the siding is. The older it is, the more UV exposure it receives, the more brittle it gets. If it's really cheap crap, it'll crack pretty easily after about ten years. The time varies with the quality of the material as well as UV exposure. Just to make sure I understand: the siding being fragile is not per se a problem, so long as it isn't touched? i.e. I don't have to worry about re-doing the siding every 10 years because it's gone brittle, unless for some reason there's stuff constantly making contact with it and pushing it around? Obviously if it's brittle, then carefully replacing only certain sections becomes a lot more difficult, I'm just trying to understand the long-term ramifications of the stuff. I've only dealt with wood, stucco, and cement board sidings in the past.
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Feb 27, 2024 13:07
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TooMuchAbstraction posted:alright, thanks for the advice, y'all! I'm in Philadelphia, so it does get fairly hot in the summer, but not like southern desert hot. Different colors are going to expand and contract at different rates. I don't see this working out well.
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Feb 27, 2024 15:21
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TooMuchAbstraction posted:alright, thanks for the advice, y'all! I'm in Philadelphia, so it does get fairly hot in the summer, but not like southern desert hot. Our old house had vinyl siding and it was getting close to about 20 years old. I don’t know for sure where it came from but it was probably like the rest of the house and built with basic stuff you could find at Lowe’s. It had some damage to it here and there but you could just repair it. You could still easily manipulate it without it breaking so it might not be as worrisome of a problem as it might seem. This is a house that didn’t have a lot of tree cover too so it just got beat to hell with the sun all hours of the day.
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Feb 27, 2024 15:38
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TooMuchAbstraction posted:alright, thanks for the advice, y'all! I'm in Philadelphia, so it does get fairly hot in the summer, but not like southern desert hot.
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Feb 27, 2024 15:47
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so PG&E bill is really not fun in the winter, I am wondering what steps we should be taking to seal up the house (1937 craftsman-ish). windows are original. they're kinda beautiful tho
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Feb 27, 2024 16:35
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A MIRACLE posted:so PG&E bill is really not fun in the winter, I am wondering what steps we should be taking to seal up the house (1937 craftsman-ish). windows are original. they're kinda beautiful tho First place I'd start is to check your insulation. New windows aren't going to do piss if your roof is insulated with a quarter inch of balled up newspaper from the 40s. After that, yeah, look into windows.
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Feb 27, 2024 16:37
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Insulating the walls of my 1930 (not) Craftsman cut my heating bills almost in half. There was nothing in there at all. The attic is finished in the center, so I can't get to the lovely paper crap that's in around there, so there's some loss there. We elected to keep the original windows, chiefly because they all worked - upper sashes as well as lower; I restored them a couple at a time because the sash ropes broke on most of them & I was gifted a 10-lb bag of sash chain, so while they were out for that I stripped & re-painted them & replaced glazing that was cracked. Custom-ordered & replaced the ancient storm windows. Not ideal, but it seems everybody not in a home on the National Historic Register has replaced them with inserts, usually crap vinyl units (which also shrinks the window size quite a bit). The storms do a decent job - there are no drafts - but definitely colder than the insulated Pellas I installed in the sunroom when I built the garage.
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Feb 27, 2024 17:59
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I need to have a pin oak pruned to get some branches away from the house and to thin out some smaller limbs all the way up the trunk. It is very close to the property line but not near any overhead lines. Trunk is roughly 20' from the house and there are limb tips within inches of the house. Got quotes from three companies that advertised certified arborists at $1800, $1000, and $400. Each described doing the same scope of work. Any reason to avoid the $400 company besides a gut feeling that they're going to botch it at that price?
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Feb 27, 2024 18:00
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voodoorootbeer posted:I need to have a pin oak pruned to get some branches away from the house and to thin out some smaller limbs all the way up the trunk. It is very close to the property line but not near any overhead lines. Trunk is roughly 20' from the house and there are limb tips within inches of the house. Got quotes from three companies that advertised certified arborists at $1800, $1000, and $400. Each described doing the same scope of work. Any reason to avoid the $400 company besides a gut feeling that they're going to botch it at that price? It seems you missed the other important question: can you send me a copy of your liability insurance policy (and any required municipal licencure/registration/bond) That likely explains the lowest bidder. Perhaps even the one in the middle.
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Feb 27, 2024 18:07
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A MIRACLE posted:so PG&E bill is really not fun in the winter, I am wondering what steps we should be taking to seal up the house (1937 craftsman-ish). windows are original. they're kinda beautiful tho Do a home energy audit, you may well be able to get one free or comped by the state or something. There's no point in fixing things that aren't causing the problem. Though yeah, you're probably gonna have to replace those windows.
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Feb 27, 2024 18:27
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I am definitely on team repair + fit storm windows over getting new ones.
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Feb 28, 2024 06:10
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Definitely check your roof insulation and improve it if possible. Maybe underfloor insulation too. Blown-in insulation in the walls of older homes can be tricky, because it can introduce a vapor barrier where the original construction did not intend for it. Ideally you should have some plan for moisture venting so that, for instance, cellulose doesn't just hold any trapped moisture against the wood framing of the house. One of the reasons old houses survive is that in addition to old growth lumber being harder and more rot-resistant, the wide-open framed spaces offer more opportunities for the framing to dry out if moisture gets in there. I'm also on board with fixing or replacing your storms. Also make sure that when it's very hot or very cold that you've arranged the panes correctly. Most aluminum or vinyl storms have two glass panels and a screen that you can move around between the top and bottom spot. When the weather's nice, you can open the window and get outdoor air through the screens. If you just close your interior sash without ensuring that you have one pane of glass on top and one pane on the bottom, you won't get the intended effect of blocking gusts and improving the thermal properties of the older window. I can tell you from experience this makes a huge difference. I think a lot of people don't realize how important it is that your storm windows are arranged correctly.
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Feb 28, 2024 15:23
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