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That right there is my grandmother and anything that wasn't nailed down in Sheboygan county. That woman must be a closet pyro with the volume and frequency of things she threw on the burn pit, my mom gets visibly upset when she thinks of all the antique furniture that went up in flames every time Gramma decided "it's too old, get rid of it!" I really hope the couple that bought their house throws a cement pad over the old burn pit, they were farmers so it's likely a mini-Superfund site with all the poo poo that would have wound up in there.
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May 6, 2014 22:04
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My dad owns a farm (Crawford County, WI) and in the 80s/90s he burned the trash. Anything that couldn't be burned got thrown in a ditch. You could find old vehicles, tires, farm equipment, dead livestock, extra fertilizer/herbicide/pesticide (caused a few livestock to end up in the ditch...oops) in his ditches. One neighbor had a house a a couple sheds in his ditches. These days people in the area are a little more environmentally conscious. Also they found that there are places that actually pay you for scrap metal!
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May 6, 2014 22:14
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When I was a kid in the 80's every house had a big old steel barrel out behind the back lane. This wasn't in a rural area, or even suburban, this was right in the core of a major city. There was an undeveloped lot behind all the houses on our street and that's where we all had our barrels. People burned garden waste and sometimes garbage. It could get super nasty in terms of smoke depending on what people were burning. Also the barrels were just sitting against the edge of basically a dense over-grown urban forest. After the 3rd time the woods caught on fire the FD and city just took the barrels away and told the neighborhood to knock it off. When I was in Malaysia this was the norm for everything. You haven't lived until you smell tires, plastics, and human waste burning in a barrel or just a pile on the median.
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May 6, 2014 22:34
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Parallel Paraplegic posted:
Australia HAD that, god knows what the current bunch of chucklefucks in charge are going to do with it. In other news, my plans are in for council approval, thats gonna take 6-8 weeks, then theres another week or two for Development approval then its full steam ahead turning dirt and pouring my $25,000 cement slab.
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May 7, 2014 12:23
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My best burn pit story is about a friend that was contracted to demolish a bunch of small cabins on a lake property so the new owner could make a huge lot for his mega cabin. The small cabins were torn in half and loaded onto a truck with a back hoe, and hauled away to my friends lot where they were burned. It was amazing to watch them burn up but as one half was getting well under way we heard a beep-beep-beep start from the pit. The smoke alarm was warning us about the fire; poor smoke alarm. Not an amazing story, but it struck us funny at the time. He did salvage what he could from the buildings but they were old and worn so most of it just went into the pit.
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May 7, 2014 15:30
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I will plant a tree in penance for my environmental sins. In fairness, it was only a few little offcuts, and it was awfully fun to watch them go up.
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May 7, 2014 16:20
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So it looks like we are buying the house with the weird power strip. The inspector claimed it was the best home he saw in the last month, and I already live in the same neighborhood in a home built by the same builder about 60 years ago. The guy did take care of it from what I can tell though, so I hope to keep any updates here to a minimum.
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May 10, 2014 14:53
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Just ran across this video http://www.wimp.com/windowinstallation/ I'm having trouble picturing that none of the people installing the windows noticed that this would be a problem.
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May 14, 2014 07:39
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Looks like a drat fine anti-burglary measure to me.
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May 14, 2014 12:46
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So recently I've started redecorating my apartment. I've found the usual horrors that I'd expect — wallpaper fixed to anything but the wall, silicon sealant used as a structural material, windows with 1/4" daylight gap — but the wiring I'd always assumed was in okay shape. It's all in ugly surface ducting so I'm going to pull the ducting off, get some proper sub-surface ducting, and bury the cabling in the walls (which are plastered on the hard as is usual in these buildings). So last night I start pulling the top plates off the plastic ducting, and I think to myself "Now, I'm not absolutely up to speed with ring main circuits, but this doesn't look quite right." So I call my Dad, who is. His reactions as I describe things to him range from "...that's an interesting way of wiring that," through "I don't understand why you'd do that at all," and all the way up to "That is extremely dubious practice." Not encouraging. So the deal is with British standards, you wire sockets in a ring main. You're allowed one double socket as a spur from any other point on the ring (either junction box, or from a double socket on the ring itself). So far, I have discovered that I have five sockets on a single mega-spur. Two of those sockets are on secondary spurs from two others in this mega-spur. I am concerned, at this point, that it's going to start becoming fractal. The light switching system appears to have been wired by a colour-blind monkey. I appear to have far too many cables for the circuit breakers in the fuse box (and, frankly, the fusing system on that makes no loving sense either, with fuses that are marked 'sockets' that don't turn off all sockets, and another fuse market 'fire wall sockets' which is helpful, since this could actually mean any of three walls...) and at this point it seems like the only possible solution is a complete rewire — which is going to be pain.
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May 14, 2014 15:25
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Shouldn't your landlord be taking care of that??
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May 14, 2014 16:58
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Baronjutter posted:Shouldn't your landlord be taking care of that?? I don't rent.
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May 14, 2014 17:24
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Jeherrin posted:I don't rent. Jeherrin posted:my apartment. Jeherrin posted:British  e: But then you also said! Jeherrin posted:1/4" 
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May 14, 2014 17:26
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Who in Britain calls them apartments. They're flats, dude. But yeah, we still use miles and feet and inches. Also pounds and stones. We're only nominally metric; we're mostly just confused. All our road signs are imperial. But then, it WAS our empire.
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May 14, 2014 17:36
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Hey, no, our funny-sounding cousins to the east still uphold the great tradition of nonsensical imperial measures. I can't get behind the "stone as a unit of weight" thing, though. That's just madness. E: Goddamnit beaten on stones
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May 14, 2014 17:37
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thespaceinvader posted:Who in Britain calls them apartments. They're flats, dude. Oh. Well, I just never know with you people.
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May 14, 2014 17:47
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Even in America, it is possible to buy and own an apartment.
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May 14, 2014 19:02
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I always thought condo = a unit you buy apartment = a unit you rent. How do you buy an apartment? Other than buying an apartment building.
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May 14, 2014 19:06
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Baronjutter posted:I always thought condo = a unit you buy apartment = a unit you rent. How do you buy an apartment? Other than buying an apartment building. You buy an individual apartment in an apartment building. It's more common in inner cities, especially new york, but I know there are many privately-owned apartments in san francisco too. My guess is that it's different from condos in that the building was originally constructed as an apartment building, and perhaps also the exact way the building and units are deeded? I'm not sure if there's also a different structure than the typical condo association for handling shared expenses.
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May 14, 2014 19:09
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Alterantely, I suppose you could be a landlord. Then you'd own at least one apartment.
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May 14, 2014 19:10
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Baronjutter posted:I always thought condo = a unit you buy apartment = a unit you rent. How do you buy an apartment? Other than buying an apartment building. Not really. You can call whatever unit in a multi-family dwelling an apartment. A condo is a legal distinction of how the building is managed. It's like an HOA, with members who are residents and or owners. This association "owns" the common areas. Apartments are typically owned/operated by a management company who, even if they sell individual units, do not allow self-management by the owners and residents.
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May 14, 2014 19:10
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All you people who are hating on certain units of measure can suck it. I walk at an average speed of 3 cubits per ohm-farad. 
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May 14, 2014 19:33
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I think it boils down to shared property, apartment = shared entry hallway, condo = separate entry. All bets are off when you get to the west cost US where we have separate entry apartments due to the permitting weather.
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May 14, 2014 19:40
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ColHannibal posted:I think it boils down to shared property, apartment = shared entry hallway, condo = separate entry. That's not at all the case. While most people use these terms interchangeably and incorrectly, it's all pretty simple. If my explanation wasn't clear, just read: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Condominium
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May 14, 2014 19:44
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Motronic posted:If my explanation wasn't clear, just read: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Condom "Shared space"
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May 14, 2014 19:46
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Motronic posted:Apartments are typically owned/operated by a management company who, even if they sell individual units, do not allow self-management by the owners and residents. I wish this was the loving norm. I'll probably rent for the rest of my life because I want an objective professional managing the building, not a clique of building busy-bodies changing the rules and fees every year and basically being a vertical HOA with all the bullshit and drama that goes along with it. Hell I wish the city just owned a ton of apartment buildings and sold/rented them as needed while being in charge of the building rules and upkeep.
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May 14, 2014 19:51
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I present the most amazing condensation line of all time: air handler in the closet, looks like poo poo, but w/e I guess  Ok, that's kind of shoddy  "gently caress it"   
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May 14, 2014 19:55
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That deserves an award.
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May 14, 2014 19:58
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What? No, you can't close the bathroom door! It needs to stay open so the condensation can drain into the sink!
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May 14, 2014 20:10
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I want to believe they made a matching notch in the door. 
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May 14, 2014 20:17
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My grandfather owned several construction supply yards and was the middle man for a whole gently caress-ton of high end projects back in the 60's and 70's. Well, one of his major connections was with a brick yard and someone miss-fired concrete blocks that were suppose to be for a roadway retaining wall, so instead of weighing around 30lbs a piece they weigh almost 90lbs and naturally Cal-Trans rejected them. This was at the same time he was building a custom house with the "basement" level being completely cut into the side of the hill it's built on. He has the foundation the walls going to sit on over engineered to support a wall that's going to be three times as heavy, but "forgets" to tell the masons bidding the wall that each one of the 18x18 blocks in a wall that's going to be in a 60'x30'x15' wall will weigh almost three times as much as they should be. Now he wasn't a complete rear end in a top hat, he paid them almost double what they bid to make up for it and for a house that was built in 72 in southern CA and even today there are virtually no cracks in that wall even with 40 years of earthquakes.
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May 14, 2014 20:56
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Qwijib0 posted:I present the most amazing condensation line of all time: This is truly fantastic.
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May 15, 2014 00:55
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Nomination for Best In Thread, holy gently caress I'm dying over here.
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May 15, 2014 01:55
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What's a condensation line? Like I can assume what it does by the name, it's taking moisture from somewhere and dumping it in the sink, but what's it for?
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May 15, 2014 02:19
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Baronjutter posted:What's a condensation line? Like I can assume what it does by the name, it's taking moisture from somewhere and dumping it in the sink, but what's it for? When your AC chills air, a side effect is all the moisture condenses out of that air onto the cold AC bits like dew condensing in the morning. The AC needs to get rid of that somehow or it will just keep pooling up until it pours out all over your house. Normally this would be done by a pipe that goes outside or to a proper drain but this guy was in a hurry it seems.
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May 15, 2014 02:26
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Parallel Paraplegic posted:but this guy can fix it himself, its not like he's an idiot Ftfy.
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May 15, 2014 02:32
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Holy gently caress, 5'd. We have one from the dehumidifier in the basement. We estimate it drains a gallon a day on a "dry" day, more when it rains. Less of an issue of poor construction but rather the fact that Rochester, NY is a goddamn swamp. At least we haven't had to install a pump yet.
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May 15, 2014 02:46
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Parallel Paraplegic posted:When your AC chills air, a side effect is all the moisture condenses out of that air onto the cold AC bits like dew condensing in the morning. The AC needs to get rid of that somehow or it will just keep pooling up until it pours out all over your house. Normally this would be done by a pipe that goes outside or to a proper drain but this guy was in a hurry it seems. Thanks, I assumed it would be AC or humid-climate related. At least it's going into a sink and not a dustpan? \/ We don't know what the sink drains into! Baronjutter fucked around with this message at 03:03 on May 15, 2014 |
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May 15, 2014 02:57
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The only thing making that better would be an orange Home Depot bucket at the end instead.
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May 15, 2014 02:59
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Missing Name posted:Holy gently caress, 5'd. Better make sure it's in tip top shape- flash flood warnings all over the area this week!
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May 15, 2014 03:12
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