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One of my rooms started smelling recently. It’s coming from one particular corner. The cat had been scratching at it for a while but I didn’t notice a smell, so I ignored it. Now it’s very obvious, and getting worse. It’s not cat urine, but I scrubbed down the carpet with one of those bottles of carpet cleaner and it didn’t help. I’m wondering if there might be something under the carpet. I live in a rental, is there a way to check under the carpeting without ripping a ton of stuff up? FWIW it was done pretty cheaply, there are spots near the middle where you can just pull upward on the carpet and it will come up a couple inches. They just plain didn’t anchor it any more than they absolutely had to. If it’s not under the carpet, it might be in the baseboards. And I really don’t want to deal with that.
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Sep 13, 2018 22:02
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Carpet is typically not anchored anywhere but the edges, where it is stretched very taut and then tacked down. If you start pulling up at the edges you probably won't be able to get it re-attached properly without using a knee-kicker. Can you describe the smell at all? My immediate thought would be a small animal like a mouse or chipmunk died inside your wall.
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Sep 13, 2018 22:07
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If it's a mouse it'll rot away soon but if it stays a long time think rat
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Sep 13, 2018 22:20
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22 Eargesplitten posted:One of my rooms started smelling recently. It’s coming from one particular corner. The cat had been scratching at it for a while but I didn’t notice a smell, so I ignored it. Now it’s very obvious, and getting worse. It’s not cat urine, but I scrubbed down the carpet with one of those bottles of carpet cleaner and it didn’t help. I’m wondering if there might be something under the carpet. Call your landlord and say you think something died in the walls or floor. It's not the carpet.
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Sep 13, 2018 22:27
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Nevets posted:Carpet is typically not anchored anywhere but the edges, where it is stretched very taut and then tacked down. If you start pulling up at the edges you probably won't be able to get it re-attached properly without using a knee-kicker. I see. Maybe it just isn't as taut as most places I've lived. Seriously, 1-1.5ft from the wall it will come up almost two inches. Either it's not nearly as taut as normal or that's some stretchy carpeting. I have a generally negative opinion of this place's build quality. That might be unfair, the only real problem I've seen is how sloppy the paint is, but that's the most obvious thing. I guess also how they put the phone box literally 1 foot from both the water heater and the furnace, so good luck using an all-in-one modem/router/gateway. I don't think it smells like something dead, I'll have to go in there and figure out how to describe it tomorrow. I was wondering if it might be mold or something. It's definitely at floor level, whatever is, and it's not just at the walls. Higher up the walls it's not as strong, away from the walls in that corner it's just as strong.
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Sep 14, 2018 05:22
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Is it pungent? Musty? Acidic? You must have [i]some[i] adjective to describe it.
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Sep 14, 2018 15:36
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Another question re: our stove/oven. We have to knock out some drywall to reroute the gas line. Is it necessary to put something back, or can the oven be flush against studs and air?
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Sep 14, 2018 21:32
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Pretty sure an open wall violates fire codes. Part of what makes drywall so popular is it's fire retardation, slowing the spread of fire room to room.
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Sep 15, 2018 00:03
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Guests staying with us for a while said not to worry about cleaning their bathroom, that they’d do it. After they were gone, in what is probably the most telegraphed outcome, I found some long-forgotten urine & fecal splashes on the toilet seat (white painted wood), which had discolored the seat due to sitting there without being cleaned. After a semi-successful first pass of each, the remaining discoloration doesn’t react to simple green or diluted Clorox-type cleaner. I’m resigned that some discoloration will probably remain either from undercleaning or overbleaching; just want to minimize visual patchiness. Any recommendations for alternatives before going full-blast with a bleach-based cleaner?
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Sep 15, 2018 23:00
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Nonvalueadded User posted:Guests staying with us for a while said not to worry about cleaning their bathroom, that they’d do it. After they were gone, in what is probably the most telegraphed outcome, I found some long-forgotten urine & fecal splashes on the toilet seat (white painted wood), which had discolored the seat due to sitting there without being cleaned. Or if the stain is not removable replace with a plastic seat that is more hygienic. I replaced my old painted "wood" (particle board) with one of these and have been pretty happy with it https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00NAHULPE The paint on the old one mildewed and bubbled out from humidity of keeping the cover closed all the time to keep cats out of it.
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Sep 15, 2018 23:53
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Nonvalueadded User posted:Any recommendations for alternatives before going full-blast with a bleach-based cleaner? A cheap new toilet seat is like $10. It's up to you what your time is worth and how much you value the current seat; it sounds like you don't use that bathroom often.
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Sep 16, 2018 01:11
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Yeah agreed, I think $10 is even too high. The sizes are universal so it's very low-effort, I think mine is like $6, I replace it every couple years. Obviously I clean it in between, but something that cheap, it's fine to get a new one every so often.
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Sep 16, 2018 03:43
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i like nice words
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Send them a bill. E: including your time 
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Sep 16, 2018 07:26
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Replace it with a plastic heated seat and turn it into your designated winter dump zone.
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Sep 16, 2018 16:03
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cakesmith handyman posted:Send them a bill. E: including your time $6.00 - Materials $120.00 - Labor: 2 hours* *Labour billed hourly, includes travel to & from client & to procure materials. Total: $126.00 Terms: Net / 15
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Sep 16, 2018 21:55
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Speaking of toilets - I have 2 bathrooms, so 2 toilets. My toilet upstairs is sticky, as in, literally everything will stick to the sides between flushes. My toilet downstairs is not like this. How do I wax the inside of my toilet bowl to make it smooth? I've never seen a toilet like this retain so much stuff between flushes, it's nuts. Because of this - it's constantly being cleaned. Luckily it doesn't get used as often as the other (good) toilet.
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Sep 17, 2018 11:38
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Could be mineral buildup in the bowl.
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Sep 17, 2018 14:55
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BoyBlunder posted:Speaking of toilets - I have 2 bathrooms, so 2 toilets. My toilet upstairs is sticky, as in, literally everything will stick to the sides between flushes. My toilet downstairs is not like this. Mineral buildup can cause the Klingons. Unfortunately, over cleaning and damaging the glaze can also exacerbate the issue. A new toilet honestly isn't that hard to install. I was genuinely shocked about how easy it was, if you can be not squeamish about how gross an older toilet can get.
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Sep 17, 2018 18:43
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Once you get the toilet off, just grab some rubber gloves, some bleach spray cleaner, a scraper, and some paper towels and go to town.
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Sep 17, 2018 21:52
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Yeah, then wait till you install the new toilet and flush the paper towels and scrapings down it as an offering to the gods, and to initiate the new one. All the while saying to the toilet "you ain't seen nothing yet bub".
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Sep 17, 2018 21:59
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We have an oval toilet, my 7 year old son always perches weirdly on the edge, and his poops always sit on the slanted part of the bowl and don't go down. He poops and wipes in ten seconds, so we don't always catch it, and visitors are always shocked when they use the bathroom and see what he's done.
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Sep 17, 2018 22:06
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Jerk McJerkface posted:We have an oval toilet, my 7 year old son always perches weirdly on the edge, and his poops always sit on the slanted part of the bowl and don't go down. He poops and wipes in ten seconds, so we don't always catch it, and visitors are always shocked when they use the bathroom and see what he's done. These things own for spraying off those bits that won’t flush. If your kid is old enough not to just treat it like a spray gun, he might even clean up after himself. Stainless Steel Cloth Diaper Sprayer Kit by Easy Giggles - Handheld Shattaf Bidet Spray for Toilet https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07121VL4D/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_api_xRbOBb9V5ZHWC
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Sep 17, 2018 22:23
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Who is the right person to ask to build some stairs from the back door down to ground level? A deck person? I built some from a kit at Home Depot and they're fine but my dog is 18 years old still jumps from the second step because the steps aren't long enough.
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Sep 18, 2018 02:45
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Whats a good solution for draining AC condensate? The area around it is so saturated and unfortunately it slopes right into my neighbors yard. Can I just dig a hole, connect the line to a perforated pipe and fill the hole with some gravel? Any reason to be concerned with back-pressure to the pump?
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Sep 18, 2018 14:13
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Kanish posted:Whats a good solution for draining AC condensate? The area around it is so saturated and unfortunately it slopes right into my neighbors yard. Can I just dig a hole, connect the line to a perforated pipe and fill the hole with some gravel? Any reason to be concerned with back-pressure to the pump? It depends on how much condensate you're producing and what kind of soil you have below the topsoil, but a french drain would be fine. There is no reason to directly connect the output of the condensate pump - you can simply start the french drain under where it drains now - you can put grass/whatever over it and it can be complete invisible.. I'd say that it's a really BAD idea to directly connect it.
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Sep 18, 2018 16:32
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Make a miniature water feature out of it 
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Sep 18, 2018 20:03
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I just stick a bucket under mine and use it to water plants
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Sep 19, 2018 02:10
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BigFactory posted:I just stick a bucket under mine and use it to water plants I've been meaning to get a condensate pump for my hybrid (heat pump) water heater, but even in this humid summer, the 'temporary' 5gal bucket I've had under the drain takes weeks to fill. It makes me sad when I anthropomorphize the little pump that can handle 80 gallons/hour getting only a few drops an hour.
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Sep 19, 2018 02:20
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Kanish posted:Whats a good solution for draining AC condensate? The area around it is so saturated and unfortunately it slopes right into my neighbors yard. Can I just dig a hole, connect the line to a perforated pipe and fill the hole with some gravel? Any reason to be concerned with back-pressure to the pump? As mentioned a french drain which is pretty much what you're thinking about doing. As also mentioned dont connect it. Depending on what the area looks like I'd opt for an open french drain, and jus landscape around the AC unit with rock.
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Sep 20, 2018 20:50
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This isn't a fixing question but this thread might be the best collection of minds to answer it, so... I'm getting into block printing and am working out how to reliably reproduce alignment between paper and block. I already have on my workbench a squared corner jig, so I grabbed some cheap 1/4" square dowels I had laying around to make an offset (paper goes against the jig, dowels on top of paper and against the jig, and then I can hold the block against the dowels while putting it on the paper), and it works pretty well, but I quickly realized that all the dowels are just not quite the same width. That's not itself a deal breaker as long as consistently use the same dowels, but if I want to stack multiple dowels to get different offsets that could get tricky. Any thoughts on options for reliable sizing? I don't have tools to make my own dowels. 1-2-3 blocks are neat but I'd need something longer. Are there higher quality dowels with better tolerances?
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Sep 21, 2018 19:51
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dupersaurus posted:This isn't a fixing question but this thread might be the best collection of minds to answer it, so... I can't quite picture what you're doing, but have you considered something like this? Depending on the size/margins of your blocks and your process, you could also notch the blocks themselves like here
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Sep 21, 2018 20:15
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Big Bad Beetleborg posted:I can't quite picture what you're doing, but have you considered something like this? Depending on the size/margins of your blocks and your process, you could also notch the blocks themselves like here That first link is what I'm calling the jig. The difference is that, instead of carving the margin in the block, I'm using the dowels to push the block away from the jig so I can hold the block against something while setting it down. There's no shortage of answers to the registration question, I'm just picking this hole to go down since it works best with the space I have. dupersaurus fucked around with this message at 20:30 on Sep 21, 2018 |
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Sep 21, 2018 20:28
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dupersaurus posted:This isn't a fixing question but this thread might be the best collection of minds to answer it, so... Just get some sandpaper and sand the dowels to the same thickness. Pick your smallest dowel to be your reference dowel, and sand the others down until they're the same width. Hold the sanded dowel against your reference and use your fingers to tell if they're the same size. Human fingers are able to detect very fine differences in width so you can easily get within a hundredth of an inch this way. If you don't trust your fingers, you can get some calipers to do fine measurements for you. You could build a fancy jig where the dowels are mounted on threaded rod, with a crank on the rod so you can advance it by precise amounts to get the right offsets, but that still doesn't do you any good if the dowels aren't the same size. Once you have like-sized rods though, such a jig could be handy if you need to frequently adjust your exact offsets.
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Sep 21, 2018 20:33
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dupersaurus posted:Any thoughts on options for reliable sizing? I don't have tools to make my own dowels. 1-2-3 blocks are neat but I'd need something longer. Are there higher quality dowels with better tolerances? What about metal rod or tube? Aluminum is extruded so it should be an extremely consistent width. Can you lay it in 1 piece horizontally across your jig, or do you need to use multiple short pieces standing on end? That would be time consuming to cut, but not impossible.
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Sep 21, 2018 21:07
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My house suffered 3" deep interior flooding as a result of hurricane florence last saturday night. I have spent the last week hurridly removing all carpet, padding, and foam rubber glue, mercilessly purging anything that touched the lava floor, have had a giant industrial dehumidifier running in various rooms, two confined space ventilators blowing into the crawlspace since the sump pump got everything that it could, and have someone coming to remove the subfloor insulation. What else do I need to do? High water mark is about halfway up the baseboards, walls are fake 70s paneling over drywall.
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Sep 23, 2018 01:51
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Almost certainly remove the paneling and see how bad the damage is behind that. Paneling on drywall is basically a best-possible-environment for mold.
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Sep 23, 2018 13:36
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Yeah, unfortunately after a week of wet paneling on drywall, its basically a guarantee the drywall is shot, and probably a foot higher than the visible water line.
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Sep 23, 2018 13:59
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Nevets posted:What about metal rod or tube? Aluminum is extruded so it should be an extremely consistent width. Can you lay it in 1 piece horizontally across your jig, or do you need to use multiple short pieces standing on end? That would be time consuming to cut, but not impossible. I need pieces running parallel to the edges, and I think aluminum is more money than I really want to throw at this. TooMuchAbstraction posted:Just get some sandpaper and sand the dowels to the same thickness. Pick your smallest dowel to be your reference dowel, and sand the others down until they're the same width. Hold the sanded dowel against your reference and use your fingers to tell if they're the same size. Human fingers are able to detect very fine differences in width so you can easily get within a hundredth of an inch this way. If you don't trust your fingers, you can get some calipers to do fine measurements for you. I think this is the way to go. I took a closer look and they’re not quite as bad as I first thought. Thanks!
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Sep 23, 2018 14:09
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Hello my outdoor sump pump drain absolutely reeks of death. I first discovered this because it's near a window and the stench blows right in. There is zero odor from my sump pit in the basesment. Is there any explaination other than "a chipmunk fell in, shield the drain" ? I filled / ran the sump once which did nothing or maybe made the smell stronger.
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Sep 23, 2018 15:46
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Satellit3 posted:Hello my outdoor sump pump drain absolutely reeks of death. I first discovered this because it's near a window and the stench blows right in. There is zero odor from my sump pit in the basesment. Is there any explaination other than "a chipmunk fell in, shield the drain" ? I filled / ran the sump once which did nothing or maybe made the smell stronger. Where's the other end of it? It's probably clogged and there's nasty water sitting in the pipe.
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Sep 23, 2018 16:34
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