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MagusofStars posted:So either (a) his building department doesn't work like that or (b) he's never spoken to them in his life because whatever it's just bullshit regulations holding us down man. 100% guarantee that if this guy's next door neighbor was building a structure in their back yard that this guy felt didn't meet safety standards, this attitude would instantly and totally reverse with no self-reflection or cognitive dissonance whatsoever. Rules exist to protect me from you, not to protect you from me, because of course I'd never do anything stupid, I'm an engineer and very smart.
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Jul 6, 2019 23:21
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beep-beep car is go posted:The thing that I just don't get is that has he ever called the building department? They LOVE to hear from you, especially when you haven't done anything yet. They go out of their way to explain what you need to do and how, and usually have the forms ready to go. It literally takes 30 minutes to make it legal, and then you never have to worry. I've called my local building department with all kinds of weird questions and they've never been anything but helpful and thankful that I'm not just ye-hawing it out in my yard without talking to someone first. Certainly not my experience with my previous fancy Silicon Valley city, which couldn't be arsed to tell you jack poo poo and which stretched out my (permitted and engineered by real engineers) project for months out of sheer assholiness. You can probably tell I don't miss that place. Direct quote: "it's not my job to teach you the code.". But I've whined about this before and accept that crummy city (rhymes with Assho Snark) is not representative of most jurisdictions. Thank goodness.
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Jul 7, 2019 04:15
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Bacon Taco posted:Certainly not my experience with my previous fancy Silicon Valley city, which couldn't be arsed to tell you jack poo poo and which stretched out my (permitted and engineered by real engineers) project for months out of sheer assholiness. You can probably tell I don't miss that place. Direct quote: "it's not my job to teach you the code.". But I've whined about this before and accept that crummy city (rhymes with Assho Snark) is not representative of most jurisdictions. Thank goodness. Menlo Park is one of the strictest in the bay area, along with Palo Alto. This is only surpassed by San Francisco, which is the strictest city in terms of permits in the country. Anyway, what is your story, I'd love to hear. But in any case, the reason why the building team in silicon valley wont tell you poo poo is: (1) liability, because there is so much construction in the bay area and anybody is doing a remodel and can call themself a general contractor/engineer (2) they are so busy out of their mind that they just dont have the time. Also, for you folks who are thinking that the building department is there 100% to protect you/neighbors, just keep in mind that dealing with them indeed is intensively bureaucratic. Most people are doing their jobs and will be nice to you if you are nice to them, but there are indeed a ton of really dumb rules in code that are sometimes super obnoxious, like: "Regulation that at least one light switch in any bathroom be manual on, automatic off"... except that some cities require instead that there be a fan that is 'automatic humidifying detecting'. Also, the moment you do a remodel, all water appliances in the rest of the house must be replaced if they output more than X amount of water per minute.
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Jul 7, 2019 04:33
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To be fair, you guys are talking about urban and suburban California. Most of the rest of the country is a hell of a lot different.
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Jul 7, 2019 08:21
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therobit posted:To be fair, you guys are talking about urban and suburban California. Most of the rest of the country is a hell of a lot different. It might be an “East coast West coast” thing too. I’m up in the northeast.
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Jul 7, 2019 13:36
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I'm in the Bay Area and had no trouble with the building department when I added a workshop in my back yard. They patiently rejected three sets of plans I made up, accepted the fourth with amendments, and the inspectors were friendly and timely. 
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Jul 7, 2019 14:57
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All the worst code stories where I am involve the power company dictating what you can and can't do on their lake.
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Jul 7, 2019 15:37
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beep-beep car is go posted:The thing that I just don't get is that has he ever called the building department? They LOVE to hear from you, especially when you haven't done anything yet. They go out of their way to explain what you need to do and how, and usually have the forms ready to go. It literally takes 30 minutes to make it legal, and then you never have to worry. I've called my local building department with all kinds of weird questions and they've never been anything but helpful and thankful that I'm not just ye-hawing it out in my yard without talking to someone first. Not here they don't.... the people behind the desk get super annoyed whenever you ask them for anything. It took them 6 weeks to approve a standard water heater swap. The actual inspectors are great, it's just the office staff is terrible. Every time I've been there, I've gotten the "why are you hear, where's your contractor?" question. The zoning department is terrible as well.. I need a permit to get a POD. It's limited to 30 days, and cannot be placed in your front yard for whatever reason. I go to get a permit, and it gets rejected because there's a drainage easement running under my side yard. Their exact words were "what if we need access"... as if they're going to come and dig up my driveway again this year to replace the concrete pipes. Not to mention the POD is movable...
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Jul 7, 2019 16:15
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Southern New Jersey: when I designed & built my garage, the township code people made it quite clear to me that they weren't in the advice business, and they went on to do exactly that - say jack-poo poo. I think that they were pissed because I was not employing a contractor, except for the concrete work (slab & footings) and the roof shingles - probably because they knew most of the local contractors & consequently would not have to pay much attention to the work/inspection. Even so, the framing code guy almost got into a fistfight with my mason, after the second time he failed their site prep (depth) while the mixer was sitting in the street with a hot load (cement plant is 15-minutes from my house). The mason was not a known local. I did get advice from the electrical code guy after I got caught without pulling an electric permit (since the garage was fed from the house via buried line, I was afraid they'd fail my house's 1974 Wadsworth panel (he did) as well as the years & years of changes I'd made while pulling the hybrid knob & tube/romex idiocy installed with the panel in '74 (he did not!)). The electric guy kept pushing contractors he knew for the panel replacement, while "strongly discouraging" me to attempt it myself. I did it myself anyway, because a) $110 for a Siemens panel+breakers trumped $2500 for an electrician, and b) I had a service disconnect between the meter & the panel. The best advice I received about replacing the panel was to keep all of the leads in the box as neat and easy to follow as possible, with right-angles into the breakers, etc. and to avoid a rat's nest. The electrical code guy was very impressed with this and signed off after giving me a short list of things I had to add (such as grounded clips on my metal juction boxes). PainterofCrap fucked around with this message at 17:08 on Jul 7, 2019 |
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Jul 7, 2019 17:03
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PainterofCrap posted:Southern New Jersey: when I designed & built my garage, the township code people made it quite clear to me that they weren't in the advice business, and they went on to do exactly that - say jack-poo poo. You should've sued them.
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Jul 7, 2019 19:01
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I had a very different experience with my county electrical inspector.. Was adding a subpanel to my detached garage. He emailed me the relevant portions of the NEC to follow since I was doing it myself. (though I already knew this) And asked me not to bury the cable run to the garage until inspection. He was very professional about it, didn't try to recommend or push a electrician. Other than pointing out I forgot 2 retention clips going into the subpanel, I passed on the first try.
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Jul 7, 2019 20:34
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PainterofCrap posted:Southern New Jersey: when I designed & built my garage, the township code people made it quite clear to me that they weren't in the advice business, and they went on to do exactly that - say jack-poo poo. I'm surprised they let you do the work yourself since a lot of places will require that a licensed electrician do something as big as replacing a panel.
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Jul 8, 2019 14:11
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Bird in a Blender posted:I'm surprised they let you do the work yourself since a lot of places will require that a licensed electrician do something as big as replacing a panel. I thought that homeowners were legally allowed to do whatever to their own homes? It's when you do work on other properties that you have to be licensed.
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Jul 8, 2019 15:24
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TooMuchAbstraction posted:I guess it's not surprising that the FIRE crowd would be full of libertarians. Forgive me for asking (and feel free to mock me for asking) but what does “FIRE” mean? Googling “FIRE bad construction” gives one loads of legal advice about firing contractors. 
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Jul 8, 2019 15:32
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Financial Independence Retire EarlyTooMuchAbstraction posted:I thought that homeowners were legally allowed to do whatever to their own homes? It's when you do work on other properties that you have to be licensed. A homeowner can't go against code just because they own the place. Well, I guess they can because the city is unlikely to find out about it if it's a small thing, but they're going to have a hell of a time selling the place.
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Jul 8, 2019 15:41
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there wolf posted:All the worst code stories where I am involve the power company dictating what you can and can't do on their lake. you've obviously never lived on/tried to orchestrate events on a Corps of Engineers administered body of water.
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Jul 8, 2019 15:48
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Ripoff posted:Forgive me for asking (and feel free to mock me for asking) but what does “FIRE” mean? Financially Independent, Retire Early demographics skew pretty heavily to white men in finance or well-paid tech jobs who can afford to save substantial amounts of money every year from their early 20's. The idea of "don't blow money on dumb crap, save more" isn't bad, but the crowd can be pretty sanctimonious and oblivious about it.
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Jul 8, 2019 15:50
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Ripoff posted:Forgive me for asking (and feel free to mock me for asking) but what does “FIRE” mean? Bird in a Blender provided the expansion of the acronym, but basically it means "make $1.5-2 million by your mid-40's and then retire to someplace with a lowish cost of living, and live off the returns on your invested money". Bird in a Blender posted:A homeowner can't go against code just because they own the place. Well, I guess they can because the city is unlikely to find out about it if it's a small thing, but they're going to have a hell of a time selling the place. Yeah, anything against code has to be brought up to code to sell the place, assuming it's noticed by the inspection of course. But as far as I'm aware, you can't be compelled to hire other people to do work on your house; doing it yourself is always an option.
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Jul 8, 2019 15:53
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Ripoff posted:Forgive me for asking (and feel free to mock me for asking) but what does “FIRE” mean? Financial independence, retire early. Get a high paying job, live frugally, plow your money into investments, judge people who can't manage a 75% savings rate for being The guy who writes that blog is a big name in that space. He is of course all about showing off how he does things the frugal way. Any suburban dad DIY projects are, of course, the frugal option, because otherwise he'd be paying somebody to do it.
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Jul 8, 2019 15:53
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TooMuchAbstraction posted:I thought that homeowners were legally allowed to do whatever to their own homes? It's when you do work on other properties that you have to be licensed. I assume this is going to vary substantially based on locale. I think that a homeowner can do anything here, for instance, but they need prior approval from the inspector before they start work. So you have to tell them what you are doing, have the inspector ok the changes, and then do the work and have it reviewed - I assume that this is to stop homeowners going balls out on some idiot project and killing themselves before an inspector can show up and tell them it's all hosed.
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Jul 8, 2019 15:54
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TooMuchAbstraction posted:
Probably depends on local laws/jurisdiction. I'm required by county law to maintain a service contract from an approved vendor for our septic system (long story short, when these systems were put in during the 80's, they were designed and installed incorrectly and if not maintained properly, can have adverse environmental impacts). I don't really know how strictly it's enforced, but there's always the potential I could get hit with a fine if I don't have an active contract. The county does semi-annual testing of our discharge, so maybe if the numbers came up bad and they asked for proof I could be hit with the penalty.
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Jul 8, 2019 15:56
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Recently moved and noticed a lovely smell of drains in the kitchen, first time figured it was just a blocked/dirty pipe and cleaned it. Second time thought it was maybe the washing machine. Third time had a proper look at the actual pipework under the sink and hey hang on a sec, why is the drain off the sink on that side of the trap? Looks like the genius that installed it took two appliance feeds and the half sink, joined them and ran them to the trap, then out another junction and connected the main sink to it and then out to the drain, so there's now no trap between the drain and the sink.  Also any vertical distance covered was done by joining spacers together so there's a run of like 5 of them just chained together. Both appliance pipes also come from the left despite the appliances being either side of the drain. So they actively rerouted pipes to get into this state.
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Jul 8, 2019 16:05
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Powerful Two-Hander posted:Recently moved and noticed a lovely smell of drains in the kitchen, first time figured it was just a blocked/dirty pipe and cleaned it. Second time thought it was maybe the washing machine. Third time had a proper look at the actual pipework under the sink and hey hang on a sec, why is the drain off the sink on that side of the trap? I have this box of fittings and I'll be damned if I'm making a trip to Lowe's and paying another fifteen bucks to do things the right way 
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Jul 8, 2019 16:24
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therobit posted:I have this box of fittings and I'll be damned if I'm making a trip to Lowe's and paying another fifteen bucks to do things the right way For me "I'm not doing another trip to Screwfix for parts" turned to "I'm not doing another trip downstairs for tools" with similar end results.
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Jul 8, 2019 16:42
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You can go hang out in the plumbing aisle at Home Depot to watch unskilled DIYers spending 20 minutes looking at DWV fittings and pipe knowing that they're most likely about to create some kind of drainage abortion.
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Jul 8, 2019 17:54
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B-Nasty posted:You can go hang out in the plumbing aisle at Home Depot to watch unskilled DIYers spending 20 minutes looking at DWV fittings and pipe knowing that they're most likely about to create some kind of drainage abortion. Yep! Mine's still in use 18 months later 
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Jul 8, 2019 18:19
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B-Nasty posted:You can go hang out in the plumbing aisle at Home Depot to watch unskilled DIYers spending 20 minutes looking at DWV fittings and pipe knowing that they're most likely about to create some kind of drainage abortion. With enough adapters, the ordinary homeowner can accomplish anything. And it might even work sometimes. The permitting department around here is generally pretty easy to work with except for the rainwater drainage people, who are nuts.
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Jul 8, 2019 20:15
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B-Nasty posted:You can go hang out in the plumbing aisle at Home Depot to watch unskilled DIYers spending 20 minutes looking at DWV fittings and pipe knowing that they're most likely about to create some kind of drainage abortion. Yes thank you for triggering my PTSD. "Okay, so what you want to do is both stupid and against code, so instead you can spend a few bucks more and do it the correct way..." [Customer dubiously looks at my suggestion] "Well, I'll bring thep arts for both, just in case, okay?" [I smile and nod knowing that everything I found for them will be in the returns basket and they'll do their dumbass juryrig just to save a few bucks in a way they, or the next homeowner, will regret immensely six months down the line] Generally anyone who needs to ask the employees anything but "where is thing" is someone who should not be doing what they're trying to do and should instead get a professional to do it.
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Jul 8, 2019 20:28
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In the past I would go to a hardware store to get parts for a costume or prop build and sometimes there would be someone watching me jam random things together with growing horror until they sidled over to ask what project I might be working on. I was always kind of embarrassed to explain I was just trying to make something that looked like part of a machine/etc, it never occurred to me they might be relieved I wasn't actually planning to try and use my frankenstein collections for something.
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Jul 8, 2019 20:39
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protectionfault posted:With enough adapters, the ordinary homeowner can accomplish anything. And it might even work sometimes. Hey, my HDMI to garden hose adapter doesn't let me stream Netflix to my garden! I demand a refund!
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Jul 8, 2019 20:40
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Methylethylaldehyde posted:Hey, my HDMI to garden hose adapter doesn't let me stream Netflix to my garden! I demand a refund! 
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Jul 8, 2019 20:51
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I'm definitely one of those DIYers, but I am the type that studies documentation carefully and never just bodges something together out of frustration. Plus uh, asking goons on SA is like the cheat code for DIY, so there's that too.
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Jul 8, 2019 20:52
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Same, and I also like to do a lot of...weird? projects that just need an odd assortment of parts to be used for something completely unrelated to their normal purpose, so it means I'm the guy just standing in the plumbing aisle for 20 minutes but if you ask me if I need help and I say I'm just brainstorming, like, I actually mean that, please don't confuse me for the guy who's going to use electrical conduit for his kitchen sink's cold water supply or whatever. Is there like a badge I can get for this actually? Maybe a hi-vis vest like they put on dogs you shouldn't pet?
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Jul 8, 2019 20:57
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I just like to stare at hardware in Lowe's and home depot, it's very meditative.
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Jul 8, 2019 21:04
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Suspect Bucket posted:I just like to stare at hardware in Lowe's and home depot, it's very meditative. Smoke weed sort parts  (I've added about 50 more bins since then)
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Jul 8, 2019 21:14
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What's wrong with a series of 5g buckets you just toss everything into at the end of a project? 
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Jul 8, 2019 21:28
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Ashcans posted:What's wrong with a series of 5g buckets you just toss everything into at the end of a project? My absolute confidence that I KNOW I have a box of 3/8-16x3.5" carriage bolt SOMEWHERE, and damnit I'm not going to spend 20 minutes running to the store for them even if it means spending the next three days searching through the shop, house, and the back of my truck. I put labels on bins even for stuff I don't have, and then when I need one, if the bin is empty, I buy a box. Works great.
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Jul 8, 2019 21:31
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B-Nasty posted:You can go hang out in the plumbing aisle at Home Depot to watch unskilled DIYers spending 20 minutes looking at DWV fittings and pipe knowing that they're most likely about to create some kind of drainage abortion. The company I work for is a chain of "home center"/hardware type stores. (like Home Depot, but smaller). I've seen some poo poo let me tell ya... The absolute worst is when they send their wife/girlfriend in to get some plumbing fittings. Its the same old thing I have seen played out many times. The wife usually doesn't know anything about plumbing, and generally the husband doesn't either. The wife will usually end up handing her cellphone to one of our employees who gets to spend 30+ minutes talking to the husband/person actually doing the job and trying to understand what they are doing. Only for the wife to end up coming back an hour later to get different fittings. If they had just come to the drat store themselves.... Edit: Sharkbite type fittings have made things a lot easier... Instead of people using 4-5 different fittings and adapters to concoct some unholy thing, they end up with one fitting that does the job stevewm fucked around with this message at 21:42 on Jul 8, 2019 |
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Jul 8, 2019 21:34
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Our contractor showed us HD Supply, which is basically home depot except without the customer service/way more wholesale http://www.hdsupplyhis.com/ They basically have literally everything, and we bought like 3-4 doors from them the other day.
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Jul 8, 2019 22:11
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My approach is to stare at the problem, furiously research it, come up with a plan, go to the shop and discover that the either don't have the parts or that I forgot what I needed, get angry, buy something else, go home, try it, gently caress it up, sulk. Edit: I will not be doing this with my sink drain I swear Looks like either the sink outflow could be joined to the top of the existing trap (which is just a u bend) or I could just take it out and replace the whole thing with a new set of un hosed up pipes going into a p trap.
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Jul 9, 2019 00:04
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