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My library rents out a FLIR camera which I'm definitely going to borrow once it gets cold to figure out how bad the insulation is in my house. Are they useful for looking for air leaks too? That's also something I want to look for.
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Oct 30, 2023 14:04
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SpartanIvy posted:You wrapped your fridge but didn't go for an anime waifu design on it? Disgraceful. he kept that for the oil bottle (?) on the counter to the right.
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Oct 30, 2023 14:39
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H110Hawk posted:Do you have any insulation between your ceiling and the attic? Any of your vents seem super anemic? You could just be leaking heat via the ceiling/lights/every poorly sealed hole around various vents and mysteries. Do you mean insulation between the 2nd floor and 3rd (the attic)? I assume that I do. The house is old but was completely flipped in 2019 (I bought just a few months ago from the 2019-2023 owner) with all new insulation, roof, etc. It's fairly comfortable otherwise. The active heating/cooling vent is like all the others, pretty normal. The return vent is larger and passive, so I'm not sure if it's anemic. I can check to see if there's particularly warm air coming out of the recessed ceiling lights (5 of them). Would this potentially broken duct (which would be new from late 2019) be going into the roof, the walls, or what? If it helps narrow down any potential problem, I notice the heat difference when almost at the top of the staircase. The attic sloping ceilings get warm. We have gaming computers there that put out a lot of heat and I'm sure it contributes, but it's definitely warm without anything running as well. Also, this morning, the attic was the coolest room by 1 degree. Now it's the same as the 2nd floor. 46 degrees outside right now, 76 inside both floors without the heat on. Edit: Almost at the top of the staircase, not half past. Edit: if anything, cool air seems to be flowing from the recessed ceiling lights, but only slightly. small butter fucked around with this message at 19:54 on Oct 30, 2023 |
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Oct 30, 2023 17:55
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I'm thinking about upgrading my snow blower and I'm seeking some opinions from owners here. I currently have a 28" Craftsman 277cc from roughly 15 years ago. It's still in great condition and runs perfectly but I really find myself wanting more power and a wider clearing area now that I have a larger driveway. My driveway is flat so would I benefit much from tracks vs. tires? Traction has been an issue because we get a lot of wind and the snow gets very hard. I've been looking mostly at Cub Cadet and Ariens but would be open to looking at other options. Basically any opinions and information is welcomed.
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Oct 30, 2023 18:45
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Anyone know anything about fluorescent light fixtures? We have one in our kitchen and the bulbs recently went out. We tried replacing them but the new bulbs didn't work, and the folks at Home Depot suggested there might be connectivity issues with the ballast and recommended a set of ballast bypass LED bulbs. I read the instructions and this sure seems like something an electrician should do, but an electrician quoted me $375 to install them which I'm pretty shocked by (ha! ha ha! Shocked! I contribute to this comedy forum!). Further googling landed me on a recommendation to just hire someone to fully replace the fluorescent system rather than paying someone a bunch of money to bypass it. I'd love input from anyone with experience with all this, as I'm a newborn baby home owner with absolutely no clue what I'm doing. E: I see there is a wiring thread so I posted this there too. watchoutitsabear fucked around with this message at 19:14 on Oct 30, 2023 |
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Oct 30, 2023 19:08
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watchoutitsabear posted:Anyone know anything about fluorescent light fixtures? We have one in our kitchen and the bulbs recently went out. We tried replacing them but the new bulbs didn't work, and the folks at Home Depot suggested there might be connectivity issues with the ballast and recommended a set of ballast bypass LED bulbs. I read the instructions and this sure seems like something an electrician should do, but an electrician quoted me $375 to install them which I'm pretty shocked by (ha! ha ha! Shocked! I contribute to this comedy forum!). Further googling landed me on a recommendation to just hire someone to fully replace the fluorescent system rather than paying someone a bunch of money to bypass it. I'd love input from anyone with experience with all this, as I'm a newborn baby home owner with absolutely no clue what I'm doing. Its always the ballast going out for me. You can look at the model number on the ballast and just order a replacement, but its about the same job as doing the bypass. The job is technically a breeze, electrician or not, but you just aren't gonna get a skilled laborer out to your house for less than 300 bucks these days in most places, so don't let that price tag scare you into thinking the job is more difficult than it is. It's a 15 minute job that's gonna knock 2 hours out of his day.
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Oct 30, 2023 19:48
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tru-tone has restocked for 2023, if anyone is looking for good C7/C9 LED christmas lights https://tru-tone.com/
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Oct 31, 2023 01:57
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Qwijib0 posted:tru-tone has restocked for 2023, if anyone is looking for good C7/C9 LED christmas lights I bought a bunch of the C7s for my parents last year to replace their 5W incandescents. They're literally perfect, as far as I can tell. I guarantee if I had done it without my parents knowing, they still wouldn't know. Haven't tried the transparent jewel-tone ones, but the painted ones are on point.
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Oct 31, 2023 02:08
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I went to start the lawn tractor today to do some leaf cleanup, but I ran into an issue. It's an early 00's craftsman lt1000 with a Kohler engine. It cranked over like normal for 5-10 seconds without firing, but that's not unusual for it. But then there was a loud pop, more electrical sounding than mechanical. After that, nothing. Battery still has good voltage, 125vdc. I can turn the motor by hand with ease. Is this likely a blown fuse? Bad starter? I'm terrible at troubleshooting electrical issues.
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Oct 31, 2023 02:18
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Qwijib0 posted:tru-tone has restocked for 2023, if anyone is looking for good C7/C9 LED christmas lights I have mine put up for the year already, we’re expecting kid #2 any day now and I figured I may as well make use of free time while I could. They look great
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Oct 31, 2023 03:07
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^^^ Congratulations, goon-Dad! ^^^Qwijib0 posted:tru-tone has restocked for 2023, if anyone is looking for good C7/C9 LED christmas lights Bless you, my child! I keep forgetting to check their page. Just ordered a ton of C9s in green and red. For some reason, I'm running out of red incandescent C9s (I have a metric gently caress-ton of C9s as I decorate my house for the holidays, and also have strings year-round on my garage). I have a zillion in blue  I gave Tru-Tones a try a couple years ago after someone here posted their house/yard. Absolutely sold. Worth the cost as they out-last the incandescents; don't think one has failed yet, although my batch of pink ones are fading badly on the year-round install. We're obviously not alone, as they spend 10-months of the year out of stock.
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Oct 31, 2023 04:16
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I couldn't get tru-tones because 230V land so I had to make my own thing from what 230V stuff I was able to find, not really the right look still but closer. I really like the classic american lights as I am not fond of the boring white light decorations that are the norm here. Maybe I should get a dedicated transformer.
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Oct 31, 2023 05:55
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Absolutely get one. That's how my folks ran American stuff in Switzerland in the '70s, and they are much smaller & more efficient now. We still have one left; I use it to run a Swiss raclette cooker here in the States
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Oct 31, 2023 13:38
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brugroffil posted:I went to start the lawn tractor today to do some leaf cleanup, but I ran into an issue. It's an early 00's craftsman lt1000 with a Kohler engine. The only component that likely to make a pop noise is the starter solenoid. You'll need at least a test light to actually diagnose it. There is undoubtedly at least 5 different videos on youtube of that lawn tractor with someone showing you how.
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Oct 31, 2023 13:40
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Can anyone help me weigh these options for managing a door in our tiny living room? The room the door accesses is an enclosed porch/sunroom area. It has an exterior door as well, but isn’t how we usually get in or out. Right now it’s storage for all the upstairs stuff while the floor is being slowly finished by my broken body. 1) Lazy: cover the door with a couch and move the couch out of the way when we need to get in from the inside. 2) Correct(?): change the door sweep so it opens outwards. The door still gets covered by a couch but this is now easier to access. 3) Expensive: get a carpenter or gc to replace the door or rotate the whole thing, then cover with a couch. I could post a floor plan of this room if anyone wants to dig into the layout more. We have no idea how to manage this space. It’s kind of a hallway with the old fireplace and new wood stove in it. We bought a little wheeled cart and stuck a monitor on there for when we want to watch a movie. Imo the couch is a big problem for this space because it’s a sectional that’s like 11’ long.
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Oct 31, 2023 13:47
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Personally, if all the options end with "cover it with a couch" then I wouldn't do anything to the door at all. Edit: Lazy-beyond-lazy option: take the door off its hinges, put it into the storage room, leave the couch blocking the hole but now you can scramble over it/pass things over it if needed.
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Oct 31, 2023 14:04
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Kylaer posted:Edit: Lazy-beyond-lazy option: take the door off its hinges, put it into the storage room, leave the couch blocking the hole but now you can scramble over it/pass things over it if needed. I had this in one of my college apartments and it was the loving woooooooorst
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Oct 31, 2023 14:09
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PainterofCrap posted:Absolutely get one. That's how my folks ran American stuff in Switzerland in the '70s, and they are much smaller & more efficient now. We still have one left; I use it to run a Swiss raclette cooker here in the States drat now I want raclette
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Oct 31, 2023 14:36
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Season for it is coming...
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Oct 31, 2023 14:55
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Mm raw meat and covid can’t wait
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Oct 31, 2023 14:58
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Qwijib0 posted:tru-tone has restocked for 2023, if anyone is looking for good C7/C9 LED christmas lights If only I had the dollars to buy the quantity I need. Last year I put about 300 lights up on my rooflines. The "Mod Mix" is so pretty but $480 to replace them seems wild since I JUST bought the old ones last year.
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Oct 31, 2023 15:42
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PainterofCrap posted:Season for it is coming... I uh... Didn't know I needed this.
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Oct 31, 2023 17:23
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Probably a dumb question, our hot water pressure / flow has suddenly and noticeably lessened. The heater is fairly new, 1-2 years. It's a very normal tank storage gas fired heater. When it was installed the pressure / flow that we got from it was noticeably worse than the previous one which died, but acceptable. Now it's unacceptable. There's not much to check on it that I can see, the output valve is fully open. The burner is lit and if I turn the thermostat up then it will fire. I haven't messed with the output mixer but in my experience that shouldn't be the cause of low flow. Does anyone have any ideas before I spend half a grand and take a day off work to get a plumber in? VVV Pressure is pathetic everywhere in the house. ~Coxy fucked around with this message at 03:16 on Nov 1, 2023 |
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Nov 1, 2023 02:59
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Is the pressure reduced everywhere, or just one outlet? There's a plumbing thread, which might have some folks that don't read this thread already.
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Nov 1, 2023 03:05
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Any good brands to look for a ceiling fan? Will a ~$200 fan from a box store be fine?
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Nov 1, 2023 03:24
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PainterofCrap posted:Season for it is coming... i dont understand what im looking at. is this some sort of variant of connect 4?
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Nov 1, 2023 03:39
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KoRMaK posted:i dont understand what im looking at. is this some sort of variant of connect 4? It's basically a small broiler that you put above a big slab of cheese. As the cheese starts melting, you "slice" off some melted cheese with a knife onto a piece of bread. I assume the charcuterie there is to put on top. It's just a fun way of eating melty cheese. There's a stand at the farmer's market by me that does raclette on like, baguette sandwiches.
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Nov 1, 2023 03:48
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~Coxy posted:Probably a dumb question, our hot water pressure / flow has suddenly and noticeably lessened. Have you ever flushed it/drained it? Maybe if it's got enough sediment/crud on the bottom it could affect the flow? IDK how far off the bottom the cold inlet is on a water heater though, but just a cheap though of something you may be able to do by yourself.
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Nov 1, 2023 03:55
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~Coxy posted:VVV Pressure is pathetic everywhere in the house.
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Nov 1, 2023 14:36
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The Slack Lagoon posted:Any good brands to look for a ceiling fan? Will a ~$200 fan from a box store be fine? Yeah it’ll be fine. I bought 2 Home Depot brand ones. So many people buy fans that the product designs are pretty straightforward. Because the price point is low, QC is not great so you might need to return it if something is slightly wonky, I had a tiny motor rubbing noise on one. Had to uninstall and replace with return policy. Overall though I’m happy. These are mine! https://www.homedepot.com/p/Home-De...wE&gclsrc=aw.ds
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Nov 1, 2023 14:54
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The Slack Lagoon posted:Any good brands to look for a ceiling fan? Will a ~$200 fan from a box store be fine? Hunter, but not the $200 Hunter's at a big box store. (but ceiling fans are pretty simple and $200 one might likely be fine, it just might not run continuously for 80 years like a good Hunter will)
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Nov 1, 2023 19:42
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Home-adjacent Zone. I've been trying to rework my tiny plot of garden for two years now. This is complicated by an even tinier leach field under half the garden which turned out to actually be a leach pit. My first gardener would show up a bit, work, disappear for a bit, work, and then flaked entirely this summer, leaving me with a big excavated potential landslide on the side of a hill. In September I decided he was absolutely gone for good, and started calling local landscapers to see if they could take over terracing. One out of four called back, and she only does landscaping, not hardscaping or whatever the right word for building terraces is. A few days later, our friendly neighbor who has a guy with an excavator said that he and his guy could put up walls for a specified price, drew up detailed maps of the yard (he's a retired surveyor) and told me how many pinned retaining-wall bricks he needed. I ordered them, and to my shock they can be here next week. They could be here this week, but oog no. The local (and only) experts on septic systems showed up two weeks ago, said frankly that they've never had to try to build a system on a lot this small, and that if we can't come to an arrangement with the neighbor to build on her land, they'll have to get waivers from the county, the coastal commission, the state, and a whole bunch of others to build a pumpable tank, on the grounds that not allowing this would be equivalent to condemning the property. Right now I am trying to coordinate the well company's coming to fill and abandon a well, the delivery of the bricks, the neighbor's schedule, and the arrival of the expert who is going to try to figure out if it's even possible to build a legal septic system on our lot, and if so how. (He won't be using the area where the garden is, not least because I didn't realize that it was impossible to put a new leach field into new topsoil ) Please, God who smiles on desperate homeowners, make it so that the well guy comes before the brickers start building, and that there is some way to build a legal septic system.
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Nov 1, 2023 22:50
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That sounds like an unbelievably stressful mess. If it were me, I'd hold on everything until the septic is settled, because the other projects may be affected depending on the septic outcome. Neverminding that trying to coordinate multiple disciplines in a small space frequently results in scheduling disasters.
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Nov 2, 2023 12:27
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EVERYWHERE 
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Two of our bedrooms for some strange reason have the overhead lights either in a corner or near the bedroom doorway. They originally had a directional spotlight which kinda suck. A flush dome or something similar seems like an easy replacement and better than nothing but I'm trying find a light fixture that can be a bit more directional without being a spotlight and the only thing I've been able to come up with are track lights but those don't seem ideal either. Anyone have any suggestions? The bedrooms are about 120sqft so not huge.
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Nov 2, 2023 20:16
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Teabag Dome Scandal posted:Two of our bedrooms for some strange reason have the overhead lights either in a corner or near the bedroom doorway. They originally had a directional spotlight which kinda suck. A flush dome or something similar seems like an easy replacement and better than nothing but I'm trying find a light fixture that can be a bit more directional without being a spotlight and the only thing I've been able to come up with are track lights but those don't seem ideal either. Anyone have any suggestions? The bedrooms are about 120sqft so not huge. Will this style track for better for you? It's flexible and can be fed from anywhere. https://www.lowes.com/pd/allen-roth-Sloan-6-Light-96-in-Matt-Black-Dimmable-LED-Flexible-Track-Light-with-Frosted-White-Glass/5013830977 Short of track lighting or hanging a chandelier with a cord swaged up on a hook from your box (don't do this) the answer is to move or add a box where you need it or put in can light, both of which are going to require drywall work.
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Nov 2, 2023 20:31
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Teabag Dome Scandal posted:Two of our bedrooms for some strange reason have the overhead lights either in a corner or near the bedroom doorway. They originally had a directional spotlight which kinda suck. A flush dome or something similar seems like an easy replacement and better than nothing but I'm trying find a light fixture that can be a bit more directional without being a spotlight and the only thing I've been able to come up with are track lights but those don't seem ideal either. Anyone have any suggestions? The bedrooms are about 120sqft so not huge. Is it an older home that maybe didn't have light switches? That would be convenient placement for a pull string fixture in the past. What are your lighting goals? Are you trying for a general light source or task lighting? If it's general you can go with a large ceiling light that is frosted or diffused. Task is going to go to track lighting aimed where you need it. Considering the location information given I have to assume you need general lighting. A large panel light like this provides a big diffused source of light by can be a challenge if there isn't enough clearance from the electrical box, check the install directions if you're interested to see the requirements. https://www.homedepot.com/p/Hampton...25111/304621409 Otherwise something that can provide a wide angle of light will help like this https://www.homedepot.com/p/EnviroL...3C-34/315955696 I'm not saying either of these are particularly high quality fixtures, just that they are of the type I am thinking. I have no direct experience with either. I must also assume based on your writing that you're not comfortable or not authorized to add fixtures, which would open a world of possibilities up.
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Nov 2, 2023 20:34
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Can anyone recommend a smart 3 way light switch that doesn't require a neutral? I thought the switch I was replacing had a neutral but it was actually tied to the switch next to it and they're on different circuits.
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Nov 2, 2023 21:31
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wandler20 posted:Can anyone recommend a smart 3 way light switch that doesn't require a neutral? I thought the switch I was replacing had a neutral but it was actually tied to the switch next to it and they're on different circuits. They're on different breakers? Because "tie all the neutrals together" is correct for same breakers. Maybe post a picture in the wiring thread?
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Nov 2, 2023 22:03
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H110Hawk posted:They're on different breakers? Because "tie all the neutrals together" is correct for same breakers. They're on different breakers, yes. Basically I'm just looking for a switch recommendation that doesn't require a neutral.
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Nov 2, 2023 22:12
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wandler20 posted:They're on different breakers, yes. Basically I'm just looking for a switch recommendation that doesn't require a neutral. There is a thread favorite in the home automation thread (Inovelli?) but I can't recall for sure. https://forums.somethingawful.com/showthread.php?threadid=3635963
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Nov 2, 2023 22:14
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