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I have a sump pump in my crawlspace that discharges fairly regularly, and as a result there's a spot by my house that's saturated with water to the point where it's basically a pile of mud. The sump pump discharges on the surface into a bed of gravel, but beyond the gravel (about 3-4') is where it gets muddy. It's a high traffic area and I'd like to move the discharge somewhere else. I was thinking about a dry well, but I wanted to know if there are any better alternatives. Can you guys recommend some resources to check out?
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May 23, 2011 17:01
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General_Failure posted:Our hot water heater is near the bathroom. Almost right outside the wall. In the past few months or so the cold water runs very warm / hot for a few seconds. Why is this happening? How water heaters have little flapper valves in them to prevent backflushing, but it's possible that those valves have degraded. When I was installing my grandfather's water heater I noticed the valves were just little pieces of plastic. Do the cold water lines going in to the heater feel warm if you haven't used any water in awhile?
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Jun 5, 2011 07:11
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The SARS Volta posted:I'm moving into a new apartment tomorrow; it's a newly renovated unit in a 100-year-old mansion. Can you ask for a new door? I would think that's a security risk. Otherwise maybe a really thick piece of adhesive-backed foam rubber weather stripping?
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Jun 11, 2011 02:55
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Already Bored posted:Does anyone know what kind of PVC was used for this sculpture: How do you know it was PVC? In my experience there's two major types of PVC. Type I is chemically resistant and commonly used in plumbing and other applications. Type II is impact resistant and used for structural applications. For your purposes I doubt it would matter which you use. What are you trying to accomplish? Usually it's sold in sheets, bars, or rods.
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Jun 22, 2011 16:11
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Already Bored posted:It says so on his site (and a couple other websites that reported on it). Interesting concept. How thick is the PVC? Is it a PVC tarp that's filled with air?
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Jun 23, 2011 01:40
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Already Bored posted:The sculpture in the image I linked to is a PVC tarp filled with air, yes. You can actually go inside it, too. For my own project I wouldn't be inflating it. Well skeletons are rigid by definition, so I'm not sure exactly what you're going for here. I mean if the "skin" is thin PVC (most tarps are only a few thousandths of an inch thick) then you would need something rigid to stretch the skin over and give it shape. Or do you mean a flexible material that you could bend into unusual shapes and allow it's natural elasticity to keep the shape? Like bending a springy piece of metal? If I had to guess I'd say that what the artist did was use CAD to create an inflated shape that he then had custom cut out of strips of PVC material. It's probably somewhat thicker than a tarp in order to preserve the shape and mitigate the possibility of leaks. The artist then had the strips welded together (probably a thermal weld, although a really good solvent weld might work) and the structure was pressurized.
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Jun 24, 2011 15:38
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Already Bored posted:Yeah I could use a malleable metal that is capable of being bent into shape. Tin's fairly expensive and won't hold its shape. You could consider a platic with a low softening temperature like styrene, something that you could soften with a heat gun or an oven and then form into shape with your hands. Wear gloves while you do it. Another option would be to consider casting. Depending on the size of the application you could cut molds out of styrofoam, spray with a mold release agent, and then pour in a urethane or resin compound. Might get expensive though. There's always wood. It's cheap, easily cut with consumer tools, and is rigid. It wouldn't be too hard to cut a form out of a piece of plywood and then use a router to make multiple copies of the shape to make multiple ribs. For the skin a heat-shrink application would be cool. Something like what's being described in this link. Apparently PVC film will shrink when heat between 200F and 275F is applied to it. If you visit McMaster and search for "Heat Shrink" you'll find some other plastics. Experiment!
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Jun 25, 2011 15:30
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Kaluza-Klein posted:Gross question, but the cat proudly took out a mouse last night, and I've noticed now that there are some nice blood stains on the carpet. Pretty heavy :/. My wife and I have decided that the combination of Resolve and Nature's Mircale is quite simply the greatest carpet cleaning solution known to man. It works on everything our pets throw (or otherwise deliver) at us.
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Jul 19, 2011 15:53
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jackpot posted:Two story house, 1,740sqft. Richmond, Virginia in the middle of summer is hot as hell, it's been upper 90's for most of the past month. Two outside AC units cooling it, info plate posted below. Put simply, they're doing a lovely job. There's a separate thermostat for each floor - both are set to 70, but the last time we saw 70 degrees in the house was when it was cloudy/rainy for about four days straight. Downstairs has floor vents, upstairs has ceiling vents. Upstairs is generally pretty comfortable, especially at night; I think it hits around 72. Downstairs loving sucks. Last night it was 80 when I went to bed. I can feel cold air coming out of the upstairs vents, but I can only feel a trickle of cool air coming out downstairs; mostly I only know the downstairs is working because the vents themselves are cool to the touch. The units seem to run all the time; our electric bill for last month was $400. You have two completely separate systems cooling your home? How old are the units? I'm not super experienced with HVAC, but the exchangers might need to be cleaned. How often do you swap out your intake filters?
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Aug 8, 2011 16:56
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hayden. posted:Would a motor from a sewing machine be strong enough to power a small potter's wheel? I figured it'd be convenient because it'd already be wired for using a foot pedal. I could see that working if you used a belt drive to slow it down some. Sewing machine motors turn really drat fast.
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Aug 15, 2011 21:13
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heyou posted:How can I tell if a wall is load bearing? I'm thinking about taking down a wall on the second floor, because the bedroom that it creates is pretty tiny. Removing this L-shaped wall would create 3 usable bedrooms, and upstairs den/rec room area. I'm not an expert, but I'm pretty sure you'll need an engineer to review the original plans. A building permit is going to most likely be required. It's possible that the wall is load bearing and there's a beam underneath it that allows for the open room underneath, or there was supposed to be a load bearing wall underneath it and it was removed during a renovation.
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Aug 17, 2011 16:13
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| # ¿ May 8, 2024 16:04 |
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The mortar in a section of the brick foundation underneath my garage (looks like it's a concrete slab with brick lining the outside) is cracked. What's the best way to patch it?
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Sep 1, 2011 14:48
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