What "man jobs" have you done today?
- Thread starter jaybee
- Start date
It could be older paint but many modern solvent based paints take a long time to dry. I repainted aluminium patio furniture with the solvent based version of Hammerite this year and had to keep the parts in my garage for 3 to 4 days before moving them outside and they didn't fully harden for a week.
If the weather isn't damaging them I would just wait as using anything to accelerate the process isn't going to work well on thicker paint.
Soldato
Yep...
Wr have a silly amount of huge Segestria Florentina (Tube Web Spiders), but slowly being replaced/eaten by the more aggressive False Widows...
Paid a man to clean the windows (well, he was doing the house and it was £10 more to get bifolds done inside/out). A bargain considering how much washing up liquid I had on them to get the seals in nicely.
Also spent some time messing around with my spare ESP32, so now my bluetooth thermometer is online and reporting in HomeAssistant. It reckons its only 16 degrees in here but it feels really quite pleasant... I have just ordered a self-install Split A/C tho.
Also spent some time messing around with my spare ESP32, so now my bluetooth thermometer is online and reporting in HomeAssistant. It reckons its only 16 degrees in here but it feels really quite pleasant... I have just ordered a self-install Split A/C tho.
The fun comes in autumn when the brown house spiders decide to go looking for a mate.. I've had one in a pint glass (2/3 of the pint glass diameter) rear up and heard the 'chink' of teeth on the glass. Paper underneath and it got ejected out the window
Soldato
Thanks gents. I'll give it some more time.
Soldato
Moved over 4 tonnes of grit (/sharp) sand and cement ( 171bags) into position ready for mixing. I'll be doing a 5:1 mix with a little plasticiser in it.
Ive bought some prebagged larson primer rather than mixing my own primer with SBR.
Ive bought some prebagged larson primer rather than mixing my own primer with SBR.
Caporegime
- Joined
- 13 Nov 2006
- Posts
- 26,382
Is this your first time doing groundwork etc?
Soldato
Yeah never done it before. Tiled a couple walls in house before tho
Caporegime
- Joined
- 13 Nov 2006
- Posts
- 26,382
How are you finding it? First time using a whacker etc?
How come you had to buy stuff in small bags?
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Soldato
Seems fine. There is a lot of misinformation on YouTube but pavingexpert.com covers most topics.
Whacker plate was fine. I suppose I have seen them before as I work in a civils/construction related engineering but on the design side. The one I got was **** and the starter cord was a *******!
That look redicMoved over 4 tonnes of grit (/sharp) sand and cement ( 171bags) into position ready for mixing. I'll be doing a 5:1 mix with a little plasticiser in it.
Ive bought some prebagged larson primer rather than mixing my own primer with SBR.
Made a start on the loft while I wait for bits to be delivered. Fitted another two 5ft LED battens only to discover that they are a different temperature to the ones I fitted a few years ago. Ah well, it's only the loft!
Started to rip up the old chipboard flooring. Seems a bit of a waste but they are knackered, the previous installer did nail them down
.
The horrors I've uncovered...
Ignoring the evidence of mice for second, cutting the joists to run cables rather than drilling a hole is bad enough but to use a screw to retain them?! Now they decide to use screws?!
With the movement of the house (and mice!), if that had eventually cut through past the insulation and shorted it would have been a difficult fault to find at best; a fire at the worst. Why would they even think this was acceptable?
Started to rip up the old chipboard flooring. Seems a bit of a waste but they are knackered, the previous installer did nail them down
. The horrors I've uncovered...
Ignoring the evidence of mice for second, cutting the joists to run cables rather than drilling a hole is bad enough but to use a screw to retain them?! Now they decide to use screws?!
With the movement of the house (and mice!), if that had eventually cut through past the insulation and shorted it would have been a difficult fault to find at best; a fire at the worst. Why would they even think this was acceptable?
Soldato
Wires meant to be 50mm below surface though. Less of an issue when wires are exposed, but if boarding the joists, it'd be too easy to put a screw through the wires.
Soldato
Here's hoping I haven't over ordered!That look redic
It’s a loft joist, not a floor joist. The loft joists are probably only 70mm in total, there isn’t 50mm from the top or bottom. The correct approach is to raise the floor for loft boards, they shouldn’t have needed to notch or put a cable through them and being realistic, without cutting the cable and rejoining it, they aren’t going to be putting it through the joist anyway.
My point was more about the joist probably isn’t structurally compromised but it can be reinforced easily if you are concerned.
Soldato
Replaced a cartridge in the office tap, after some weeks of intermittent dripping.
Ooh, I'm such an outlaw. Supposed to phone an expensive handyman!
Ooh, I'm such an outlaw. Supposed to phone an expensive handyman!
My ceiling joists are 125mm but regardless, it's a valid point about the cables being initially run over the joists prior to the loft flooring being installed. They've notched them to allow the cables to run flat under the floor boards which is quite typical, thanks for the clarification. The use of screws to retain them though - each time the boards were walked on pressed the screws in to the cable if the were not lower that the top of the joist.
The horrors continue, this one I knew about. When the previous owners installed an ensuite they put an extractor fan in the ceiling, however rather than extracting the warm and very moist air to the outside they thought it would be acceptable to just vent it in to the loft insulation. As the insulation was covered by the loft boards, this caused moisture to condense and fester to create mould on the underside of the loft boards. This wasn't found during the building survey, or at least mentioned.
A while ago I fitted the extractor ducting seen in the top right of the image as a temporary fix as I knew the loft boards would need replacing eventually.
I should start a thread on this escapade, who knows what else I'll find! Mummified remains of the last owner?!
Interestingly we had all of the ducting in place, but the hot air was condensing in the loft pipe. Meaning it was full of water constantly. Ended up having to insulate the pipe and installing a stronger fan to push the air outside before it condenses.