Life as a sponge.

I don't know what it is about me that attracts water. I'm not even a great fan of Spongebob Squarepants. But  dammit if the water doesn't find me where ever I may be.

A couple of months ago I noticed an unusually wet spot in the middle of the yard. We had no rain in the previous couple of months and this spot was not at a low point in the lawn. A couple of days after I noticed this spot, the lawn guys cut the grass. I'm surprised that they didn't raise hell, because judging from the size of the hole they fell into the mower had to be stuck. 

Upon investigation I discovered that it wasn't a sinkhole, but a "junction box" for the septic system drain field piping. And of course, in typical contractor fashion the freakin' box was ABS (soft) PLASTIC. It's a wonder someone didn't put a foot through the damned thing.

So I dug all around it, framed it up and poured a concrete box around the junction. I then bought a cement stepping stone large enough to cover the opening and laid it on top. Now I have access to the drain pipes so that I can snake them out when necessary and keep the system working as it should. And I don't have to worry about the riding mower falling through again.

Ok, let's take a look at what we've had so far:

Solenoid on fridge- check.

Busted pipe in wall- check.

Leaking roof- check

Septic drain issues- check

What else could go wrong?  Hah!

After several months of no rain whatsoever, tropical storm Debbie decided to grace us with 6 or 7 days straight rain, rain and more rain. Heavy rain. During a lull in one of the downpours I went out to the shed (my workshop) and discovered that the many of the screws holding the tin on the roof had worked loose and water was pouring in onto everything. So what did I have to do? I got on the roof with a bucket of tar and took out each screw, tarred the hole, and put the screw back in tight. An hour or so later (and 20 pounds heavier from my clothes being soaked) I had everything water-tight once again.

Only to have my wife inform me that we had some water spots forming on the ceiling in the bedroom. *sigh* Due to the fact that it was now rather late in the evening, I told her I'd check it the next day after work, which I did. I found that the AC drain line was stopped up, and the switch that's supposed to shut off the compressor when the water backs up in the drain was not working. So the water was dripping through the insulation and eventually to the sheetrock of the ceiling.

Now one wouldn't think that this is much of an issue, right? Just unstop the line and everything is fine you say. But the idiots that installed the drain line on the AC did it the same way that all of the AC people seem to do it.... without any concern for the person who has to unstop the drain. The way things are set up looks like this:

You have the AC unit with a drain line and a "T" installed on it. The "T" has a removable plug so that you can "clean out" the line. Yeah, right. There is no good way to get anything into that tiny hole at a 90' angle which would be effective in removing the slime clog. And you can't really blow it out because the slime builds up in the drain line past the "T" and not so much between the "T" and the AC Unit. So if you try to blow it out, the air goes down the path of least resistance, which is back to the AC Unit, effectively negating the effort to blow the slime out of the drain.

After having to do this once before, I decided to make it user friendly so that next time I was in the attic sweating and trying not to fall through the ceiling I would be able to get the drain blown clean and get out quickly. I went to the local hardware and picked up the fittings I needed, came home, and put together the ideal junction for doing this sort of thing:

I made an "H" junction using two "T" fittings (bottom image). On the end of each "T" not connected to the main line I put a 45' elbow, which gives plenty of angle to insert an air hose or even a clean-out fish (top image).  With a plug in each elbow the air integrity is maintained as well. So now I can clean out the line between the unit and the junction, and from the junction to the outside. Both can be accessed with ease. Disconnecting them at the point shown allows me to insert a plug so that compressed air can be used to clean out either section of line without having the air take the path of least resistance, but instead pushing out the blockage.

Now, instead of running hose from the air compressor through the house and into the attic to blow out the drain I can simply take a small air tank with a ball valve (for a blast of air) and a hose that fits snugly into the 45' elbows that I installed up into the attic to take care of the problem. 

Total spent in parts- $4. Why the HELL can't they do this kind of thing in the first place? I'll tell you why- so that they can charge you $95 to come out and clear the line for you. Now all I have to do is replace the defective switch and the ceiling shouldn't get any further spots :)

*Edit- I put plywood in the attic this morning so that I'm not balancing on the rafters when I have to work in the attic. While I was up there I took a pic of the new fitting that shows it better than my primitive drawings :)

When it rains, it pours...

And now I know why.

Today I decided to finish working on the eaves of the house. I started on them last year. I know, I know.... it should have been done already. But I went to sleep and when I woke up a year had gone by and the eaves still weren't finished being repaired. (To be fair, the wife is very efficient when it comes to planning things for us to do on my day off.) Anyway, today was the day to finish.

I pulled out the scaffold, ladder and tools. I ripped out the bad soffit and I was greeted with this:

If you aren't sure what you're looking at, it's the underside of the roof sheathing. And it shouldn't be wet and rotted like this. So instead of just working on the soffit I decided to replace the sheathing. This involves removing shingles, tar paper, etc, then cutting out the bad sheathing and replacing it. Then you have to replace the drip edge, tar paper, flashing, and finally the shingles. I've not replaced shingles before. I know how to install them initially, but I haven't had the opportunity to replace damaged ones on an existing roof. This was going to be fun.

Here's another shot of the damaged area (from below):

First step: remove the shingles from the affected area-

Next step: Remove the felt/tar paper to expose the wood- and guess what I find!

The idiots that put the roof on put the flashing ON TOP of the upper layer of tar paper instead of under it. You can clearly see the bump in the flashing that was allowing water to run straight down onto the wood. Like making a funnel for the rain to run into the walls. Freakin' idiots! Once I removed that flashing, the wood underneath it just fell apart.

And the view from the bottom:

Moving forward: Remove the bad sheathing-

After removing the bad wood, I "sistered" some 2x4's to the existing so that I would have a place to nail the new wood down on the left and to level the board on the right that was water damaged on the top. You can see the added boards in the photo above.

Next I put the new plywood in place:

Next: Tar paper, starter course of shingle, and flashing. I also put in a new drip edge before adding the preceding items. The drip edge has to go on first :)

It's not perfect, but it's not bad either. And it shouldn't leak. Now for the fun part.... tying in the new shingles to the old. This is the part I was unsure of but it turned out fairly well.

You can see a slight "hill" on the left where I tied into the existing shingles. I think I should have taken out a bit more, but wasn't sure. Apparently I should have :) All in all it's not bad for a first time with no guidance. The new shingles are some that came with the house so I'm assuming that's what the old ones looked like when they were first installed. It's about time for a new roof- there are issues in other places as well. I'm thinking about taking a week or so off and replacing the roof myself. I'm confident that I can do it, but I hate to try to tackle that by myself. I hate paying someone to do it even more :)

I'm in hot water! *sigh*

I just changed restaurant locations a couple of weeks ago, so in order to determine the true strengths and weaknesses of the new location I worked a week of night shifts. This means that Saturday I went to work at 6:30 pm and got home Sunday at 5:15 am. After sleeping 3 hours I got my butt out of bed so that I could spend my day off doing things for work that can only be done at home. (I had some sandblasting and brazing of various parts that needed to be completed.)

During the process of setting up the sand blaster I heard a strange hissing noise at the corner of the house. Upon closer inspection I found a steady stream of water rolling out from under the wood paneling that covers the outside of the home. I went inside and found a big wet patch of drywall (kind of oxymoronic, eh?) and a puddle forming on the floor. Just what I needed.... a leak inside of the wall.

I grabbed my sheetrock hole-saw from my truck and cut out a nice square patch around the wet spot and was immediately greeted by a jet of water gushing from a hole in the copper pipe. It was the hot water return line leaking, so we should have been able to at least have cold water for coffee making and toilet flushing while I worked on repairing the bad pipe. Hah. Fat chance. The freakin' cheap valve that they put on the inlet refused to turn completely off..... the water would have to be shut off at the meter.* (I really hate those cheap valves. Hate them!)

So I gathered up the wife and kids and it was off to Lowe's. I really like Lowe's :)

Since I had enough 1/2" pipe in the shop, all I really needed were a pair of couplings. But I figured that as long as the water was off, I should go ahead and replace the cheap valve with a nice ball valve that will outlast the water heater, and perhaps even the house itself. I didn't have any 3/4" pipe or fittings on hand, so I ended up spending about $40 total for two 1/2" couplings, four 3/4" elbows, a 24" length of 3/4" copper pipe and some emery cloth for cleaning all of the connections for soldering. Everything else I needed I already had.

Next step- cut the offending valve out of the line and drain enough water from the heater to make sure it wasn't in the way of the soldering. I also vacuumed out the lower pipes with the shop vacuum before I started working with the heat. If you don't have adequate space between any water in the line and the heat source steam is created which will absolutely prevent a solid solder joint from being able to form. I cut and dry fit all parts, then pulled them out and cleaned / fluxed everything before putting it back together. Fifteen minutes later it was time to turn on the water main and check for leaks.

No leaks! None! ~happy dance~ Disaster averted, and I'm figuring that since it's Sunday if I had called a plumber the bill would have come in at roughly $230 give or take a few.

I like not spending money I don't have to :)

*The funny thing here? A couple of weeks ago I spent a few hours in the shop making a big wrench for turning off the water main. Yes, you can buy them for next to nothing, but I enjoyed making it. When I showed it to the wife she says "What would you possibly need a water wrench for?". I reminded her of that today :)

Consolidation

I am working on a new movement. It will save countless millions of dollars for the country and every municipality in it! The movement could possibly be considered a stroke of genius due to the simplicity and effectiveness of the idea.

The concept came to me while I was working. It was supposed to be a normal morning but it seemed unusually slow for a Saturday. This meant that it would be very busy later in the day. I asked the crew if anything was happening in the area that would explain the slow start and they told me that there was an MLK parade happening in a nearby municipality. Last Saturday there was an MLK parade in the town where we are located and it was CRAZY busy. We were in for another crazy day.

Then I started thinking.... why the hell do they have separate parades on different days? It's not like the parades are money makers for the towns. On the contrary- they cost the towns tons of money when you consider blocking the roads, police presence required, emergency personnel presence required, stores losing business while the parade is going on because no one can get to them, etc, etc.

So why not just have "Parade Day" every year? On January 1st (while the children are out of school, many parents are off, etc.) each city could have as many parades as they care to fit into the day. After that, no more parades for the rest of the year. That would give them a solid time frame to budget for each year, businesses would be able to plan for that day, and by wrapping all celebrations into one day across the nation billions of dollars would be saved.

Just consider it.... you could have the Christmas parade, followed by MLK parades, Superbowl parades, Mardi Gras parades, and wrap it all up with a New Year's parade. Towns and cities close to each other could have alternating events so that everyone has a chance to see whatever flavor of parade they care to watch.

And when it's over you've paid overtime to the Police one time, you've inconvenienced Emergency personnel one time, you've paid to have the streets cleaned one time- and then it's done for the year.

Next move: Consolidate holidays :)

Do it right the first time.

I understand that there are times when you just have to take shortcuts. I have no issue with this if you go back at some point in the near future to make sure whatever you have rigged is done properly.

I built out a restaurant- my own. With the experience gained from years of working in food I made sure to spend a little extra up front so that I wouldn't have issues years down the road. When I put in the cooler, I put in two cooling units instead of just one. This had a dual effect: the units didn't have to work as hard to keep the cooler at temp, and when one of them went down (as will happen with refrigeration) the other was perfectly capable of holding temp while the other was being repaired. When the AC units were installed, I made sure that the drain lines had cleanouts on them that were easy to access since the slime and muck builds up quickly here in the south. All of the water supplies inside had ball valves instead of the little cheap kind they put on everything now so I wouldn't ever have to worry about replacing a leaky on/off valve. The electric lines were run to the breaker panel and hooked up in specific order so that quadrants of the panels controlled quadrants of the store. (Electricians usually just run all of the wires to the panel, hook them up, and then figure out what each breaker controls.) The bottom 18" of every wall in the store was 1/2" pressure treated plywood instead of sheetrock so that I would never have to worry about water damage. I used expanding foam insulation on the bottom 18", and standard fiberglass in the rest of the wall space to negate the possibility of mold if water did get in. There were many other small things that I did while I was building it out to insure that I wouldn't have to spend money on repairs in the future.

Which brings me to the house I'm currently in.

When I got here, there was a non-working wireless doorbell system decorating the walls. So when I did some repair work on the front of the house I ran wire for a proper doorbell. When I went to install the doorbell, I discovered live wires in a hole in the hallway where a doorbell should go. I asked the wife why her ex hadn't installed a proper doorbell, and she said that he told her that there weren't enough wires to make it work. (There were two wires, all you need is two wires.) So I traced the wires to the source and found the transformer which was fully functional, put in the new doorbell, and everything works as it should. Cost? $12.00 for the doorbell and button, as opposed to the $19-$24 someone spent on a useless wireless system. Do it right the first time.

Last weekend I decided that I should check to see if the dryer vent and element needed cleaning. I asked the wife when they were cleaned last, to which she responded "It was installed 12 years ago, and since it was new I'm pretty sure it was clean then." I was astounded when I opened the unit. There was an 8" layer of lint in the bottom of the dryer, and a 2" heat blackened layer on top of the heating element. A fire waiting to happen. Clean your dryer annually! It's very easy to do and doesn't take that long.

This weekend the wife told me that she was worried that someone would break into the dungeon (computer room) through the window where the AC unit is housed. I tried to tell her that any burglar with a modicum of intelligence would simply tap out a window pane and open any other window rather than move the air conditioner unit but she would not be swayed. So after replacing the rotted support structure with pressure treated wood (which will likely outlast the AC unit) I removed the rotted plywood that was duct taped on each side of the unit and custom cut two pieces of 1/4" steel to fit the spaces. Sanded, primed, painted and drilled the steel. Screwed the panels in place making it a 30 minute job to remove everything when the AC dies and has to be replaced, but the wife is happy since a burglar definitely won't break into this window. I also put in a vapor barrier to keep the steel from rusting due to condensation, and then I insulated and put in custom plexiglass panels on top of the insulation to make it all air tight and aesthetically pleasing on the inside. Do it right the first time.

So many other little things that would alleviate issues as a home ages.... like using proper lags and screws on the thresholds instead of just trying to glue them down. Buying drain pipes that are long enough instead of forcing what you had into place when the garbage disposal was installed (improperly, at that.) Leaving enough line for the dishwasher to be pulled out without having to unhook it first. Label the breaker panel, put drip loops in the cable lines that were run. Do it right the first time.

Oh well, at least I have things to work on, and I like the feeling of satisfaction I get when I make things right. But I'd really rather that everyone would do it right the first time ;)

Le Sigh and a Solenoid

Ok, so the posting isn't a continuous stream. Not that I am lacking things to post about... it's just that a few factors prevent most posts from ever reaching my blog.

1: I usually think of something great to post about while I'm working, then promptly forget about it by the time I get home.

2: Many of the posts would be work related and I'm hesitant to put anything like that in a public medium considering the depth to which many companies now dig. One never knows how any particular statement will be taken by a prospective ( or current ) employer.

3: Some parts of my life would be really, really funny but I refuse to post about them on this blog since it's listed on my Facebook account and there are things that I don't care to have casual acquaintances knowing about me.

If it weren't for those three things, I'd have a new post or two every day!

On other fronts....

When I moved in with my wife, the ice maker/dispenser was broken. That was back in 2009 and judging from the condition it was in when I first checked it out it had been that way for quite some time. (The wife says '08, possibly '07 that it quit working.) So I looked at it on and off for a couple of years while my brain tried to figure out how the thing was put together. At first, I thought that the door had to be dismantled from the inside. But while I was cleaning the coils on the fridge I ran across the water solenoid in a panel on the back of the unit. This made me realize that it probably came apart from the outside rather than the inside.

Lo and behold, upon further study I found how to dismantle the control panel to trouble shoot the damned thing. I got the ice maker working with a few tweaks, and moved on to the dispenser portion of the unit. Behind several layers of plastic and screws was a solenoid that opened the dispenser flap for the ice to flow through the door. It was solid rust. I pulled it out, took a wire wheel to it until I could read the part numbers again, and ordered another one.

The part was at the front door when I got home. Fifteen minutes to install it and it was once again working as it should. That made for a very happy wife. And Choreboys around the world know.... a happy wife is a happy life :)

Now why, you ask, didn't I simply call a repairman and have ice for the last 2 years? I'll tell you why: There have been many times in my life that I have called someone out to fix something only to realize how damned simple it would have been to do it myself. And I kick myself mentally every time I pay someone for things like that because it makes me feel lazy! I respect the people who do repair work, I just respect myself less if I spend my hard-earned money paying them to to something I'm perfectly capable of doing.

With all of that being said, I realize that there are people in the world that wouldn't know which end of a screwdriver to use (or the difference between a phillips and a standard) much less be able to repair something on their own. Those are the people that need repairmen.

Me? I'm grateful for the knack I have for fixing things.

You're kidding, right?

Working in a restaurant has benefits. If you so choose, you can eat anything on the menu fixed any way you want it and it's FREE. On the flip side, you get so tired of eating the same thing every day that it can be a treat to eat food from some other restaurant.

Today was one of those days. We all decided to send someone out to pick up food from other places so that we could have something different.

So I'm in the restaurant busting my butt serving people that feel like eating our food when my cell phone starts to vibrate incessantly. Of course, I can't stop making food to answer the phone so I ignore it. At this point in time the store phone starts ringing, and doesn't stop. Just ring, ring, ring, ring, ring. Fifteen minutes later when the lines were eliminated and everyone was served and happy I ran back to the office and picked up the phone (which had not stopped ringing even once).

It was the guy we had sent out for food. His question to me: "Do you want your chicken wings to be white meat or dark meat?" I said "WHAT?????" "Do you want your wings to be white meat or dark meat?" He was serious! I said "Fred, wings are wings. They only come one way." He says "Well, I always order my wings with white meat, because if you don't specify they give you dark meat."

I did not think it was possible to surprise me with the power of human ignorance, but damn if it didn't happen today.