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saying they are ‘low e’ windows. If yours aren’t then you have to make some checks by looking at the glass inside the frame. The windows have to be dual panes. The glass should be about 3/8″ thick in the frame. Depending on the maker there might be a film centered in the frame. That film holds the very thin metal covering that blocks sun’s heat. Sometimes the metal is put on the inside of the glass itself instead of a film. Either way, the view through the glass should be darker than the view through the open window because of the metal film. If your glass is single pane it’s not low e. If your glass is crystal clear it’s not low e.
Wall joint compound, MUD as it is known, comes in various set-up times. 90 minute mud is rock hard when dry and it’s a pain to sand. Stick with something around 30-60 minute set-up time, that’s your standard mud. Buy it in 5 gallon buckets because you will be using a LOT of it! Tape can be either perforated paper or plastic mesh. It’s your choice, both work fine.
As for the actual taping and mudding: stir the mud and never let the dry mud on the top or sides of the bucket get into the fresh mud. You don’t want lumps in the mud.
Use a 6-8 inch wide blade to put down a 1/2″ thick layer of mud on the joint. Lay the tape over the layer of mud and sweep smoothly down the joint with the blade at a 45 degree angle to the wall to embed the tape into the mud. Don’t press too hard, you want a layer of mud under the tape but you don’t want the tape and mud to stand out from the wall. Go to both sides of the joint and smooth off the ridges you will normally get. Get off all the big ridges but don’t be too worried about getting the joint perfect.
Let the joint dry for a few hours or overnight if possible. If the joint is fairly smooth you can apply more mud. If the joint is lumpy you will have to sand it smooth first. Use sandpaper on a wall sander and wear a mask! You will be amazed at how much dust you create!
This time use a wider blade, 10-12″. Fill the blade with a good amount of mud and sweep it down the joint. The mud should end up as a very thin layer at the outside with a smooth heavier center over the joint. That’s called feathering. This time try to get the mud as smooth as possible and as wide as possible. The joint should be about a foot wide by now. Look the joint over and be sure you don’t have any high spots. The joint should extend above the wallboard by no more than 1/8″. Ignore the low spots for now.
Let dry and sand and re-mud the low spots. By now you should be very close to the end. Let dry, check, touch up anything that doesn’t look right, and sand again if necessary. When you run your hand over the joint you shouldn’t feel it. It should be smooth and level with the wallboard.
All the screw holes only take a quick swipe with the smaller knife. The mud shinks as it dries, so you will have to go back two or three times to get them level with the wallboard.
Once you get the hang of it mudding isn’t all that bad. It takes a lot of time, it takes effort, and it’s messy, but it’s worthwhile doing yourself.
1. Is the wall deep enough for an outlet? Drill a small hole somewhere to check the depth. If the wall is 3″ from the plaster face to the outside wall a normal outlet will fit. If it’s smaller than that you would have to use a surface mount type outlet.
2. Do you have access to either the top or bottom of the wall? If not you won’t be able to run wires between the studs.
It might be easier to either run surface wire moldings and outlets or tear out the walls and putting up drywall after it’s wired.
to remove completely. I love it, and have used it a lot, but the properties that make it so good also make it difficult to clean up.
They keep the stove from tipping forward if you open the oven door and either put a heavy pan on it or lean on it for some reason. If the stove tips whatever is on top, say that boiling pot of chili, will spill on anyone in front of the stove. The device can be bought at any appliance or home store and can easily be installed on any stove. Just be sure that the bracket on the stove doesn’t hit electrical or gas lines behind the back panel.
The seasonal shift is caused by the whole addition moving in the ground.
The fix? It isn’t pretty. Contact a foundation expert and find out what was done wrong, lift up the addition and fix it. There is NOTHING you can do from the outside to fix a foundation problem like that.
Try some turpine and gentle scrubbing. Most likely it won’t come off clean. Your best bet is to repaint the brown if you can match the color. Kilz is a tough primer/sealer and works great but cleaning it up is a royal pain. Good luck.
The flue from a corn fed stove will get as hot as any normal furnace flue. I’m not sure I’d want a 200-400 degree flue at ground level or running up the side of the house. You will also run into problems if there is a window or door on the wall. You can’t exhaust a furnace anywhere near a window or door because all the fumes could get sucked into the house and kill your family.
I would most certainly check with the local building inspector to find out what is legal and what isn’t. If it’s illegal there is a very good reason for it.
I have something similar and I decided I’d rather have a few holes in the furniture than have the whole thing come off the wall or fall on the TV. If, someday, you decide to use the bookcases differently it’s easy to patch the holes with wood putty. Try to find a stud behind each bookcase and screw them to the wall. Add screws to the bridge to make sure it’s firmly attached to the bookcases. I know it hurts to drill holes in new, expensive furniture, but for your safety and the safety of the new TV I would do it. Just try to make the screws as inconspicuous as possible.
I’ve had a grandchild try to climb a bookcase once. Luckily I was there to catch the case before it tipped over. Since then I ALWAYS mount them to the walls. I’ve used little “L” brackets on the top or screws through the back wall into a stud, whatever works the best and is the easiest to hide.
gets you into the code screen. Apparently pressing the same two buttons a few more times allows you to program in a new code. Of course this only works when you have the original remote as most ‘universal remotes’ don’t allow pressing two buttons at once.
It seems there is a back-up battery inside the TV and when it fails the TV locks up this way. Sounds annoying to me but I suppose Mitsubishi thought it was a good idea back when the TV was new.
My 48″ Samsung projection TV just got junked because a major part is no longer available. It’s three years old! You have to love TV makers these days!
EXACTLY how the old fixture was wired you will probably never guess right. Guessing wrong will, at the very least trip a breaker. At worst it could burn your house down.
By code the blacks and red are hot but the red might come from a 3-way switch or it might just be there because it was handy. The blacks could be anything from the main power to a switched power line. One of them could be a neutral too. The whites are supposed to be neutrals but at least one of them might not be. A hot white wire is SUPPOSED to be marked with black tape or a black mark, but it rarely happens.
I hate to say it but you are going to have to call an electrician. There is no way to guess at what the correct wiring is now. It’s going to take a meter and some time to trace each wire to find out where it comes from and what it does.
it gets to your patio. Is there any chance of putting up a low stone or brick wall above the patio level and diverting the water downhill and away from the house? That would require that there are areas lower than your patio within 50 feet or so. The other option is to dig a long trench along the side of the hill, put in gravel, filter cloth, and perforated drainage pipe heading to some lower spot in the area. When you cover the pipe leave the downhill side higher than the uphill side.
Of course you can’t just dump the run-off into the neighbor’s yard or the street. If you are the lowest house in the area then plan on buying a sump pump that has a back up battery because you are going to need it!
A normal breaker that trips a couple of dozen times is worn out. I would suggest doing some troubleshooting before replacing the breaker.
A GFCI trips when it senses a small return current in the ground or neutral lines. That amount of current can be caused by nothing more than a small amount of moisture inside one of the junction boxes or even cobwebs.
Turn off the breaker and trace the wiring to the hot tub. Open each junction box you find in the line. There might only be one near the tub or there could be three or four. It all depends on how it was wired. In theory the wiring run should be inside a PVC or some other conduit with a single run from the breaker box to the tub location. Yours might be different. Check inside each box, carefully, to see if you have insects inside, loose connections, or water in the box. Any of those could cause the problem.
If you don’t find anything strange inside the boxes the problem could be inside the hot tub. It could be anything from a bad pump motor, a bad heater, or some wiring issues. It’s time to call in someone familar with hot tubs then.
Super glue has very poor shear strength which means it might be able to be chipped off carefully. Try working the point of a knife blade or something like a nut picker from your Christmas nut bowl, or even a large needle under an edge of the glue and gently prying it loose. Be careful! It is very easy to end up poking yourself that way! Also, putting the dentures in the freezer for a few hours should make the super glue a little more brittle and easier to chip off.
Acetone, like fingernail cleaners, will dissolve super glue but it tastes terrible and I wouldn’t recommend it! I’m pretty sure it’s not healthy either.
I’d suggest going to a hardware or home supply store and look for a small bottle of Gorilla Glue. It’s fantastic for fixing wood! You have to dampen the wood before you put the glue in the crack because water activates the glue. Squirt a small amount of water into the crack with whatever you can find; a squirt gun, a turkey baster, something like that. Put some Gorilla Glue in soda bottle cap and force it as deeply into the crack as you can using toothpicks or a small nail. Then find a way to close the crack in the wood. Tape it down tightly, or drive a nail in next to the wood and bend it over to push the crack together. The glue takes a little while to cure, but it’s stronger than the wood itself when it’s done. The glue foams up and expands to seal the crack. Any excess can be cut off with a sharp knife.
You will have to redrill the mounting holes afterwards, and drill them a little deeper this time, but it should fix your problem.
