Home Improvement/Repair Questions

[youngmotivatedengineer]

and they just have a hard time with standard business acumen -they rarely show up on time, or do anything within schedule, and never manage their own subs.

That is one of the problems. Too many peoe want to make money without doing actual work. So you hire 1 guy, who then hires someone else.  Both guys are charging overhead costs and profits on top of their expenses for the work.

 

[Supe]

That looks good, RG.  Can't see any of the red showing through, surprisingly.  I will have to keep that in mind, has to be cheaper than reflooring the entire downstairs.  Its the logistics of needing to stain a downstairs with 3 people/2 dogs that worries me...

 

[Road Guy]

HD rents a sander for around $60/Day that will strip pretty much anything wood floor related. then probably around $50 bucks in sandpaper for it. But you could strip pretty much any room in about an hour - and if you are going with a darker stain you don't have to remove 100% of the old stain.

I got sidetracked on Saturday with some basement stuff and didn't get around to putting the polyurethane on until Sunday. so our downstairs is still a wreck (All the living room furniture scattered around the dining room, office, hallways, etc) it is a PIA - if I did this over again I think I would just take a few days off work while the kids are at school and board the dog for 2-3 days -

 

[Road Guy]

so electrical people - the wife bought a ceiling fan off of nextdoor (pit of misery) - the people we bought our house from 5 years ago had little kids so we were trying to change out the "baseball style" ceiling fans in the kids rooms - was a nice hunter fan, but when I wired it up it would blow the breaker? the fan had the instruction manual so I was able to figure out the wiring (pretty much only three wires - white, black, and a blue one for the light switch) ? I finally gave up and put the old one back in - which worked fine, just seemed really odd?

It was a larger fan than probably needed for a bedroom but I cant figure out what would make a standard ceiling fan trip the circuit breaker? Good thing we only paid $10 bucks for it, but the wife is not a fan of my idea which is just to drive by at night and toss the fan back into the peoples yard we bought it from? probably not the best idea since they live 6 houses down..

 

[Supe]

Since its not the wall switch, its either drawing too many amps or the fan motor has a short. 

The polyurethane is what scares me.  I can stain in stages, but poly looks like shit if you try to blend it.  There is only one way to get up the stairs in our house, so there's absolutely no way to do the poly in one shot and still live there. 

 

[Road Guy]

yeah when I did the stairs and upstairs hallway at the old house I did it while the wife and kids were out of town and I just slept on the sofa..

I did 3 coats of poly - and I've got one spot where I let the poly overlap a little too much - not going to redo it a 4th time - but it can be a total PIA!

 

[knight1fox3]

so electrical people - the wife bought a ceiling fan off of nextdoor (pit of misery) - the people we bought our house from 5 years ago had little kids so we were trying to change out the "baseball style" ceiling fans in the kids rooms - was a nice hunter fan, but when I wired it up it would blow the breaker? the fan had the instruction manual so I was able to figure out the wiring (pretty much only three wires - white, black, and a blue one for the light switch) ? I finally gave up and put the old one back in - which worked fine, just seemed really odd?

This is how I would have wired it if not using the switched light circuit. But if that still didn't work, then I would have went with your "plan B". :thumbs:  

but the wife is not a fan of my idea 

I see what you did there...

 

[Road Guy]

yeah I tried wiring it that way also and the circuit tripped again - must be something messed up with the fan is all I can figure?

 

[knight1fox3]

must be something messed up with the fan is all I can figure?

That would be my assessment as well. Possibly something faulty with the fan coil or a short elsewhere in the wiring hub.

 

[Supe]

Anyone have experience with the various retaining grid products used to trap stone/mulch/dirt?

I want to mulch or put gravel around the perimeter of my backyard.  One side is no issue, but the other two may be problematic.  The left side gets a considerable amount of runoff during heavy rain from the neighbor's yard, and I'm pretty confident it would wash the mulch away.

Along the back of the yard is the neighbors' fences, but there is a short, aggressive slope between the fence and my holly trees in spots - about 1' drop over a 3'-4' span,  leveling off some as you approach one side.

Retaining walls are not an option.  I need a way to trap the mulch or stone in place, while still allowing sufficient drainage, especially along the left side. 

Any thoughts would be much appreciated!

 

[Master slacker]

 

[MA_PE]

I think what you want is geotextile filter fabric.  It should be available at most garden centers.  It's a fiber weave that gets placed beneath the stone and prevents migration of the finer soil materials into the voids in the stone material.

If you have running water going through and the weight of the stone won't hold it it place, you'll need some mechanical means to restrain movement of the stone downslope.  Some small fence to hold the material upslope with filterfabric and then stone might be the answer.

 

[Supe]

My concern is that I need something to lock the material in place, and the geotextile fabric isn't aggressive enough to do that.  My line of thought was more along the lines of this stuff, but I know it can get pricey fast. 

https://www.amazon.com/Standartpark-thick-ground-polyethylene-strength/dp/B06VV93QH7

 

[Road Guy]

You have a pic of the area?

What's done around bridges is we put geotextile fabric down and then large enough rock (rip-rap) that won't wash away during heavy rains - so I think you could do something similar but instead of type 3 rip-rap just get a larger size river stone or something - something about the size of your fist or bigger shouldn't wash away u less you have a really steep slope?

 

[Road Guy]

Or make some small Gabion baskets out of hardware cloth.

 

[Supe]

Will snap some pics tonight.  Definitely don't need stone that big.  I would prefer mulch as the option based on price and the fact that I'd be looking at probably 7-8 yards or more to do this, and that's a SHITLOAD of stone to move via wheel barrow.  Just to summarize, the flat area is the one at risk of being washed away.  The steep area doesn't have the water issue, but I question whether or not paver edging would hold back 3" of mulch or stone.

 

[Road Guy]

yeah hard to get the picture in my mind what you are trying to do, but what about one or two levels of those smaller keystone style wall blocks they sell at home depot and then use some 24" rebar and drive into the ground behind them to hold  in place? could probably just have them so they stick up enough to hold them in place but not really show?

we had a driveway with a steep side slope and the neighbors water always rushed down onto it - I did a short retaining wall and then backfilled it with crush and run and topped with mulch and it diverted most all the runoff back onto their property - and since they never had any grass in their backyard there was a nice string of mud in their front yard when it rained, but it was better then on my driveway

 

[MA_PE]

yeah hard to get the picture in my mind what you are trying to do, but what about one or two levels of those smaller keystone style wall blocks they sell at home depot and then use some 24" rebar and drive into the ground behind them to hold  in place? could probably just have them so they stick up enough to hold them in place but not really show?

we had a driveway with a steep side slope and the neighbors water always rushed down onto it - I did a short retaining wall and then backfilled it with crush and run and topped with mulch and it diverted most all the runoff back onto their property - and since they never had any grass in their backyard there was a nice string of mud in their front yard when it rained, but it was better then on my driveway

you could drill holes through the stones and pound the rebar in the holes so the bars won't be visible.

 

[Road Guy]

here is another drainage mystery if anyone has any clues.. - the red area on this older pic is where a tree used to be but died due to a large amount of water that accumulated below ground here - I have traced back all the irrigation that I can find to around 10-15' from the location without finding any leaks, but still water is always here during "sprinkler season"  When I look at the ground at "ground level" it looks like this is the low point for the yard and maybe the water drains here and has no where to go? behind the fence my neighbor has a raised concrete patio - which has always been there since the houses was built.

I plan to try and look for more irrigation that I may have missed in the next few weeks, but I kind of wanted to put another tree here since my neighbors home school their kids and all 24 of them are like always outside- or at least when I am trying to be outside drinking a CAB..

 

[Road Guy]

Gesus Christ this took to damn long, being without a living room for 2 weeks sucked...

took me 4 coats of polyurethane to get it where I wanted it, kept having these big streaks where I missed some spots. totally annoying.. but this was before we moved the furniture back in...