Episode #2036: Fun Fall Flooring Ideas | Secret to Finding Replacement Tiles | Storing Screens | Make Leftover Paint Last
In this episode …
Did you know that Fall is the busiest season of the year for flooring programmes? Well, it turns out that flooring is not being used for time floors anymore. Decorators are using floor fabrics in some awfully unexpected and beautiful methods. Tom& Leslie have tips-off for this trending activity. Plus…
Pretty soon it’ll be time to take out your opening screens for the season. Before that happens there’s one thing, you’ll need to do to make sure they last though wintertime storage and are good to go next spring. We’ll share that step, really ahead.Ceramic tiles are durable and easy to care for, but what happens if one shatters and you can’t find a permutation? We’ll share some fast fixups for tile projects.Are you saving half-filled cans of leftover coat from research projects? We’ll share step by step tips for accumulating colourthat’ll make it last TWICE what the manufacturers say it should.
Plus, provide answers to your dwelling better a matter of, installing a vapor barrier, choosing a kitchen sink, repairing kitty steps, improving driveway drainage.
Do you have a home improvement or decoration question? Call the show 24/7 at 888 -MONEY-PIT ( 888 -6 66 -3 974) or post your question here.
Read Transcript
TOM: Coast to coast and floorboards to shingles, this is The Money Pit Home Improvement Show. I’m Tom Kraeutler.
LESLIE: And I’m Leslie Segrete.
TOM: And welcome to the fall home improvement season. It is beautiful out. It’s precisely the right temperature to take over activities inside and out. If you’ve got something you’d like to get done, we would love to help you with some tips-off, some plans, some suggestions to help you move that project along and procreate the very best home ever.
Coming up on today’s show, we’re going to talk about flooring projections firstly up. Did you know that flooring is a fall-season project? It is. It’s the busiest season of its first year for floorings. And it is about to change, though, that flooring is not just being used for storeys. “Thats a lot” of designers now that are using flooring on walls, so we’re going to talk about some of those trends.
LESLIE: And pretty soon, it’s going to be time to take out your space screens for the entire season. And before that happens, there’s one thing that you really need to do to make sure that they’re going to last through the winter storage and be ready to go next spring. So we’re going to share those steps, in simply a bit.
TOM: And ceramic tiles are a particularly durable and easy-to-care-for surface. But has this ever happened to you? You undermined a tile- either from mistreatment, it fell off the wall, it get cracked on the storey- and of course, the tile campaign, at this spot, is years old perhaps and you don’t have any extra tiles? We’re going to share a solution with you on how to find those missing tiles so it looks like they’d never left.
LESLIE: But first, what’s on your fall to-do list, guys? Are you thinking about a project that you’d like to get done while the forecast is pleasant and beautiful? Or maybe you’d like some of those drop-off shades into the design of your residence? Well, cause us know. We are here to help, so utter us a announcement. We’re standing by to help you guys out.
TOM: That multitude is 1-888-MONEY-PIT, 888 -6 66 -3 974. And if you call us with your question, we will also supplemented your mention to the hat for an opportunity at earning a cool established of fixes from Pony Jorgensen. These are called the E-Z Hold Bar Clamps and they are the perfect clamp for dozens of dwelling improvement projects. Kind of like having an extra set of entrusts around when wishes to get something done.
So, give us a call right now. Let’s get to it. The list, again, is 1-888-MONEY-PIT.
Leslie, who’s firstly?
LESLIE: Judy in Iowa, you’ve came The Money Pit. What can we do for you today?
JUDY: I’m in a house that my father built back in 1990.
TOM: OK.
JUDY: And while they lived there, they experienced black distinguishes coming through on the drywall.
TOM: OK.
JUDY: And they called in a painter; a painter “re coming”. He went over everything with KILZ first and depicted it. Well, since then, they’ve both passed away and so I purchased the house.
TOM: Right.
JUDY: I had a friend take a look up in the attic and he told me, “Oh, I can’t believe that your father wrap all this in plastic. Your house can’t breathe. We need to get up here and slice this plastic, cause the house breathe and you won’t get any more of these pitch-black spots.”
TOM: So does he visualize the pitch-black places are mold?
JUDY: I don’t know.
LESLIE: And what room saw you assuring it in?
JUDY: Every different room. Yeah.
TOM: OK.
JUDY: It’s almost like it’s the claw managers are getting moisten or something.
TOM: OK. So, up in the attic- let’s talk about that area. And you say he wrapped it in plastic. What accurately are you looking?
JUDY: Well, I didn’t; I haven’t been up there.
TOM: Oh, your best friend ensure it.
JUDY: My neighbor ran up.
TOM: Alright. Well, search, when it comes to vapor barrier, here’s the rule: the vapor hurdle goes towards the heated slope of the members of this house. So a common mistake, for example, up in lofts, is to framed the insulation in downwards where they have the vapor barricade sort of facing up as you’re in the attic appear down.
And the solution to that is to cut the vapor barricade. I’ve seen that in crawlspaces, very, where they framed the vapor railing because it has the nailing flange on it- nailing tab on it- at the edge of the lights and it’s on the wrong side. So, as long as the vapor hurdle is between the ceiling and the isolation, it’s done correctly. If not, then yes, you can go up and slice the vapor railing and let it breathe more.
The other thing to do is to make sure that your attic has adequate ventilation. And the best ventilation is a endless ridge vent, which goes down the heyday of the roof, matched with soffit ventilates at the overhang.
JUDY: OK. That’s what I needed to know.
TOM: Thanks so much for announcing us at 888 -MONEY-PIT.
LESLIE: Now we’ve got Bill in Missouri on the line who needs some assistant choosing a kitchen subside. Tell us what you’re working on.
BILL: Well, I’m having a kind of a tough time trying to decide on these brand-new materials and stuff that they’re representing the kitchen subsides out of now.
TOM: Yep.
BILL: And my spouse didn’t want a stainless-steel sink and she demanded one that was colored or lily-white: one that would be easy to keep clean and wouldn’t show scratches or rifts or anything like that.
TOM: OK. OK.
BILL: And I was trying to keep away from the cast iron, because that’s what we have in there right now. Those things weigh a ton. And they’ve got some brand-new ones that we were looking at over at the Lowe’s store and it’s called a Swanstone, which is a man-made product. And I don’t know how good those are.
TOM: I’ve had some suffer with those composite concoctions and I will say if she’s acquainted to a cast-iron, porcelain settle, she’s not going to be happy with a composite sag because they are a lot harder to keep clean. I’ve got one that’s sort of like the undermount sink that’s made of the- like sort of one of the Corian-wannabe produces. And when we are employed wine in it or tomato sauce or something like that, it does leave a stain and we have to get the Bon Ami out and sort of scour the bottom to keep it clean.
You know, there’s- if you’re used to a cast-iron sink- and that is definitely the easiest one to keep clean, I’ve got to tell you.
BILL: The one we’ve went hasn’t been easier than i thought and it’s shown scratch markers where the jackpots had scratched it and I really made, “Well, we’ll merely get something easier to clean.”
TOM: Right. But it has a nice, smooth, cleanable skin-deep that doesn’t stain; that’s the nice thing about cast.
I was telling Leslie, last week on the register, that I only superseded a capsize for my mama that was an Americast product- an American Standard product.
BILL: Yeah.
TOM: And it was actually covered by a lifetime warranty. So it had already begun to rust and chip in one corner and 17 years after she bought it, American Standard applied her a brand-new sink.
BILL: Wow.
TOM: And it was a cast-iron- like a porcelain, enameled kind of a submerge. And she had a beige one that we took out and they gave us a brand-new tan one, virtually the same configuration 17 year later and sounded it back in.
BILL: Well, I wanted to tell you thank you for taking my call and I certainly enjoy your shows.
TOM: Well, you’re very welcome. Thanks so much for calling us at 888 -MONEY-PIT and good luck with that project.
LESLIE: Susan in Montana is having some drainage issues such as the driveway. Tell us what’s going on.
SUSAN: I had my office driveway resurfaced with asphalt. And I thought that the people did a really excellent job until we got a monsoon( ph) flood and all the water was collecting. And I had to leave to go down to Colorado and I got a frenetic phone call from my husband telling me that the water was backing up into the house and it was like a big pool. And I called the asphalt beings and they’re not responds to me.
TOM: Well, listen, if they just resurfaced the driveway, they’re not going to do anything to change the pitch.
SUSAN: That’s true-blue. They did make love but they purposely- supposedly, they had the tone so that it would drain off into the lawn.
TOM: And they didn’t quite get that right. So how do you specify that?
SUSAN: Yeah.
TOM: If the ocean is draining down the driveway back towards the building- so in other words, it’s never certainly draining off to the lawn anywhere- then what you have to do is you have to kept a curtain pump in the driveway itself.
And in a driveway, mostly it’s a hassle where the driveway is essentially sliced in half. They slice out a gob of driveway that’s perhaps 6 inches wide. And you slip this trough into it so that as the ocean falls down the driveway, it puts into the trough- there’s a evaluate on top- and then it runs out the bottom of the trough. And of course, that requires some additional plumbing, so to speak, because you have to hook it up to a drainpipe to take it to the lowest place on the property to get rid of the sea. But that’s how you drain a driveway that’s not sloped properly.
And commonly, that’s put right near the members of this house or right near the garage cheek or something like that so that it catches the spray at the lowest possible spot.
SUSAN: So who are capable of I call for something like that? A plumber?
TOM: You’re going to need a general contractor that can install that for you. I make a driveway-sealing company is not going to do it. A general contractor that could be used to do that- it’s kind of a handyman project. It’s not a difficult project, it’s not a really time-consuming project but you virtually have to cut into that driveway and set a depletion. You’ve got to catch that ocean and you’ve got to manage it. And that’s the only way to do it, Susan.
Thanks so much for announcing us at 888 -MONEY-PIT.
LESLIE: Alright. Give us a call anytime at 888 -MONEY-PIT. In addition to getting help with your dwelling improvement projects, we bring out huge accolades. And this hour, “were having” the Jorgensen E-Z Hold Expandable Bar-Clamp Package.
Now, it’s pretty great because these are really handy fastens. So you’re going to be able to tackle a lot of projects with really one pas. And you can actually join them together to actually help you with the bigger projects.
TOM: You get a determined of eight clamps- including 6-, 12 -, 18 – and 24 -inch fastens- worth 170 horses. You can learn more at PonyJorgensen.com. We’re going to give that package out to one listener attracted at random. Make that you. Pick up the telephone, upright your question at MoneyPit.com or scold us at 1-888-MONEY-PIT.
LESLIE: Alright. Now we’re welcoming Tim from Illinois to The Money Pit with a water-heating question. What’s going on?
TIM: Oh, I have a nine-year-old water tank and I’m trying to get the rod that obtains all the minerals out. And it didn’t want to come, so I was afraid to have busted some tubes. So I was curious, should I just- should leave it alone? And with it being nine years old, it’s almost at the end of its life as far as the water tank. Because I understand that water tanks are usually from 8 to 12 times for a permutation?
TOM: Yeah. So you’re – you’ve been trying to supersede the anode and having a hard time getting it out, correct?
TIM: Yeah. I think it’s rusted in or I …
TOM: Sometimes, you are required to introduced- get a little leverage on the wrench to do that. And formerly you get the wrench on the anode, sometimes you have to kind of give that strain control to actually get that out. It’s a bit of a difficult chore. But considering the age of the cistern, I probably wouldn’t spend much coin on it because I think you’re right: 10, 12 years is a somewhat average life expectancy for a standard water heater.
And when it comes time to replace the spray heater, you might even decide to upgrade it and go with a tankless liquid heater, “whos going to” last you a good deal longer and be far more efficient.
TIM: And that might be a good choice for me, because I’m single and no one else lives in the household and I’m exit most of the time.
TOM: Yeah, well, that’s the difference between a tankless sea heater and a standard water heater: the water heater is kind of dumb. It only- it heats the ocean, 24/7, whether you need it or not. And when the water cools down, it comes back on and hots it some more.
A tankless water heater is going to heat on demand. And so, because that’s going to be a lot more efficient for a single guy- but even a big family with youthful daughters, for example, that don’t know the meaning of a short shower, they never run out of hot water when they have tankless. Could simply- designs very well in both extremes.
TIM: So how much is something like- cost for installing and so forth?
TOM: Well, if you liken it against a high-efficiency, tanked ocean heater, it’s similar. But if you liken it against service standards, sort of low-efficiency, it’s probably going to be about twice as much. But it will last longer, extremely, and you’re going to save money on the vigor monies, too.
LESLIE: Well, did you know that fall is the busiest season of the year for flooring jobs? And you know what? It turns out that flooring isn’t really utilized for floorings anymore. A spate of interior designers out there are actually consuming flooring fabrics in some awfully unexpected and really beautiful directions. And with as little as 100 square paws of flooring, you can step up that wording in any apartment of your dwelling by utilizing floor cards to create accent walls.
TOM: I think this is an awesome idea because if you think about it, what are your other options, right? You’ve got wainscoting- that doesn’t genuinely fit in a bedroom, for example, or a living room – you’ve came wallpaper and you’ve came draw. So, this is a whole’ nother direction you can go and it works well in bedrooms, in lavatories. It is to work in family rooms and basements.
And it looks really, really cool. It’s awfully, unusually trendy. You can do it in a weekend. It gives a big impact for a relatively small expense, because you don’t need that much flooring to do this. You can choose from pretty much all the flooring fabrics that have existed: so hardwood, bamboo, the wood-look tile, the comfort vinyl or even laminate. That all works well and looks great on a wall.
LESLIE: Yeah. And you know what? It certainly depends on the type of flooring that you pick as to how you’ll secure it to the wall.
So, for example, if you pick a timber, you positioned that to the wall utilizing tacks, glue or even merely wood-flooring tape. I intend it certainly depends on the weight of that make, the size of that product. So you sort of have to gauge it depending on what you pick.
Now, you likewise want to make sure- and this is with flooring, in general- when you get that make, you want to let it acclimate in your dwelling for a few days before you actually start that project.
And then to get the best layout, think about arranging those boards side by side on the flooring firstly. That’s going to help you balance out the shade and the speck. So this path, if you’re getting any strange decorations or you’re trying to achieve a pattern, you can really plan that out before you situated them on the wall.
TOM: And when you’re ready to go, you install the first plank pretty much the same way you are able to do if it’s on the storey. You start in one corner, frequently the bottom-left corner of the wall area, and then sort of work your room up left to right.
And make sure you leave about a 1/4 – to 1/2 -inch divergence between the planks and the ceiling and the storey. This leaves a bit of apartment for the flooring to naturally sort of expand and contract. Then you can easily cover that up with some molding.
LESLIE: Paul in Connecticut, you’ve went The Money Pit. How can we help you today?
PAUL: We’re working on a coat place where we were covering rough-cut cedar clapboards with Benjamin Moore ARBORCOAT Solid Stain that’s self-priming. We drew over the same product that was previously scattered probably about, I’m guessing, 7 to 8 years ago. And what we’re running into with- exactly on one side of the house where we’re getting illusions, like moisture froths. It’s morning sun on that side of the house but we’ve never seen a blot – you know, a solid discolour- bubble up like that. I’ve seen it with paint but not with the solid stain.
TOM: Well, cedar has to breathe and sometimes when they install cedar siding, they don’t leave enough space under it for it to breathe. And so it tends to get blockage with sweat and I’ve seen that promote blot before.
You mentioned that you’re employ a make that both primary and discolours. I am not a fan of doing that with a stain produce. I exactly, in fact, repainted my entire cedar-sided house and I did it the same method we did it over a dozen years ago and that was we oil-primed it firstly. We squandered an oil-based primer first because we had good adhesion with the oil-based primer. And it actually affixed well to the cedar. And then we put the solid stain on top of that.
So, once the depict starts to bubble, any time you have a failure of adhesion, there’s no way to employ that back together. If that continues to get worse or if it ogles bad enough already, you’re going to have to make that stain off and start again. Because you’re simply- it’s never – you can’t stick good decorate over bad dye. And if there’s moisture in there, it’s just going to lift that dye right off again.
So, sorry to be the bearer of bad news but I wouldn’t have done just the way it is. I would have expended an oil-based primer first and then I ought to have been set a solid-color stain on top of it.
PAUL: Right. We’re getting that precisely on one side of the house.
TOM: Yeah. Maybe it’ll time end up being on one side of the members of this house, for whatever reason. But at least on that side of the house, you have to pull that grime off and start again. And scratch, prime- scratch it and primary it properly with an oil-based primer and then you can stain on top of that.
PAUL: What would you intimate for the purposes of an oil-based primer?
TOM: I think if you stay within one family of concoctions, I would use the same oil-based primer that that particular make moves for solid stain but as long as it’s oil-based and not acrylic or spray or latex-based.
PAUL: So , now, to remove that stain that’s on there now, that – you’re going to lose that rough-cut finish.
TOM: Well, if you wire-brush it, perhaps not. You may be able to pull it off with a pressing washer. It depends on how well-adhered it is.
When we did my activity, we had an unexpected difficulty with the screens. We were applying a produce that the manufacturer said did not need to be primed. And it worked well but it made a long time to cure. And so some of the shutters were sitting around for an extra week before we put them back up. And all the paint rind off of those. And so we had to actually strip all that paint off and start again. So it even happens to the pros. But formerly that cover separates, you’ve got to pull it off; there’s really no way to save it.
PAUL: Alright. Thank you for your help.
TOM: Paul, good luck with that project. Thanks so much for calling us at 888 -MONEY-PIT.
LESLIE: Andrew in Texas has had something very unfortunate happen to a pond: the steps end? What happened?
ANDREW: Well, we were just chilling out in the reserve one nighttime and it’s got a brand-new liner in it. In East Texas, they use salt-water kitties, so you have to line them. And my buddy was getting out of the fund. He stepped on the fiberglass steps, which were not brand-new. And regrettably, his foot went through the steps.
LESLIE: Now, the fiberglass steps are underneath your liner or these sort of sit on top as like an connect?
ANDREW: It’s an feeling to the liner. They’re two separate entities that are underwater.
TOM: OK. Can the fiberglass steps be removed from the pool for mend roles?
ANDREW: I believe so. I has not been able to tried it. In all franknes, looking at the degradation of the steps, the appearance that they’re in, I think it’d be easier to merely do a immediate spot right now, if that’s possible, or precisely absolutely remove the steps. But can I do that without relinquishing the liner?
TOM: Yeah, if you can get the steps out of the reserve, like disconnecting them out of the pond, the easy space to do that spot is with more fiberglass. You can go to an auto-repair store- like a Pep Boys or a target like that that sells, perhaps, auto-body gives- and you can buy fiberglass.
You could buy the fiberglass resin and you can buy fiberglass material itself. And you apply the resin to the step, you press the material in place, you let it dry and then you would include more resin on top of that and then more- and then gelcoat to finish it off.
Now, it’s not going to match, color-wise, but it could be very strong and perhaps, next time, your friend won’t step right through them.
ANDREW: An easy mend is an easy secure, right?
TOM: Yeah. But the easiest thing is to get it out of the sea so that you don’t have to drain the liquid. And you have been able do that restore on your- maybe in your garage, on a workbench or something like that, and then precisely made the whole assembly back in after it’s nice and baked and strong again.
Andrew, does that help you out?
ANDREW: Very much so. I sure do appreciate the assistance. You all have a wonderful evening and God bless, alright?
TOM: Well, pretty soon, it’s going to be time to take out those space screens for the season. But before winter determines in and the brave begins to get super cold, it’s a really good idea to clean your window screens so you are eligible to manufacture them last.
LESLIE: Yeah. You think about it. The screens have been on the window all summertime long. They’ve got a lot of sun exposure. They’ve got time a good deal of clay and dust from all the lawn and yardwork. So I means that they genuinely do need some cure before you place them away.
So make sure you remove those screens and then positioned them on a flat face. Your driveway is going to work best for that. Then use a slight soap-and-water answer and apply it with a soft-bristle brush. That’s going to remove all of that grease and the grunge. And you want to make sure that you emptied both sides of that window screen and around the interior and exterior of that chassis. Then rinse off the window screens with halfhearted water.
TOM: So, next, you want to allow those screens to cool altogether before you replace them in the window. And don’t even “ve been thinking about” working a push washer on them while your openings are closed and they are still in the chassis, because you could damage them and the window , not to mention those- divulging water you’re going to squirt right through those windows, into the house.
LESLIE: Now, you can put those screens back in or if “youd prefer”, you can store the screens in the winter months. You want to make sure, though, that you keep them upright or flat. And do not lean anything against them or gave anything on top of them, because those screens can get damaged so easily.
TOM: Absolutely. Now, if you are dropping storm windows into neighbourhood to keep cold air out , now is also a good time to clean those windows and clean-living and lubricate the moves. And for all spaces, make the opportunity to check the exterior gaps between the shave and the siding, because this is where you get crackings and spreads that will let a lot of cold breath in. So recaulk those, as needed, to keep the elements away.
We’ve got a video that gaits you through how to scavenge and accumulate your screens, on MoneyPit.com.
LESLIE: Julie in Colorado is on the line and has a heating question.
JULIE: My question is regarding heat pumps and how energy-efficient they might be, because we’re an all-electric house. Our electrical proposal is very high.
TOM: And how is your house heated right now, Julie?
JULIE: It’s heated with baseboard. And actually, we don’t even really heat our residence. We’ll heat one room because it’s so expensive.
TOM: Right now, you’re heating with electric-resistance heat which, as you accurately territory, is the most expensive type of heat. Now, a heat-pump system would be far less expensive but it would require a duct system to be installed throughout the house. So, you would have that up-front costs of running the heating ducts.
If you had that method set- the path a hot shoot employments is it’s kind of like an air-conditioning system that runs all wintertime except that in the wintertime, the refrigeration structure is changed. Now, if you’ve ever strolled, say, by a opening air conditioner in the summer, you know it blows hot air out the back of it, out to the outside. If you sort of made that window air conditioner out and flipped it around and fix it inside, you’d have a heat pump; it’d be blowing the hot air in the house. That’s essentially what happens: it switches the refrigeration cycles/second in the wintertime.
Now, generally speaking, hot shoots are not always recommends that unusually, very cold climates, because hot gushes only maintain the heat when there’s a 2-degree differentiation between what the temperature is set at- what the temperature is and what the temperature established at, I “re saying”. So if you define your temperature at 70, it precipitates to 69, the heat gone on. If it precipitates inside to 68, the heat run stay on. If it falls to 67, the heat gush says to its electric-resistance backup system, which is always part of a heat run, “Hey, I can’t keep up with this. I need some promotion. Turn on the heating coils.” And then you’re not saving any money.
So, will it save- will it be less expensive than baseboard electrical? Yes. But it has a significant up-front cost in terms of the station because you’d need a pipe plan, as well as the heat-pump equipment. Does that make sense?
JULIE: OK. Sound good. Thank you.
TOM: Good luck with that projection. Thanks so much for calling us at 888 -MONEY-PIT.
You can always call us with your residence increase question at 1-888-MONEY-PIT. And you might just win our weekly giveaway. And today, we’ve got the Jorgensen E-Z Hold Expandable Bar-Clamp Package to give away to one listener.
Now, clamping implements are truly the only concoctions that Pony Jorgensen makes and they do it really well. I mean they’ve been doing this for more than 100 times. And I like these E-Z Hold Clamps. I’ve got a named of them myself. And they make it easy to take on jobs when you just have a single handwriting to kind of grab the secure on something and it gives people that additional fixed of entrusts, that extra placed of hold.
I’ve been working on a makeover. I was just telling my squad here, off-air, I noticed a very old tricycle from the early 80 s, I believe it was. And it used to belong to my nephew, who had newborns, and now we’re going to redo it for his teenagers. And we found that it needed a total makeover, so it’s like a little body shop in my garage right now for this little tricycle.
LESLIE: That was a very good project.
TOM: And I’m using my E-Z Hold Clamps to hold things down while I bang them apart, placed them back together and so on.
That set of secures is worth 170 bucks. Get out to one caller drawn at random. Make that you. Pick up the phone and render us a call at 1-888-MONEY-PIT.
LESLIE: Lee in Maryland is on the line with a concrete question. What can we do for you today?
LEE: House was built 30 decades ago. And I’ve been told by several contractors that- my slab is 16 x18 that I’m going to pour. I’ve been told by various contractors that I should introduce rebar into the house and connect it to the house. And then I’ve been told by other contractors that I should just put swelling seams in. And I don’t know what to do.
TOM: OK. So this slab is for the garage?
LEE: No. It’s off the two sides of my deck.
TOM: Oh, OK. So a patio. Is that what you’re saying?
LEE: Yeah. It’ll be right up against the house, so …
TOM: OK. Yeah, listen, putting the rebar in and bind into the house is a good, solid road to do that. But if you prep the soil right underneath it, I tend to think you probably don’t have to do that. Most beings, where they go wrong is they don’t prep the grunge, they don’t prep the locate. And if that grunge is compressible- if it’s topsoil, if it’s mulch- if it’s not flattened out and certainly tamped down, mechanically, with a machine tamper then you’re going to have all kinds of movement in that slab. And that’s where you come in trouble.
So, if it’s time a matter of being concerned about it plummeting, you know, I guess with all the work you’re doing it wouldn’t hurt to run the rebar into the house. You’d have to drill holes, provided it inside the block wall and then run the rebar into the slab itself. But you want to make sure that slab is properly reinforced. If it’s 16 x8, you’re probably going to want to applied a seam in it to give it some area to move without cracking.
But I think it’s not exceedingly required but I don’t think you can go wrong by doing it. But again, the most important thing is to tamp that cornerstone under where you’re going to pour the slab truly, really well. Because invariably, that’s what causes the problems with slabs. And make sure you have a good pitch away from the house so that you don’t trap any water against the house, you don’t force water to run back into the house even when it resolves, OK?
LEE: OK. It had a base of concrete backwash tamped down really good and it was starting to set up pretty good. But I was going to bring in some more 57 limestone and then pack it down. You think that would be ample or a good pick of stone to use?
TOM: Yep. I would go through the hassle of hiring a mechanical tamper and using a mechanical manipulate. Because I tell you what, when you applied that base in and you tamp it mechanically, it itself becomes hard as concrete.
LEE: OK.
TOM: Thanks, Lee. Good luck with that activity. Thanks so much for announcing us at 888 -MONEY-PIT.
LESLIE: Well, ceramic surfaces are durable and really easy to care for. But from time to time, you might encounter the need to make a repair to that ceramic-tile surface.
Now, those repairs can alternate from a grouting issue or to even superseding a alligatored tile. Now, the problem with replacing cracked tiles is that more often than not, you don’t have a matching tile handy. Well, we’ve got some magic tricks to acquire them reappear.
TOM: Well, that’s right. And something that happens a lot when you set out to do a bathtub remodel- because it’s not ever possible with an older house. Even a 10 -year-old tile can sometimes be really hard to find. But when changing any tile, it’s actually always first choice best to use ones left over from the original installation. Then you can be sure that the replacing tile “il go to” perfectly match the existing ones.
But if you don’t have any squirreled apart, accompanying the smash articles to a well-stocked tile store and you might be able to find a new one that is a close substitute.
LESLIE: Yeah. And you know what? You can also consider stealing one from an neighborhood that’s not very visible. Maybe you’ve got that tile surface in a closet or it’s under a refrigerator or the dishwasher. Removing that aged tile can be a bit risky but it’s definitely possible.
And another option, which tends to be a little bit costly, is that you can have tiles made to order, habit glazes desegregated exactly to match. The only thing is you’ve got to make sure that if you’re having a tile prepared- and say it’s for a flooring versus a wall – you have to make sure that that skin-deep has all of those standards that you would see when you’re buying a ceramic-tile for a flooring. Because they have different ratings on them so they’re not as slick, et cetera. So you have to make sure, if you’re having one spawned, that it’s going to do the same thing.
TOM: Now, here’s my favorite alternative, because it’s the least expensive and 9 out of 10 goes , no one is going to know exactly what you did. Let’s say despite your best efforts, you can’t find the replacement, you don’t want to have one realise, it’s too expensive, whatever. Well, you could just forget about trying to match the tile absolutely and fill the blot with an accent tile.
An accent tile could be a tile of a different colour or a different quality. In all such cases, you might even want to arbitrarily oust a handful of tiles, around the floor or the wall, to clear the correct blend in with the rest of the field.
I’ve consumed this approach a number of seasons over the years and it’s ever interested that you get so many nice commendations about the pattern after you’re done. And tribes really have no idea that was done to solve a problem; they thought it was just purposeful to have the mingled tiles. And they examined fantastic.
So, lots of options there if you do have to replace a busted tile and don’t have one around. There are some ways and means to get it done.
You can call us with your residence better question or you could post it to The Money Pit website, which is exactly what George in New Jersey did.
LESLIE: That’s right. And George writes: “After painting, I have two partially ill-used cans of latex paint. Can the rack life be improved if all the air in the cans to be accumulated were replaced with water to dispossess all the air? ”
TOM: Well, that’s an interesting idea, George. I don’t think it’s going to work because with latex dye, the irrigate is just going to mix in with the latex coat itself. And you’ll have soupy paint when you go to open it up again.
LESLIE: Yeah. The make-up will be terrible.
TOM: I do have a few other suggestions for you that you may find helpful.
When it comes to storing paint, the life expectancy of leftover dye- most creators are going to tell you it’s about 2 years. My personal experience is it could last at least twice that long. But the success depends not only on where the dye is collected- like a cool, dry area- but even more importantly, the condition of the can, the condition of that seal between the coat lid and the cover can.
Now, as you pointed out, the foe of collecting depict is simply air. So the more air that gets into who were able to, the shorter living conditions of the paint. So, the seal is the key. Here’s how you can make sure it’s as tighten as possible. First up, when you open a brand-new can of colour, kind of most of us do this: we use a screwdriver, right?
LESLIE: Sure.
TOM: Well, that’s probably not the best tool because you can deform that make-up lid and then impact the seal. The better option is to use a make-up can-opener tool. You’ve probably seen this at the coat supermarket. It has a little bit of a wide lip on it and it grabs the paint-can lid and opens it up without damaging it.
Now, once you have it open, it’s OK to use the screwdriver if you need to poke some sewage faults in the bottom of that channel inside the can. But don’t use it to pry that lid off initially.
Now, when you’re done with the cover, you want to use the brush to empty that seam as much as possible. Get all that old depict out of it and then you can use a rag to wipe the opposed seam on the lid. Because paint that bone-dries in either country, either on the lid or in that can lip, is going to prevent that lid from shutting completely.
Now, in addition, decorate that sits in the seam can cause blight, which can discolor the make-up. A assignment, Leslie, I learned the hard way. You know, a few years ago I tried to touch-up some woodwork in my home applying coat from the same can that I initially had decorated the wood with. And formerly the decorate baked, I noticed it was a different colouring. It was more of a- it had kind of a tea blot to it. And I was like, “What the heck? I know it’s the title paint.” Well, it turned out that some rusty had fallen into that dye and it had totally converted the shade from white to a little bit of off-white. And it was very obvious when I did the touch-up. So, learn that lesson from me.
Now, when it comes time to seal that cover can up, what I like to do is to seal it first with a piece of clear plastic wrap, like Saran wrap. This kind of assists act as a gasket. And then you can place that lid on top. And sounds it down gently at first so you get it mounted just right, get the seating just right. Use a rubber mallet if you have one. If you’ve got to use a hammer, make love gently. You want to make sure it’s an evenly distributed heavines all across the top of that seam.
Then what you can do- and this is the best tip ever- take a rag and lay it over the top of the can and bang it down through the cloth. Why “are you doin ” that? First of all, you’re not denting the can. But if “youve left” any drippings of colour in that lip, it doesn’t shoot out in all directions and cover you and the whole area you’re working in in paint drippage. I’ve accumulated decorate this mode and had it last five years, so I know it duties. Just make your time and this behavior, you’ll be able to use it again and again and again.
This is The Money Pit Home Improvement Show. Hey, thanks for spending part of your drop-off weekend with us. We hope we’ve engendered you to take on some projects around your home. If you’ve came questions about those projects, remember, you can always reach us, 24/7, at 1-888-MONEY-PIT. If we’re not in the studio, we predict we will call you back the next time we are.
I’m Tom Kraeutler.
LESLIE: And I’m Leslie Segrete.
TOM: Remember, you can do it yourself …
LESLIE: But you don’t have to do it alone.
( Copyright 2020 Squeaky Door Production, Inc. No segment of this transcript or audio datum may be reproduced in any format without the express written authorization of Squeaky Door Production, Inc .)
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