Rant: home improvement shows

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Diddy
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Re: Rant: home improvement shows

Post by Diddy »

I don't know how people doing drainage work don't understand that water flows down hill. Whoever put the sump pump in in our basement put it several inches above the lowest point so there has to be six inches of water in the basement before the sump kicks on.

DIY channel use to be a lot of how to shows but I haven't had It in years. I've never used you tube for repairs guess I'll have to try it usually I have a book or just tear into it and figure it out.

Were looking at adding onto our house I think we've got a plan and then she sees something in hgtv and completely changes her mind. One of my buddies that's a contractor says that's a huge problem or him also.

AWvsCBsteeeerike3
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Re: Rant: home improvement shows

Post by AWvsCBsteeeerike3 »

Finally got the wood delivered and got to gettin on this frame. FYI, Lowes will deliver any amount of stuff seemingly for $59 which if you think about it is a pretty decent deal. No way all the lumber was fitting in the bed of a truck and the closest one is about 20 miles away. Driving 40 miles, hooking up a trailer (after finding a trailer to use), loading all the wood, unloading all the wood, etc etc etc...it's just easier to pay them to deliver it.

Anyway, quick little pro tip. Don't measure down from the finish floor elevation (FFE) to set the pier elevations like I did. Go ahead and measure down from what you're going to abut. Here's a pic of where the bottom of the frame was going to be and with an inch and a quarter deck board on it, by goodness, it was going to match FFE. Probem is that ledge was going to be 3/4 of an inch or so down in a hole.

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So, had to rip all the frame boards about an inch going from 2x10s to 2x9s....probably should have just given myself room for error up front...or measured from the correct spot, but whatever.

Here's where I got over the weekend. Actually have the top 2x6s bolted in on the left side as well as the right side too. That little corner...took care of that little guy by adding a little concrete block, filling it with concrete and then lagging the post in from every gosh damned direction under the sun. Lagged in a stablizing 2x4 to the 2x10s just to be able to lag the 2x4 into the post. But...hey, it's not going anywhere.

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AWvsCBsteeeerike3
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Re: Rant: home improvement shows

Post by AWvsCBsteeeerike3 »

Diddy wrote:I don't know how people doing drainage work don't understand that water flows down hill. Whoever put the sump pump in in our basement put it several inches above the lowest point so there has to be six inches of water in the basement before the sump kicks on.

DIY channel use to be a lot of how to shows but I haven't had It in years. I've never used you tube for repairs guess I'll have to try it usually I have a book or just tear into it and figure it out.

Were looking at adding onto our house I think we've got a plan and then she sees something in hgtv and completely changes her mind. One of my buddies that's a contractor says that's a huge problem or him also.
I think a lot of people just assume contractors can change plan mid project. In reality, the good ones have time frames mapped out and materials ordered in advance and of course labor costs associated with changing stuff.

That's a great benefit of doing stuff yourself is that once you get going, you can always kind of change something here or there and be fine with it.

Diddy
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Re: Rant: home improvement shows

Post by Diddy »

AWvsCBsteeeerike3 wrote:
Diddy wrote:I don't know how people doing drainage work don't understand that water flows down hill. Whoever put the sump pump in in our basement put it several inches above the lowest point so there has to be six inches of water in the basement before the sump kicks on.

DIY channel use to be a lot of how to shows but I haven't had It in years. I've never used you tube for repairs guess I'll have to try it usually I have a book or just tear into it and figure it out.

Were looking at adding onto our house I think we've got a plan and then she sees something in hgtv and completely changes her mind. One of my buddies that's a contractor says that's a huge problem or him also.
I think a lot of people just assume contractors can change plan mid project. In reality, the good ones have time frames mapped out and materials ordered in advance and of course labor costs associated with changing stuff.

That's a great benefit of doing stuff yourself is that once you get going, you can always kind of change something here or there and be fine with it.
I use to work for a big millwork company after college. I did about everything in the office and even some work on the plant floor. Change orders is where we made big money. With certIn architects we'd even bid jobs at a loss to get them because they always did change orders. Rarely did a project not have a change order so it gave us a chance to recover overages if there were any. Lots of times the changes actually saved us money but we still charged for the change order.

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Re: Rant: home improvement shows

Post by AWvsCBsteeeerike3 »

GeddyWrox wrote:
Popeye_Card wrote:I just don't like how 99% of the shows that are supposed to be about home improvement projects (as opposed to just real estate, like House Hunters) don't teach jack squat about actually doing home improvement. They are all about whatever personality is the star of that show, and wow! at the end of the show the house/room/whatever is so beautiful! Couldn't they at least have a few shows that still give details about how to do projects?
There's a show produced in Canada that I can't get on Charter anymore called Holmes on Homes. He's a contractor who comes into peoples houses and fixes the things that have gone horribly wrong with other contractors. I loved this show, largely because he really focused on how to spot and fix REAL issues. I really wish this show would come back on one of the channels I actually have.
Good and bad news for you Geddy.

This guy probably won't be coming back on anytime soon because he is doing a show called Home Free on Fox.

http://www.fox.com/home-free

Watched a couple minutes of it last night. It's him and Teblow doing some feel good helping stories while doing a tiny bit of 'building' work. In short, all the contestants have a Hero (someone who is struggling with something). Tebow acts as a cheerleader life ocach telling contestants how they can overcome and then they do challenges like frame a 10'11" tall wall 8' wide with a hand saw, 2x4s, nails and a hammer.

When a contestant gets eliminated, their Hero gets a new house. Not sure what the winner gets.

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lukethedrifter
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Re: Rant: home improvement shows

Post by lukethedrifter »

That sounds horrible.

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Re: Rant: home improvement shows

Post by AWvsCBsteeeerike3 »

Yeah

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Re: Rant: home improvement shows

Post by AWvsCBsteeeerike3 »

I know everyone has been waited with bated breath on deck updates. So, without further ado, here you go.

Decided to add some drainage work to the project. Put in a trench and drain against the house and brought it out into the yard. Took it around the house and tied into a drain pipe that was luckily there so didn't have to take it all the way down the street.

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Finished out the frame andpergola and everything.

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After finally finding a distributor to get the decking from, getting that delivered today. Should have it functional by this weekend. Woot woot.

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GeddyWrox
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Re: Rant: home improvement shows

Post by GeddyWrox »

Nice! Sucks about Mike Holmes working with Tebow, too. :(

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Re: Rant: home improvement shows

Post by AWvsCBsteeeerike3 »

Thanks. Not going to lie, took a lot more work than I thought and a couple weeks longer, but most of that was getting the decking. Hopefully it all works out.

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