Dandai
<WoW Guild Officer>
- 5,918
- 4,503
I reached out to a local contractor to see what their bid would be. If it's within a few hundred bucks I'll let them handle it.
Home Improvement
- Thread starter Picasso3
- Start date
-
Guest, it's time once again for the massively important and exciting FoH Asshat Tournament!
Go here and give us your nominations!Who's been the biggest Asshat in the last year? Give us your worst ones!
Dandai
<WoW Guild Officer>
- 5,918
- 4,503
Contractor bid $3,500 ($3 per sq ft of the house) site unseen, but they would come out and evaluate before doing a final bid. Gonna price out the raw materials, but I'm quite confident it'll be less than $2,500.
Lanx
<Prior Amod>
- 65,271
- 147,151
looks like i'm looking for a new mower, this corded lawn mower lasted a year, don't get me wrong, it's still going strong, just that i guess w/ more confidence working on my cars now there is no "plus" to having an easy push corded mower, it's more annoying actually.
i'm not gonna junk my other corded lawn tools tho, they're simple use that i won't have to and really powerful, but it's just getting annoying mowing up and down w/ a cord getting in the way. (making straight line paths w/ a trimmer is no big deal)
so i'm doing a bit of research
Jonsered 21 in. 175cc Kohler XTX Gas Walk Behind Lawnmower, L4621, yea i know, wtf? it's some swedish lawn company using a honda engine, i can get a cool menards rebate on them atm.
atm i have no hills or slopes to warrant an awd mower or even the acreage, but when we get a new home, i won't have to worry.
the sears near me is going out of business now, but they only have the sitting kind mowers left.
i'm not gonna junk my other corded lawn tools tho, they're simple use that i won't have to and really powerful, but it's just getting annoying mowing up and down w/ a cord getting in the way. (making straight line paths w/ a trimmer is no big deal)
so i'm doing a bit of research
Jonsered 21 in. 175cc Kohler XTX Gas Walk Behind Lawnmower, L4621, yea i know, wtf? it's some swedish lawn company using a honda engine, i can get a cool menards rebate on them atm.
atm i have no hills or slopes to warrant an awd mower or even the acreage, but when we get a new home, i won't have to worry.
the sears near me is going out of business now, but they only have the sitting kind mowers left.
Lanx
<Prior Amod>
- 65,271
- 147,151
i used this site
Acreage Calculator - Find Acres Using a Map or Land Dimensions
and the total grass is 0.13 acre
Lanx
<Prior Amod>
- 65,271
- 147,151
so i went in to menards to get the display mower for 245, no returns. i put gas and oil in there before buying it, it started up, i talked the manager down to 165 apparently it's an eyesore just sitting there everyday and they just want to get rid of it, and labor day sales is coming, so that was cool, also the 11% rebate is applied to it also.
Fuck shit is a beast, holy shit, again my first mower is a corded 14in that works well, it's as light as a feather. This thing was heavy, wow, but i don't mind cuz once i pulled the handles for awd, holy shit, it's like mowing is night and day, i have to do a brisk jog to keep up w/ the mower, wow. It's pretty dang heavy tho, i don't know how ppl can push these things w/o fwd or awd and not complain about not getting a motorized one.
Fuck shit is a beast, holy shit, again my first mower is a corded 14in that works well, it's as light as a feather. This thing was heavy, wow, but i don't mind cuz once i pulled the handles for awd, holy shit, it's like mowing is night and day, i have to do a brisk jog to keep up w/ the mower, wow. It's pretty dang heavy tho, i don't know how ppl can push these things w/o fwd or awd and not complain about not getting a motorized one.
- 1
Erronius
<WoW Guild Officer>
- 17,229
- 44,563
I've done some bigger jobs with foam & romex (old 100yo+ schools remodeled into apartments), and we had issues with the guys spraying the foam managing to melt the sheathing on the romex. Now, I couldn't begin to tell you what type of foam they used (usually they just had two 55g drums of chemicals, and we didn't ask questions) but if memory serves, you aren't supposed to just spray a ton in a giant lump/mass...more like...make multiple passes/layers. But they would just fill the pockets full in one pass and move on. It could have been the type of foam they were spraying, I don't know. Some people thought they were holding the spray nozzles too close, other people thought that the foam releases heat after being sprayed and that spraying a metric fuckton in a small area all at once...creates a lot of heat. But after everything was painted and we went back to power up circuits, we got some circuits that tripped. Spent some time trying to figure out where, cut open walls/ceilings and found large sections of blackened romex sheathing. And let me tell you, removing drywall and cutting out foam is a huge PITA. Even worse is trying to run new wiring when everything is 100% foamed.
But to be honest, they damaged way more wiring when they tried cutting back all the oversprayed foam so they could hang drywall than we ever had heat damage. They make special tools to cut the foam facing down, but these guys just put the longest sawzall blades they could find into their sawzalls and tried to cut the foam even with the joist/stud face. Which, if you've ever used those 1ft+ sawzall blades, is hilarious because that shit will flop back and forth on you, and they ended up cutting a ton of wires while cutting the foam back.
I still have a work coat that has fine beads of foam insulation stuck to it. They were trying to foam in a stairwell and didn't have their plastic sheeting installed right, so we had that shit wafting down the hallway in a fine mist. Usually it hardens right away, but for some reason this didn't.
Erronius
<WoW Guild Officer>
- 17,229
- 44,563
I've never used an electric mower, WTF LOL.
I go over and mow my mother's yard. She has a self propelled mower; weighs a ton. I intentionally push it w/o the self-propelled portion engaged, because I'm a fatty and I need to lose weight.
The old school mowers weren't near that heavy and were a lot easier to push. Maybe not as easy as an electric, but still...
Lanx
<Prior Amod>
- 65,271
- 147,151
the electric corded mower weighs 30lbs, thats literal 1/3 the weight of my new mower thats 87lbs.
i didn't know how beastly it is, heck the manager found me in the store again(i bought it, then went to shop some more) and said he wanted to make sure and show me the discharge options. (it has some weird rear discharge adapter that converts to side)
He was surprised i fit it in my back seat (of course i folded the handles), i couldn't fit it in my trunk, i was like 1inch away. (subaru impreza)
He said most ppl that buy mowers w/o a truck end up taking it out the box and fitting it in somehow, he says theres always boxes of lawn mowers in the parking area around spring time.
I mean yea, the electric weighing 30lbs, i could spin that thing on a dime w/ one hand. I did buy a newer blade for the mower, after i was done w/ my first mow, the grass seemed uneven, the blade was blunt on one end.
i got this
i guess it's called a gator blade, cuz it looks like gator teeth, it's only for mulching, which is what i want, i guess it super dices the blade grass. (the standard blade that comes in most mowers are called 3in1 and do mulch/bag/discharge ok as a jack of all trades blade)
i do have a blade sharpener
actually i bought it a long time ago for my kitchen knives Work Sharp Knife & Tool Sharpener - Fast, Easy, Repeatable, Consistent Results but it literally eats metal, it's basically a belt sander.
but for lawn care it's amazing, i was able to take out dings and put a razor edge on my old lawn mower blade (probably why it lasted a year).
Dandai
<WoW Guild Officer>
- 5,918
- 4,503
Lanx
couple of things I wanted to point out - lawn mower blades are cut at 30 degrees so they feel blunt compared to knives and other sharp tools. A good rule of thumb is to sharpen once every 7 mows, but you can see if your blade is dull by looking at the grass blades. Dull blade on the left. Sharp blade on the right:Mulching grass is almost always best if you’re in warmer, not higher altitude areas. The caveat is that the microorganisms have to be active enough to actually break down the mulched clippings as fast as you’re making them. If you’re heavily fertilizing and having to cut frequently then you’re more than likely accumulating clippings that will smother the soil and crowns of the plants (causing water and nutrient uptake issues).
- 46,611
- 214,505
This is only quasi related, but I figured you guys would enjoy this.
I have a good friend who builds and restores pipe organs for a living. Believe it or not, that's not a small business in the US. But over the last few weeks I've been flying out to help him because he got a contract to build a new, bloody huge instrument. I volunteered for this because this guy does everything totally old-school (but with excellent, new tools). Along with a couple other people, we built the entire casement, keyboards, many of the pipes themselves were wood, too. Virtually no screws used except to hang the exterior panels.
Seriously, it's so bloody cool. Here are a couple pictures, and I'm really sorry about the length, but I can't seem to make spoilers work. Someone tell me how and I'll fix it.
Dovetails!
Fit together dovetails!
This is a pipe for the wind to get from the wind chest to the pipe distribution manifold.
Hand-made keyboard.
Centre-piece, directly above the keyboard, holds the tallest facade pipes.
I have a good friend who builds and restores pipe organs for a living. Believe it or not, that's not a small business in the US. But over the last few weeks I've been flying out to help him because he got a contract to build a new, bloody huge instrument. I volunteered for this because this guy does everything totally old-school (but with excellent, new tools). Along with a couple other people, we built the entire casement, keyboards, many of the pipes themselves were wood, too. Virtually no screws used except to hang the exterior panels.
Seriously, it's so bloody cool. Here are a couple pictures, and I'm really sorry about the length, but I can't seem to make spoilers work. Someone tell me how and I'll fix it.
Dovetails!
Fit together dovetails!
This is a pipe for the wind to get from the wind chest to the pipe distribution manifold.
Hand-made keyboard.
Centre-piece, directly above the keyboard, holds the tallest facade pipes.
- 12
Siliconemelons
Naxxramas 1.0 Raider
- 11,871
- 17,836
Dining room cheap laminate has been chipping - this is sub 1$ Sq ft stuff... I knew it was temporary.
Sam's had their laminate 6$ off per box- limit 12 box- so we got 12 (@12.5sq ft per box)
Took out the stuff that's down there and there are circles of mold along the edges... everywhere there was a nail for the tack strip when it was carpet... sooo water is seeping up in the wet season and that part was unsealed when I took out the strip.
Bleached the floor, sealed the floor - self leveling cement the floor - put down the new floor... now just the new base boards need to be put in.
Projects are always more then expected...
But it does look good
Sam's had their laminate 6$ off per box- limit 12 box- so we got 12 (@12.5sq ft per box)
Took out the stuff that's down there and there are circles of mold along the edges... everywhere there was a nail for the tack strip when it was carpet... sooo water is seeping up in the wet season and that part was unsealed when I took out the strip.
Bleached the floor, sealed the floor - self leveling cement the floor - put down the new floor... now just the new base boards need to be put in.
Projects are always more then expected...
But it does look good
Last edited:
- 1
Siliconemelons
Naxxramas 1.0 Raider
- 11,871
- 17,836
This is only quasi related, but I figured you guys would enjoy this.
I have a good friend who builds and restores pipe organs for a living. Believe it or not, that's not a small business in the US. But over the last few weeks I've been flying out to help him because he got a contract to build a new, bloody huge instrument. I volunteered for this because this guy does everything totally old-school (but with excellent, new tools). Along with a couple other people, we built the entire casement, keyboards, many of the pipes themselves were wood, too. Virtually no screws used except to hang the exterior panels.
Seriously, it's so bloody cool. Here are a couple pictures, and I'm really sorry about the length, but I can't seem to make spoilers work. Someone tell me how and I'll fix it.
Dovetails!
Fit together dovetails!
This is a pipe for the wind to get from the wind chest to the pipe distribution manifold.
Hand-made keyboard.
Centre-piece, directly above the keyboard, holds the tallest facade pipes.
There are only a few people in the USA that do that - and it is a large combination of trades - most places you buy and organ from, usually from EU land - require you to have it installed by some certified or whatever person - so however you get that gig, it is just $$$$$
Music Center at my school got some big ass organ from germany, the install cost was 1/3 the total price, had to fly some guy in to do it- and he gets called in to check on it every now and then - there is a line in our budget for it lol - as he was the only guy in the US that could install it.
- 46,611
- 214,505
Actually, there are quite a few companies, and even more individuals that do organ work. If you want a brand new organ built and installed I could name a dozen companies off the top of my head, and there's not certification required to install an organ. It is specialized work, but there are folks around who can do it.
I've actually been involved in the installation of seven organs. Three of them were brand new instruments, four were refurbished, historic instruments. It's awesome work.
- 1
Dandai
<WoW Guild Officer>
- 5,918
- 4,503
Lanx
<Prior Amod>
- 65,271
- 147,151
i needed a blade w/ mounting holes like this
but amazon didn't have the blade length i wanted as a purr gator mulch blade, so i had to get this
and drill the two holes.
Dandai
<WoW Guild Officer>
- 5,918
- 4,503
My Dow Froth Pak (closed cell spray foam) came in on Wednesday, but I couldn’t get the fam to vacate the house for more than a couple hours until this afternoon. I read the instructions twice, followed them to a T, and was surprised at how simple and easy the prep and application ended up being. My biggest concern was getting the mixture/ratio wrong and having inconsistent depths in the foam since so several people in the reviews said they had problems. At this point I think it’s safe to say those were very likely operator errors and not reading or following directions.
Granted, this isn’t picture perfect, but after a couple minutes I got the hang of it and relaxed a bit. This stuff is really fun to use!
Granted, this isn’t picture perfect, but after a couple minutes I got the hang of it and relaxed a bit. This stuff is really fun to use!
- 2
Dandai
<WoW Guild Officer>
- 5,918
- 4,503
I can appreciate your ingenuity, but that kind of mod makes me super nervous. I’d check the fit of that blade every time before I turned the mower on... if that thing comes off you’re all but guaranteed to lose a body part. Be careful broseph.i needed a blade w/ mounting holes like this
but amazon didn't have the blade length i wanted as a purr gator mulch blade, so i had to get this
and drill the two holes.
- 4
Lanx
<Prior Amod>
- 65,271
- 147,151
i was worried too, but it fits flush against the blade holder, and it mulches so fine now, w/ the old 3in1 blade i had clumps, this new blade no clumps. looks kinda uneven tho, might sharpen blade.
It was actually more dangerous having 2 drill bits pop off, of course i did wear PPE
- 2