Not every project goes as well as planned. We would be happy to spend a few minutes answering your questions.
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There are times when you need to add an electrical outlet to the exterior wall. This is easiest when you have an outlet on the interior side of the wall and can branch off of it to supply power to the new outlet. You must use GFCI (ground fault circuit interrupter or GFI for short) protection.
Outdoor elements can cause problems for unprotected outlets (think rainwater), so not only must the outlet be GFI protected, but you also should have a weatherproof box cover. These allow you to use the outlet yet protect it from the weather.
If you are cutting through stucco, a grinder makes quick work of the job. Mark out the lines and slowly cut the perimeter. Use a junction box and caulk around the perimeter. The weatherproof box will have gaskets to further seal out the weather.
After installing the GFCI outlet, install a box cover that uses a plastic dome to protect the outlet. This is hinged and opens to allow you to use the outlet, then swings closed to seal out rain. The other type of cover uses small doors on each individual plug, but once these small doors are opened, it exposes the outlet to rain and could potentially allow rainwater to come into contact with the electricity.
There are lots of carpentry projects that require you to anchor something heavy, or that will support something heavy, into wall studs. In the event you are anchoring shelving into the wall, the entire span of the shelving should be anchored into each wall stud.
I prefer using lag bolts when mounting lumber to a wall. Place a large washer over the lag bolt to increase the bearing pressure on the lumber. You must pre-drill the hole into the wall stud to the approximate diameter of the shank of the bolt (that is, exclude the threads on the bolt and use a drill bit that is just slightly smaller than the shank).
Use a stud finder and hold it against the wall. Move the stud finder horizontally and watch the lights. You want to determine the center of the stud face and install the lag bolt there. If you hit the edge of the stud, you won’t have as much holding power as in the middle. The stud finder will locate the face of the stud. When the sensor lights up, it has contacted one edge of the face. As you move it across the face the lights will die off and that typically identifies the other side of the stud. You can draw a light line on the wall when the sensor picks up each side and aim for the middle.
I had a customer call about his toilet not flushing, He had enough common sense to remove the lid to the tank and look inside. He found the chain was disconnected and he couldn’t get it to reconnect to the toilet flapper. Folks, with something like this, if the hook on the chain won’t connect to the flapper, don’t screw around with it. Just go buy a new flapper with chain. The customer was talking about using duct tape to hold it together (in the water mind you).
The toilet flapper and chain are purchased as one unit. Buy one and throw it in. The old flapper is connected to some ears on the flush valve overflow tube. Lift the flapper off of these ears and set the new one in it’s place. Make sure the seat that the flapper will rest against is nice and smooth. If it is pitted it will allow water to pass from the tank to the bowl and the toilet will flush intermittently and drive you crazy.
All that is left is to lengthen or shorten the chain so that when you push the toilet handle, the flapper lifts and allows the toilet tank water to rush into the bowl.
A plumbing leak at a drain can be coming from several areas. Grab a flashlight and start looking for the source of the leak. Just because the water is dripping off the lowest pipe sure doesn’t mean that it is the cause of the leak. Run the water and look for the source. If the leak is occurring 24 hours a day, the leak will be coming from a pressurized water line or valve.
If the leak occurs only when the water is running, then the leak is probably somewhere on the drain line. Check along the drain line for where the leak is originating. It will likely be at a slip fitting which you may need to tighten or replace. If that doesn’t stop the leak, unscrew the fitting and check the slip washer. These have a tendency to crack which won’t allow it to stop the water. Replace it and tighten.
If the source of the leak is coming from where the drain connects to the sink, you will have to remove the drain assembly. In many cases, the installer will have used silicone under the drain flange. Silicone needs to set up and even then, I don’t have as much confidence in it as I do plumbers putty. My choice is to use plumbers putty under the flange. Roll out a chunk about as thin as a pencil and push it under the flange. As you tighten down the drain assembly, you should see it ooze our around the flange. That is a good thing and confirms you have good coverage.
Sooner or later, your toilet paper holder will become loose. It is an easy fix if you have the right tools.
A toilet paper holder is basically two metal arms that attach to the wall via some metal brackets. The metal brackets attach to the wall and the toilet paper holder arms secure under a lip on each bracket with a tiny setscrew. Either the setscrew has become loose at the bracket, or the bracket has become loose at the wall.
Start with the easy stuff first. Use a tiny standard screwdriver and give the setscrew a few turns. If this tightens everything up, you are done. If the setscrew becomes tight or is already tight, you will need to unscrew it and remove the arm because the bracket is loose at the wall.
This is very common because the brackets rarely seem to go into a wall stud, combined with the fact that the toilet paper holders take a lot of abuse. Use a larger wall anchor and screw and secure the bracket back into the wall. For a lot of holding power, use an EZ anchor. These have very large threads that give superior holding strength in the wall.
Once the anchor is in, screw the bracket to the anchor and finally the setscrew under the bracket.
If you are installing baseboard and you come to an inside corner, you will need to join the two pieces of molding for a nice looking corner. You can use a miter saw and cut two 45-degree angles for this, or you can cope the corner.
Coping is very tedious but leaves a flawless looking corner. That’s why many crown molding installers cope the corners of these very noticeable trim pieces. Coping the joint involves cutting the exact profile of the molding into the edge of the joining piece.
If you are experienced with this, you can use a table saw and nibble out the profile, otherwise, use a coping saw.
You cut install one piece of molding along the wall and not worry about mitering the edge of it. However, on the mating piece of molding, you will need to cut an angle on it so that you can see the profile stand out. Use a coping saw and angle it back. You will need to remove enough of the material so that when you push the molding against the mating piece, it will fit like a glove.
Since the coping saw has a skinny blade, you can make tight radius cuts and then clean everything up with a file. The file will make the fine cuts so that all the curves and angles in the profile of the molding will exactly match the profile of the mating piece.
A cabinet drawer handle can go through a lot of abuse before it finally falls off of the drawer. This can happen for several reasons, but repairing it is not difficult.
A drawer handle is held in place from inside the drawer. If you open the drawer you will see the screws. If you have only a knob, you will have one screw, and if you have a pull you will have two mounting points and two screws. The knobs seem to get the most repairs as they have only one screw holding them in place.
In a lot of cases, the screw holding the knob on will slowly unscrew due to movement of the knob. In some cases, the screw head will start to wear away at the wood drawer face (many are particle board) and get loose in that manner.
Try using a washer on the inside of the drawer. Remove the screw (if its not already out) and place a large washer over the end of it. The washer should have a small hole so that it won’t slide beyond the screw head. Place the knob or handle back on and thread the screw back on. The washer should provide plenty of bearing pressure against the back of the drawer to keep the knob tight. It will also span any damaged wood that will cause the screw to loosen.
Small plumbing leaks can be tough to diagnose. Leaks most often occur at points of connection. Sometimes a pipe is cracked, which is hard to notice, but more often the leak is occurring where a pipe meets a fitting. Depending on the type of piping being used, you may have a threaded connection or a soldered connection. For pipes and fittings that are threaded, a common mistake is not using pipe tape or pipe dope.
Tape fills in the tiny gaps that are left when the threads of two mating objects screw together. The spaces are tiny, but water will find a way through. So by filling these small spaces, you will stop any slow drips or leaks.
For water lines, use white Teflon tape. This tape is on a roll and you wrap the tape in the same direction as you would twist on the fitting. If you wrap the tape the opposite way, it will bunch up. Hold the end of the tape on the fitting and start wrapping it around the threads. Overlap the beginning piece tightly and you will notice it will start gripping onto the threads. I usually wrap the threads three times and then pinch the threads with my fingers in the same direction as the fitting will screw on to the threads.
The same goes for fittings using natural gas. Use yellow gas tape for gas lines. It is thicker than the white Teflon tape and seals out leaks at the threads.
If you are adding an electric outlet in you house, you will need to cut a hole in your drywall. The hole you cut has to be the correct size for the remodeling box you will install.
A remodeling box is a plastic junction box that sits at the wall surface while the box resides inside the wall. You don't need to secure it to a wall stud since the box has mechanical wings that clamp it to the drywall. However, the size of the hole you cut is very important. The hole has to be big enough to allow the box to sit in the wall, but not so big that the mechanical wings can't grip the drywall.
So the best thing to do is to place the rear of the box against the wall where you will install it. Mark around the rear of the box with a pencil. This will be the rough cut, and you will have to fine tune it later. Use a drywall saw and make a shallow cut. Pull the piece of drywall out and place the box in the wall. It won't go in all the way because the wings jut out in two areas. You will need to cut these areas out somewhat until the box fits.
Once the box will completely go into the wall up to it's front lip, you can push the cables into the box and push the box into the hole. Use a philips head screwdriver and twist the screws which cause the mechanical wings to pop out and clamp against the rear of the drywall.
A bi-fold door is a door that will need regular adjustments. In some cases you may need to replace some parts as they are plastic and break under the stress of the door. These folding doors are held in place at both the top and bottom of the hinge side. The top of the door rides in a rail and has a small wheel at the top end for this purpose. This wheel guide will often break and will need replaced.
Reach up into the guide rail and press down on the guide. This will enable you to swing the top of the door out to replace the guide. The old one just pops out of the hole, and as they are spring-loaded, just press it down and swing it back into the rail.
The bottom of the hinge side is somewhat prone to splitting. This pivot is metal and the doors are usually hollow and the wood will split before the metal does. Before you replace the door, remove it by lifting it out of the bracket and removing the metal pivot. You can try gluing the split back together if it is small, and it usually is. Squeeze plenty of glue into the crack and clamp it shut for at least 24 hours. When the glue has dried, reinstall the metal pivot and reinstall the door.
