Home D.I.Y.

[MichaelW2]

For some applications, I bang in old fashioned wooden plugs rather than plastic rawlplugs.
Wood works better in poor plaster and in walls where drill bits skip around.
Once a wooden plug is in place you can screw anywhere on the woid, not just the centre.

 

[cyberknight]

Not DIY
One of the kids blocked the toilet and needed dyno to come out and fix it £160 !!!!
and now they have gone the toilet is leaking around the base so they have to come back and sort that

 

[Alex321]

Common solution to loose curtain pole brackets is to bond a length of timber to the wall with no more nails or similar then screw the brackets to the batten. Not something I've done at home, but when fixing a curtain pole for my in-laws this was their requested method. It worked pretty well.

I did that last weekend for the curtain pole we wanted over the front door (to reduce draughts). The brackets we had were old fashioned wooden ones which attach using a single screw from the rear, and while you can use a double ended bolt which screws into the wall first, then screw the bracket onto it, much easier (and I think more secure) to use a length of wood with bolts through from the back.

 

[Jameshow]

Having a right pain with the freestanding bath taps. The cheap eBay one I got for £60 has non standard tails.

They are about 10mm fine thread.

 

[bikingdad90]

It’ll be 12mm?

 

[gbb]

New carpet laid in the living room,18ft x 11ft, weighed a ton, bogger to get into the van, to the house and work around stuff we couldn't get out the room, not a very pleasurable job.
A days work to empty the room, skirting off, get and fit carpet, get everything back in the room.
£430, lovely thick ...heavy heavy carpet

 

[gbb]

And for a friend whose washing machine keeps regurgitating the drain water over the floor, she was trying to find a plumber.
It'll be the hose is out of the stack, the stack is blocked or its got a split i proffered.
Went over, hose was just just in the stack but not enough. Sorted in 5 minutes, would been the easiest most profitable job had a plumber been got in.

 

[gbb]

A reminder that DIY doesn't always go easy, sometimes its a swine.
Double glazing is maybe 30 years old and a second lock/gearbox has gone. Remove DG panel, to allow some flex in the frame, still an absolute swine squeeze a hooked implement into the gap, find the mushroom head peg to release the window. Lots of swearing, got it, then it fell into place again and locked, gah, repeat process....all to get the gearbox out, measure, find one on the Internet then put it all back together. Repeat process when the new part arrives.
Scarred the frame, damaged the gasket, its not always easy....and I've done it before, it went quite well that time.
Ah well, they are 30 years old, no surprise bits are giving up now.

 

[gbb]

Went to mums (she is in hospital), cleared out her bedroom of all the furniture and bed, removed the carpet, it had a horrible bloodstain from a previous fall where she smashed her head open, get that bundled up and binned,, got all the floor tiles hoovered and washed, went to town, got a new carpet (£130)...on the way back to mums, stopped and ordered a new mattress (same fate as the carpet), that was £270, ,laid the carpet, furniture put back in, that includes removing and refitting the bedroom door and fitting the carpet strip.
All in less than 4 hours. Busy busy busy.

 

[fossyant]

Went to mums (she is in hospital), cleared out her bedroom of all the furniture and bed, removed the carpet, it had a horrible bloodstain from a previous fall where she smashed her head open, get that bundled up and binned,, got all the floor tiles hoovered and washed, went to town, got a new carpet (£130)...on the way back to mums, stopped and ordered a new mattress (same fate as the carpet), that was £270, ,laid the carpet, furniture put back in, that includes removing and refitting the bedroom door and fitting the carpet strip.
All in less than 4 hours. Busy busy busy.

That's some work there...

 

[Fastpedaller]

Having a right pain with the freestanding bath taps. The cheap eBay one I got for £60 has non standard tails.

They are about 10mm fine thread.

They'll be 3/8 BSP
ETA do you really mean bath taps or basin taps for bathroom? 3/8 BSP is the 'standard' size on cheap basin mixer taps.

 

[gbb]

That's some work there...

Much appreciation to my wife, she's a grafter too, never afraid to get in there. Both well over 60,

 

[slowmotion]

The waste pipe from the bathroom WC goes into the soil pipe a few inches above the bath waste pipe. Somehow, the more enthusiastic hair washers and teeth flossers in this household managed to create a plug of dense and impervious mank in the soil pipe just below both waste connections. The result was that the contents of the WC and the blocked soil pipe emerged from the bath plug hole in an alarmingly unpleasant torrent. The only way to get rid of it was to bail out the bath every time I flushed the WC in the hope of clearing the bung. It turned into a plumbing and tiling epic.

BTW, mind bleach anybody?

 

[MrGrumpy]

Well I’ve got a job to do with fitting new lights. However it going to require getting under floors and strengthening with wood. She’s bought small chandeliers, coming in at 17kg !!! Ffs

 

[MrGrumpy]

Well I’ve got a job to do with fitting new lights. However it going to require getting under floors and strengthening with wood. She’s bought small chandeliers, coming in at 17kg !!! Ffs

Getting under floors is going to be huge PITA ! So gonna try toggle bolts !