Steps for Painting Bare Wood Step 1: Sand the Surface It may seem unnecessary to sand bare wood before painting, but stock lumber is often coated in a glaze to help protect it. Removing that coating will help the paint adhere. In addition, sanding opens the grain of the wood, which can also help with adhesion. This Old House Painter Mauro Henrique suggests using 150 grit sandpaper and then vacuuming and wiping the surface clean....
What is Mold? Mold (sometimes called mildew), is a type of fungus. It’s made up of small organisms that send out tiny spores to reproduce when they find somewhere wet. These spores can attach themselves to clothing, hair, shoes, or just travel on the wind — and you encounter them throughout your day, mostly without noticing. What Causes Mold to Grow in Basements? Mold loves temperatures between 60 and 80 degrees F, a little bit of moisture, some tasty surfaces to feed on, and plenty of room to grow—all of which the average basement supplies readily....
How to Replace a Fireplace Cover Note: It’s important that the fireplace be absolutely cool, with no embers or coals, so it’s best to wait several days after the last fire before attempting this job. How to Tile Over a Brick Fireplace Materials Garbage bag Fireplace doors Fireplace insulation Tools
Steps: Tools
Whatever your motivation for bringing a ceiling fan into your home, it’s important to choose a model that’s the right size for your space and install it correctly. The installation process isn’t difficult if you’re replacing an old light fixture with the fan, but if wires have to be fished and circuits added, or the ceiling is higher than 10 feet, you may want to enlist the help of an electrician....
Nathan installed TEC Soft-Close cabinet hinges, which are manufactured by Grass USA. He recommends identifying the brand currently installed in the cabinets and replacing the hardware with that same brand, which is what he did in this case. Usually, that will require less work on the cabinet doors to get the new hardware to fit. For the drawer slides, Nathan installed 22” soft-close, full-extension, ball bearing, side-mount drawer slides, which are manufactured by Everbilt and sold at home centers....
Q: Previous owners moved the laundry room to the second floor and terminated the dryer vent in the attic space above, since it’s not near an exterior wall. What’s the best way to vent it to the outside? A: It’s become popular to put laundry rooms on the second floor for the convenience, but venting a clothes dryer into an attic is a big mistake. Warm, moist air from the vent creates a perfect climate for mold to grow on the roof framing, sheathing, and anything you’ve stored in the space....
Where Can You Watch Makers Channel? Stream This Old House Makers Channel for free anytime on The Roku Channel, #458, and for free anytime on Samsung TV Plus, Channel #1214.
He also showed an interconnect switch, which wires to the main breaker panel and allows the entire panel to be energized by the generator. Both of these should only be installed by a licensed electrician and can be purchased from an electrical supply house. Heath showed the GP6500 COSENSE portable generator, which has a built-in carbon monoxide detector and is manufactured by Generac. Shopping List: Portable generator
First, this type of cement will cure under water, which means that you don’t have to dry out the leak before stopping it. Second, is that hydraulic cement expands as it cures, so it tightens up cracks and seals the gaps around pipes. Tools:
title: “Idea Houses” ShowToc: true date: “2022-11-27” author: “Jessica Nez” title: “Idea Houses” ShowToc: true date: “2023-01-07” author: “Colleen Yingling” title: “Idea Houses” ShowToc: true date: “2022-12-05” author: “Martha Lawson”
On colder days the boiler will make more heat than it will on warmer days. Makes perfect sense.
Why Are Japanese Saws Better? Many traits distinguish saws from East and West, but it all boils down to this: In Japan, you cut on the pull stroke. Pulling keeps the blade straight, so it can be thin—up to 75 percent slimmer than a Western blade, which must struggle to resist bending with every push. Since thin blades produce thin kerfs, Japanese saws remove less wood, produce less sawdust, and need less muscle power....
He is the host of the podcast Clearstory, he published a book The Best Homes of This Old House, and he also has hosted shows for the DIY and History’s H2 networks. Kevin received a Bachelor of Arts degree in history from the College of the Holy Cross and a Master’s of Business Administration degree from Boston University. Prior to his television career, Kevin worked for Bank of America as a Senior Vice President in the Commercial Real Estate Group and before that in the Sports Finance Group at Fleet Bank....
“The laundry room has turned into the hamper, the mudroom, the catch-all storage area,” says Duo Dickinson, an architect in Madison, Connecticut, who adds home office, craft room, indoor potting area, and pet-washing station, to that, well, laundry list. And now, tricked out with first-class features such as custom cabinets, built-in ironing boards, and purr-quiet machines, the new harder-working laundry room is (when possible) migrating from the isolated basement. Find it on first and second floors, where the washer is just a dishrag’s throw away from the kitchen, or a diaper’s toss from the nursery....
How Do You Measure Pull Down Attic Stairs? You’ll need at least three critical measurements: the width and length of the rough opening, and the ceiling height. Measure the rough opening’s width and length in three different spots, at the top and bottom of the framing. Choose a stair that fits into the smallest of these measurements and is long enough for your ceiling height; you may have to trim to fit....
These machines owe their versatility to their unique motion: The sandpaper disc spins in a circle while the whole pad moves in an oval loop. As a result, no single abrasive particle follows the same path twice, leaving a swirl-free finish even when sanding across the grain. But while random-orbits work more quickly than vibrating sanders, they can’t aggressively remove a lot of material—for that, get a belt sander for flat surfaces or a disc sander for curved ones....
