hausdok

Uh, yeah, sure, but I was referring to the guy who made his house the test subject for the ceramic insulation. The post waaaaaayyyyyyy up there at the top of the thread, not the UFFI drift posts below it. OT - OF!!! M.

Oh, I dunno, I suppose that if ASHI or NAHI really wanted to get a discount for their members they could make it happen. These people aren't going to care much about association rivalries - their business is selling software. They know that not everyone will want it, so they need to get as many as possible to at least try it. The more inspectors they can get to try it, the more chance there is that it will stick with some. NACHI probably just beat the other associations to the punch. I doubt that this company wouldn't offer the same discount to other organizations if they thought that wide exposure of their products to those organizations through their official conduits were possible. If they didn't, they wouldn't be very bright business people, would they? If I were an independent or belonged to another association and was looking for software, tried their demo and wanted it, I'd just tell them that if they want my business they need to give me the same discount they gave members of the other organization. Bet it would happen. ONE TEAM - ONE FIGHT!!! Mike

Hi, So, I have to wonder. How's he doing after two years? Does anyone know? OT - OF!!! M.

Hi, Well, it's no secret, but it doesn't surprise me that it's not mentioned in home inspection books. Most of these are pretty poorly written, deal primarily with only how to perform an inspection and rarely reflect accurately, in my opinion, what inspection concerns are in every region, and are usually a reflection of the author's own narrow perspective based on his/her own experiences. When you figure that the average inspector probably doesn't like to drive more than about an hour from home in any given direction to perform an inspection, their experiences are usually limited to a pretty small geographic area. Aside from that, most inspectors are, in a nutshell, better at the actual inspection process than they are at being business persons. I think you could fill 20 encyclopedias with what home inspectors don't know about homes and the business of being in business - myself included. Not thoroughly investigating copyright aspects of their reports is just one example of many things that inspectors are clueless about. I've been aware of it since I got into this business. The pre-inspection agreement I had as a franchisee had a 3rd Partly Liability provision and a copyright at the bottom, but it didn't explain the copyright, so I went to the U.S. Copyright Office to study up on it. In the 10+ years that I've been doing this, I've read probably a hundred discussions on this and other internet discussion boards for home inspectors - some of them on the NAHI, ASHI, or NACHI organization sites - where this topic was the subject. We even ran a short story here on TIJ a while back that was about the same fellow who's copyright decision you just read about. ONE TEAM - ONE FIGHT!!! Mike

I don't think this is anything new. The copyright laws have been on the books for decades but home inspectors, for the most part, haven't bothered to make themselves smart about the subject. Your copyright begins when you put pen - or in most or our cases, keyboard - to paper. You don't have to have a copyright symbol on your document, or to have even registered your copyright on the document, but, should you ever need to defend your copyright and are successful, having done so can potentially result in far greater monetary penalties being levied against those who violate your copyright. I deal with this up-front before the inspection. I tell every client that the work is my copyrighted work product and that they are paying me for my knowledge and the time it takes me to inspect the home, impart my findings to them and produce the report. I tell them that once the report is released to them they are free to share it with their agent and the seller if they so desire. However, I also tell them that they are responsible to make sure that it's use is controlled, because it's a one-time work product created for their use for their transaction only - not for anyone else's - and that, if they walk away from the home, they may not sell it, barter it, trade it or give it freely, by any means, including electronically, to anyone that plans to use it to purchase the property. I tell them that if someone else wants my report on that home, they can call me, schedule an inspection, and I'll sit right there on another day, go over the pre-inspection contract with them the same way and have them sign a separate contract, and then reinspect the home and product an entirely new report for them for which they can pay. I warn the client that I'll take any violation of my copyright very seriously, and, should my report ever be used against me by another person who is not a party to the contract, that I'll pursue them (the client) in a court of law. It's all part of a very serious 15 - 20 minute pre-inspection briefing that I undergo with every client before allowing them to sign the pre-inspection contract, in order to impress upon them that I'm very serious about the inspection process and expect them to be the same. I don't realistically expect that everyone will pay attention to that and my copyright won't ever be violated. However, I fully intend to go after anyone who I find out knowingly blew-off the pre-inspection contract, violates my copyright and it comes back to bite me in any way, shape or form. ONE TEAM - ONE FIGHT!!! Mike

Wow, An infant masochist who would have ever expected that? [:-bigeyes OT - OF!!! M.

Tad off-topic, This reminds me of those danged anti-inspector plastic covers that people stick in all of their receptacles. They claim it's for child protection but I just know it had to be some ticked-off home seller who invented those things to get back at inspectors. Some days you can wear out the tips of your fingers prying those damned things off every accessible receptacle. [:-gnasher

My thoughts exactly when I posed the question above. OT - OF!!! M.

So what are you saying? That you'd write them up as a deficiency if you didn't find them installed that way? That's kind of like making up the rules of the game as you play, isn't it? While I see the logic in these explanations, I don't think we have any business making stuff up. OT - OF!!! M.

Don't let my wife see that. She wants me to install an air-lock with air evacuation between my throne room and the rest of the house. For the life of me, I can't figure out why. I don't notice anything objectionable or noxious when I'm in there. [:-boggled OT - OF!!! M.

Back on topic, I take a very blunt and hard line approach to the whole issue of appliances and such. I think that if you do otherwise, people get the impression that we are somehow warranty providers anyway - when we're anything but. I tell folks up-front, before the inspection, that the only thing I do with appliances is turn them on to see if they work. I tell them that I don't have any food to grind up in the disposal - if it spins up and doesn't leak, I'm happy with it. I tell them that I don't have any dirty dishes to wash in the dishwasher - if it fills, cycles properly and then empties itself without leaking all over the place, I'm happy with it. I tell them that I don't have any clothing to wash/dry in the washing machine and dryer - if the washer fills with water and then spins out without flooding the house and the dryer heats up I'm happy. I tell them I don't have any unbaked cake to stick in the oven and wait an hour to see if it will bake properly, or any food to cook in the microwave, and I'm not going to boil any water to ensure that the stove burners reach any temperature that is hotter than is too hot for me to touch - if the oven and stove burners get too hot to touch and the microwave will make a wad of damp paper towel heat up in about 10 seconds, I'm happy. I also tell them that I'm not going to guaranty the longevity of any furnaces, boilers or water heaters. I'll test them to see whether they work and examine them to see whether they're installed correctly, but I don't have x-ray vision and am not a swami, so I have no way to know how long they'll last. I emphasize the fact that there is no guaranty on anything by saying that, if any of those items breaks down before my truck reaches the end of the driveway, I'll feel sorry for them, but don't expect me to pay for any of it. Everyone gets it. Everyone, that is, except for one lady who didn't seem to understand that "already beyond the end of it's useful service life and should be replaced now, before it springs a leak and damages something" meant that she should have the water heater under her kitchen counter replaced before my truck reached the end of the driveway. She bought the home without having it replaced and it failed two weeks after she moved in. She wanted a refund plus the cost of the labor to completely disassemble her kitchen counter to remove and replace the danged thing and reconstruct the counters. I shouldn't have, but I gave her a refund (25% of the cost of the new one plus the work) and had her sign over a hold harmless before I handed over the check, because I could just sense that if I didn't I was going to hear from her when a 40-year old lockset stuck or whenever one of the appliances reached end of it's service life. When I was with the franchise outfit, they tried selling warranty's for a while. I sold the first, and, I think, only one ever sold. A year or so later they dropped the program. Most consumers would read through the long list of disclaimers and rules in the brochure and were smart enough to see that it was all a bunch of malarkey designed to rope them in and give them some perception of having a valuable added service tacked onto the inspection when it was anything but. Concentrate on doing an exemplary and extremely thorough inspection that won't ever come back to bite you. Do that and be firm up-front about what you'll do for the client, what you won't do for them, and what avenues they have open to them in the event they think you didn't perform. Do that, and you won't have to charge ridiculously low fees to garner work, can charge more than the other guy for your services, and people will happily pay it, and you won't waste your time chasing your tail to process rinky-dink little complaints or process claims, only to see them turned down and then have to waste more time explaining to the client why the warranty company won't pay out when the furnace that's 125% of its expected service life craps out. (I'm feeling particularly sanctimonious today. Can't you tell? [:-smile_g ONE TEAM - ONE FIGHT!!! Mike

Omaho Steak?.....hmmmmm, Cost of forum access membership at TIJ equals one Omaha Steak per year times 2,457 board members.... Holy Mackeralannie! Have I got an idea. Steeaaaaaaaaaaak Ummmmmmmmmmmmmmmm. Gotta order the new belt first. OT - OF!!! M.

Yeah, Nasty, incontinent little bastards can hold their breath for longer than we can. ONE TEAM - ONE FIGHT!!! Mike

Hi Brandon, I've pretty much done everything that you've recommended. I'm just waiting for the other shoe to drop now. OT - OF!!! M.

Well, Not if they're asking for a ball park sizing. It's my understanding that you are an electrician, so asking you for a ballpark on service sizing wouldn't be any different, at least in my view, than calling the local sparky and asking, "Hey Sparky, I've got a _______square foot house that's heated with a ______, cooled with a ________, has an _______dryer, a _________water heater, a _________stove and will have X-number of rooms. What's your professional opinion would be an appropriate service size for a house like that?" The sparky would probably answer something like, "Well, a load calc will need to be done on the actual house to know for certain, but given that information, I think in this area you'd want a service that's not less than _____amps, but to be certain that you never max it out, given what's generally predicted to be the requirements of the future, you'll want to install a _____ service." As long as you tell 'em that an actual load calc is going to be absolutely necessary before one can be certain, I don't see why asking for a ballpark figure and getting an answer from a real rootin-tootin sparky is so terrible. Let me guess, it was a certain engineer with the initials G.R. who laid that one on you. If so, Chad and I know that t*****. He's got the franchise on pomposity. ONE TEAM - ONE FIGHT!!! Mike

Well, there you go. I learned something. A day that passes and one doesn't learn something is a day wasted. OT - OF!!! M.

Hi, I spent the first 21 years of my life in New York State and grew up learning how to build houses there. I'd never even seen a building trap until I saw one in a photo posted here, so, yeah, that would jive with the "it's up to the local AHJ" thing. OT - OF!!! M.

Hi, Yeah, that would be Michael Leavitt and the Monday Morning Messenger, but I don't remember anything about IR technology. He's a 3-D user and has some customized 3-D plug-ins that he sells. He could be doing something with IR now, but I have no knowledge of that. ONE TEAM - ONE FIGHT!!! Mike

Um I thought the B2 was under $7,000 now. Didn't someone say that somewhere above in this thread? OT - OF!!! M.

Washington, DC - Release #07-020 Today, the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission, in cooperation with Weil Mclain of Michigan City, IN, announced a voluntary recall of gas boilers due to a carbon-monoxide (CO) poisoning hazard. According to the CPSC release, these boilers are made for use with natural gas but may be mis-labeled, indicating that they are approved for use with L-P (liquid propane) gas. If they are installed and plumbed to L-P gas, incomplete combustion can occur and pose a risk of CO poisoning. The alert states that consumers should immediately stop using these boilers unless otherwise instructed. The recall involves about 16,000 Weil-McLain Ultra Series Gas Ultra 80, Ultra 105, Ultra 155, Ultra 230 and Ultra 310 condensing, high-efficient, gas-fired boilers for space heating. The user's manual and installation manual have "Ultra Gas-Fired Water Boiler" on the cover and the boilers are wrapped in a glossy silver/flat black jacket and either stand on the floor or are wall-mounted. Serial numbers of the affected boilers range from CP5071716 through CP5327000 and can be found on a bar-coded label on the lower right-hand side of the boiler when the front cover is removed. These boilers were sold by plumbing and heating wholesale distributors, plumbers and contractors nationwide from May 2005 through July 2006 for between $4,000 and $7,000. So far, according to the CPSC, two consumers sustained CO poisoning when their boiler was incorrectly connected to L-P gas. CPSC says that any consumers that have had a Weil-McClain boiler connected to L-P gas, and have not already been contacted by their installer, should contact the installer or a heating professional for a free safety inspection. If the boiler was not installed with a propane conversion kit, one will be installed at the time of the inspection at no charge. Heating professionals may contact Weil McLain Technical Service at (219) 879-6561 for more information. Consumers can contact Weil-Mclain toll-free at(866)426-6172 between 8 a.m. and 4 p.m. CT Monday through Friday, or visit the firm's Web site at www.weil-mclain.com. To see this recall on CPSC's web site, including pictures of the recalled product, go to: http://www.cpsc.gov/cpscpub/prerel/prhtml07/07020.html

Hi Martin, It's probably too large. Since it's a pdf, you should be able to reduce it. Have you tried using an image resizer on it to get it under the upload threshold? Also make sure that there are no special symbols or spaces in the file name. For instance a file name like GFCIinstructions will work fine but GFCI(Instructions) or GFCI Instructions won't upload. OT - OF!!! M.

Must be a regional thing. I've never seen one of those before. OT - OF!!! M.

Is that a chimney? Could it be an air inlet for a fireplace? OT - OF!!! M.

Hi Randy, The most noticeable features that I see are the exposed lugs on the sides of the tanks where hydronic systems are supposed to connect. That and the fact that most are usually at least 65,000 Btu/Hr vs. the 40 - 45,000 for the typical water heater used for domestic hot water. I see te Bio-Radiant systems frequently and most folks I know who've had them love them. ONE TEAM - ONE FIGHT!!! Mike

Hi, Here's a 1998 article by a veteran plumber who uses hot water heaters for radiant heat. OT - OF!!! M.