hausdok

Hi, Oldest I've seen were both on the other side of the Sound on the Peninsula. They were both Hotpoint brand electric units from 1951. Big, ugly monsters with cast iron trimmings. OT - OF!!! M.

Hi, Most of them are glass lined. There are 6 manufacturers producing more than 105 brands of water heater in the U.S. and a whole lot of 'em use glass lined tanks. So what? The constant heating/cooling over years causes the lining to spall and then the tank begins to rust. Kurt's right, the plumber will say whatever he believes he's expected to say by the folks paying him and then when it fails he'll say there was no visible evidence, so how could he possibly have predicted anything? I cite an expected 10 to 15 year service life. When they're beyond 15 years and not leaking, I tell people, "Pop is still with us, but he's in the nursing home with tubes in his arms under 24 hour observation. He could go anytime and there's no way to know when that will be." They always get it. ONE TEAM - ONE FIGHT!!! Mike

Hi, I'm wondering how the hell they are restoring the integrity of the weather resistant backer behind the stucco once they've drilled a hole through it. There are actualy 16 ASTM standards that apply to the application of traditional 3-coat Portland cement stucco and none of them discuss drilling holes in the surface to take moisture readings. If their purpose is to determine if water had penetrated through to the sheathing behind the paper, they'd be smarter to take the reading from the interior with long probes through an interior wall. That way they don't have to drill through the surface and damage the backing. A properly mixed, applied and cured 3/4-inch (19-mm) basecoat of stucco is water resistant. The Northwest Wall & Ceiling Bureau built three test panels, each with a different stucco formulation, and tested them by spraying each for over two hours at a rate of 112 gallons per hour at a pressure equal to a 38 mph wind. At the end of the testing none of them showed water penetration on the backside. Good stucco is water resistant but permeable so it can breath, allowing the home to dry to the exterior. FWIW, random cracking, or crazing, is generally not considered a "defect" in stucco. All stucco cracks, which is precisely why accessory joints and control accessories are used in its application - the purpose being to limit, not eliminate, the amount of cracking that occurs and help direct water that gets behind the surface back out again. The two layers of Grade D paper or polyolefin stucco wrap behind the cladding are responsible for redirecting that moisture down the wall, but if the sheathing gets wet are supposed to allow it to dry to the exterior. Get a copy of The Portland Cement Plaster Stucco Resource Guide from the Stucco Manufacturer's Association. (http://www.stuccomfgassoc.com) It has everything you'll ever want to know about stucco in it. You can also click on "About Stucco" for some other useful information. ONE TEAM - ONE FIGHT!!! Mike

Hi, You can do that. Except, you need to insulate the duct so air won't cool to dewpoint and condense inside, you should not use corrugated ducting and the duct needs to not have any dips in it that could end up pooling water. You also need to be careful about what's directly overhead. I've never personally seen vents that exhaust out the side of a house cause any attic issues, but others who've posted here have posted pictures of some serious moisture-related issues involving vents that discharge outside of sidewalls beneath the eaves. OT - OF!!! M.

Hi, I've never seen anything but trouble with soffit venting. When properly installed a rain cap designed specifically to vent a bath fan through the plane of the roof will not leak. There is no need to "patch" the roof perfectly, because the cap flange is integrated into the roof shingles. They are even used on shake roofs around here and don't leak despite the uneven surface. Whoever is telling you that, should go to his proctologist and get his head freed up. ONE TEAM - ONE FIGHT!!! Mike

Hi Brian, I've been using one for nearly 5 years and love it. Vd is not highest on my radar. I usually have to have a litany of things going on before I'll break a sweat over it. OT - OF!!! M.

Hi, I think Chad is correct. Electrical devices are supposed to be designed to operate in the 108 to 132 volt range. So, unless you drop below 10% of the 120volt nominal, you are in a safe range for whatever is operating off that circuit. Scott is also correct, voltage drop is affected a great deal by distance from source. Think of water through a pipe. The farther from the source, the less pressure water has, unless you up the size of the pipe. With wiring it is the same way. An outlet 100ft. from the panel can easily have a drop of 10% but have perfectly good connections all the way to the panel. The issue then becomes a question of delivered voltage at that distance, which won't be within parameters. The correction is supposed to be a larger pipe (conductor). If not, delivered voltage is insufficient and whatever is being powered could be at risk. My understanding anyway. Don't rely on it - in my mind electricity and voodoo have similar properties. ONE TEAM - ONE FIGHT!!! Mike

When I pulled the air filter out of that furnace with a 14 year old uninspectable coil in it two weeks ago and the dead deer mouse hit the ground I definitely recommended "sanitizing" the ducts. OT - OF!!! M.

Mmmmm, I suddenly feel hungry. Must be 'cuz of all of these nasty crawls I've gotten used to negotiating. Maybe it's time for therapy. OT - OF!!! M.

No Terry, It was leaking exhaust condensate from the furnace when the heat was on. When the A/C was turned on, no condensate came out of that puppy at all. I'm guessing that drain was stopped up with rat feces or something. Didn't really care, just referred it off. Was curious about the coil though, cuz with the amount of stuff that was clogging up the air filter, I'm betting the inside of that A (V) coil is similarly nasty. ONE TEAM - ONE FIGHT!!! Mike

Hi Dan, No, it's a downflow. I just had a brain fart. Look at the time I made that post. My head kept bouncing off the keyboard and waking me up. I finally dragged my chubby butt into the sack at 0330hrs.. Out the door again at 0730 for the morning job. I.F., It was a Fraser-Johnson Mod G/CM0305A. To answer your question about AC here - it probably gets hot enough for A/C for a few hours of one or two days of the year. When we do see A/C units, they've seen so little use and are so old they should probably be classified as antiques. Thanks for your responses everyone. Neither the furnace nor the A/C had been looked at since 1996 and the furnace was a hi-eff Payne unit that was leaking condensate all over the place. It was easy to refer it to an HVAC guy for cleaning and repairs as necessary. ONE TEAM - ONE FIGHT!!! Mike

Hi All, Well, today was a banner day. I actually got to see an air conditioner. (I think it is my 5th or 6th in 8 years.) Anyway, I have a question about this puppy. They mounted the A-coil on the supply side of the furnace beneath a high-efficiency gas unit, with an electronic air filter at the other end of the furnace. So, I open up the electronic air cleaner to take a look and it looks like it hadn't been cleaned in years. The, when I pull the last pre-filter out, a damned dead deer mouse falls out and damn near gives me a heart attack. (Sorry, I'm like an elephant when it comes to rats and a deer mouse is damned near as big as a rat.) Anyway, back to the AC - The A coil is mounted on the underside of the furnace with the apex pointed downward! Now, I'm not an AC ace, but seems to me if the A coil is mounted with the apex pointing downward isn't it going to be impossible to clean properly without completely removing it? At least when they're installed with the apex pointed upward into the airstream you can vaccuum the intake side of the coil and remove all of the accumulated crud. With the coil mounted the other way, like a pair of cupped hands, to catch the crud, I should think it would be pretty well clogged up. (Installed in 1989 by the way and never serviced yet.) Let this puppy run for about half an hour. Ran nice and quiet but only achieved about a 10° split and it dropped the temp in the house (on a 72° day) by only 2 degrees. (I set it much lower.) What're your thoughts Norm and you other warm climate folks. Okay to have the A coil installed in such a way that you can't even get a vaccuum to the intake side of it? Could a coil clogged with dog hair result in some poor cooling? (They had two hunting dogs.) Or, do you think it has lost its charge after 15 years without any servicing? ONE TEAM - ONE FIGHT!!! (From where turning on the air conditioner means cranking a window open.) Mike

Hi, I fixed the link OT - OF!!! M.

Hi All, I just got home and tried it and the gentlemen are right it didn't work. Most of the time it does. Not being a computer-friendly guy, I guess I was just lucky and was getting away with it 'cuz I didn't know any better. Go figure. OT - OF!!! M.

Hi, Over the past 6 - 8 months I've been finding that some insurance companies out here are refusing to insure a home with K & T, until it's all been taken out and replaced, while others are charging significantly higher premiums. I now pass that on to my clients during the inspection and in my reports. After all, it doesn't matter if the stuff will continue to perform well for a hundred more years, if the insurance companies refuse to insure the home, the question of its replacement is moot. ONE TEAM - ONE FIGHT!!! Mike

Like Jim K., all the time. OT - OF!!! M.

Hi Robert, Personally, I would have turned it off and told him that he didn't own the house yet and had no right to place any of the home's systems at risk of damage until he did. I think you should be careful to include in your report a statement at the beginning of the AC portion of the report that you informed the client that you would not be running the A/C due to low temperatures, but that he took it upon himself to start the A/C without your knowledge or permission, therefore relieving your firm of any responsibility for recovery of damages, should it malfunction or otherwise fail now or at any future date. ONE TEAM - ONE FIGHT!!! Mike

by Mike O'Handley, Editor Question: What association can you join and as part of your membership benefits receive: A monthly periodical containing numerous well-written technical articles of value to both a home inspector and his or her clients? Free monthly members' prize giveaways? (This month some lucky member will win a Kawasaki Mule worth $9,800!) A monthly E-Newsletter? An on-line bulletin board similar to TIJ's? The chance to win up to $200. per month by sharing simple do-it-yourselfer tips for other members to use? All of the above for a measly $1.50 a month (Or half the cost of a latte.)? Answer: The Handyman Club of America (H.C.O.A.), (http://www.HandymanClub.com). If you are in this profession and have never joined HCOA, you are missing out on one of the best deals around. I joined HCOA in 1995, about two years after they were originally formed and became a life member a couple of years after that. When I first joined HCOA, they had nearly 400,000 members. Today, not even 9 years later, their nationwide membership is nearing 1,000,000 and continues to grow. Membership is only $18.00 a year, which is less than the average magazine subscription and their monthly periodical, Handy Magazine, is worth the price of membership alone. The Club's members author many of the articles featured in Handy, and if you think these are poorly written by know-nothings you had better think again, because they've featured articles by members such as Rex Cauldwell and Roy Barnhardt who are nationally-known authors. While the premise of the club is to focus on the do-it-yourselfer, home inspectors can find a lot of great information in the pages of Handy - information that they can learn from or share with their clients. For example, the January/February 2004 issue featured an article by Cauldwell about using multimeters, and there were two other articles about today's smaller, more efficient water heaters and (Gasp) mold in modern homes. One article that I have shared with hundreds of clients over the years is an article from the May/June 1996 issue that explained in great detail how to apply a reinforced mortar cap with a built-in drip edge to the tops of chimneys. I've heard from no less than six masons over the years asking for their own copy of that article, after their customers showed them what they wanted. Since then, I've begun to see a few crowns done that way around the Seattle area(Good news travels fast!). There's only one thing in Handy that I really object to, and that's the ubiquitous full-page ads for home inspection courses by various correspondence schools, touting the ever-deceptive claim that anyone can be s successful home inspector and make a full-time income while working only part-time hours (I guess you have to put up with some "stretches" by advertisers, but this one qualifies as a lie in my opinion.). Another neat feature of HCOA is the tool tests. Members are chosen at random to try out certain tools and equipment and to report their experiences in Handy. When they're done, they get to keep the tool. How's that for kewl, as my grandson would say? Those interested can log onto the website above to fill out a membership application.

Hi Kurt, I agree with your point about the checklist/matrix reports. I can't understand how anyone, who needs to, can go back into their files several years later and be able to recall an inspection based on a bunch of icons or checkmarks and one or two word comments. Being a former criminal investigator, I'm accustomed to describing what I observed and every one of my subsequent actions in great detail. I tend to trust in my written reports to revive a very clear picture of the investigation process. imagine the chaos that would ensue if police agencies suddenly let all of their line-duty cops and investigators rely on a checklist and icons for their reporting procedures. Remember when I wrote last week about the very first inspection I ever did? Off the top of my head, I had a pretty good memory of that inspection, but when I pulled the written report and reviewed it, I found lots of details that I'd completely forgotten about. Once I read through the report, it was as if a video tape had been plugged into my head and I could remember every issue in great detail. If I'd been using a matrix or checklist type of report, there is no way any of those details would have returned to mind after 8 years. That's why I favor a narrative type of report. ONE TEAM - ONE FIGHT!!! Mike

Hi, You describe it as a 13 year old shake roof, but you don't state what kind of periodic maintenance the roof has had. Shake roofs need to be kept clean and free of organic debris that will promote rot. That means a good shake guy needs to get on that roof about every two years and tune it up by refastening loose shakes, replacing rotten and missing ones and then oiling the roof to preserve it. Above all, shake roofs should not be pressure washed with high pressure. It's okay to allow a professional roof cleaning company to use a pressure washer on the roof, if they are treating the roof with a chemical to kill any algae and then are cleaning it with a high volume of water at low pressure. However, if you have had the roof recently pressure washed by some buckethead using high pressure, you've probably got a bunch of holes in the field just below the butts and in the keyways between shakes, in which case you could be looking at replacement, depending on how much of the roof has been damaged. Tell us more, post some pictures and stay the hell away from goop. ONE TEAM - ONE FIGHT!!! Mike

Hi Terry, That's not a bad site for information, but don't bother purchasing their The Siding Book. It's pretty sparse and nothing but a re-hash of bits and pieces of information that is available about various siding products on the websites of the manufacturer's. You can spend a couple of hours on the internet and if you have a fast printer compile a hundred times more good information about various siding products than you can get out of that book. ONE TEAM - ONE FIGHT!!! Mike

Hi, Must be a regional thing. I see installs like that too and I often see it omitted but I see cut-in flashing done correctly all the time. OT - OF!!! M.

It's hard to tell from that distance, but the spacing of the channels in the T111 pattern looks like it could be Masonite's Omniwood. It was sold in the late 70's early 80's and is basically a layer of masonite just a little thicker than a 16th of an inch bonded to an OSB substrate. ONE TEAM - ONE FIGHT!!! Mike

Hi, Well, as Walt Jowers would say, I don't have a dog in this hunt, because I'm not a member of any organization. However, I have been a member of two in the past. I left purely because of philosophical differences between where I think we should be as a profession and where those two associations were going. Take a look at Jack's figures. He garners about 3 to 4 inspections a month from the ASHI website. In my area, at my absolute bottom-dollar rate, that would be good for $11,520 to $15,360 a year, for an investment of about $250, besides membership dues, without the need to beat the pavement. That's not exactly something to scoff at. Now, before you start making sweeping judgments about ASHI or any other association, based on rumor and innuendo heard on this or any other forum, consider the fact that so many inspectors belong to ASHI and ask yourself why any good businessman would continue to remain a member, if it weren't ultimately good for their bottom line. ONE TEAM - ONE FIGHT!!! Mike

by Mike O'Handley, Editor It's no secret to even the newest home inspector that there aren't that many decent books written about inspecting homes. Sure, you can order various books about the profession from the aftermarket retailers who cater to the home inspection profession, but the information in many of these is dated, highly generalized and technically drab. There aren't many that actually provide new inspectors with a feel for what it is like to be a home inspector. Noted author, electrician, plumber and home inspector Rex Cauldwell has taken a different approach with Inspecting A House (Taunton Press, $29.95). Cauldwell seeks to give inspectors an idea of some of the unique situations that inspectors are often exposed to, while at the same time providing a firm understanding of the technical basics of a home inspection. All in less than 260 pages. While most experienced home inspectors won't find a whole lot of new information, new inspectors can learn a great deal - particularly from the electrical and plumbing sections, which are reflective of Cauldwell's extensive experience as a Master Plumber and Electrician and are written in easy-to-follow text that is light on technical background and gets quickly to the point. Cauldwell begins most sections with amusing anecdotes about his inspection experiences and accompanies most technical discussions with some very good color photographs of frequently-encountered deficiencies. Like most inspection texts, many of the topics discussed reflect strongly those issues commonly seen in the author's experience, in his own part of the country, while at the same time providing sparse information about issues commonly seen elsewhere. Fortunately, the amount of information contained in the electrical and plumbing sections - areas that the majority of inspectors, being primarily fresh from the construction trade, have little understanding of, makes up for these shortcomings. Most veteran inspectors will consider the $29.95 price tag steep for the amount of information Inspecting A House contains, but the kind of insight that a rookie inspector can garner from this book early in his or her career will be worth every penny. Check out ourother news items or visit our forums.