hausdok

Hi Rob, I think that's a commercial tank number. If so, I believe that the month is the J and the two digits right behind it - 00 - represent the year - September of 2000. ONE TEAM - ONE FIGHT!!! Mike

Is it me, or are those Tires and mags you stuck on there about 10% over scale. Looks almost like a dune buggy now. ONE TEAM - ONE FIGHT!!! Mike

Ok, That was friggin weird. Jeez Mike, warn a guy before you swap the background next time. For a second there I thought my monitor was going kablooey! ONE TEAM - ONE FIGHT!!! Mike

Sigh, Gearballers, can't live with 'em and ya can't kill 'em. ONE TEAM - ONE FIGHT!!! Mike

Sent those photos to my younger brother. He's been buying and restoring 55 - 57 Chevys for the past 30 years. He has some pretty uncomplimentary things to say about it. Still if would make a bitchin' inspectmobile even if the Belair badge is wrong, it does need to have "all of the hotrod crap scraped off it, the hole in the floor welded up, the engine and transmission pulled and replaced with an appropriate small block and tranny, the steering column restored, the suspension restored, the dash restored, the diamond pleat ripped out and replaced," etc. etc. Jeesh, purists can be such a pain in the keester. Makes it hard to enjoy something. Here's the last one he did before he got his Harley sidecar, his current toy. He gets testy if one points out that the rims and tires are anything but stock and I won't repeat what he said when I pointed out he'd taken some of those pictures with the headlight bezels off. ONE TEAM - ONE FIGHT!!! Mike Click to Enlarge 64.41 KB Click to Enlarge 51.82 KB Click to Enlarge 38.04 KB Click to Enlarge 68.5 KB Click to Enlarge 68.5 KB Click to Enlarge 15.56 KB Click to Enlarge 68.61 KB

Just down the street. ONE TEAM - ONE FIGHT!!! Mike

Thanks Randy, It took me a while to figure out what the hell half their instructions meant but I finally got it. ONE TEAM - ONE FIGHT!!! Mike

Yeah, I'm with Jimmy. I won't go into my usual rant about asbestos. You've all heard me wax on about it here before. Want to see sensationalistic reporting about Zonolite? Google Seattle P-I, Zonolite and Vermiculite and download their whole "investigative series." They way they've carried on over the years you'd think that every one of us in the Seattle region is going to keel over at any second. Funny thing though - they've made lots of noise about the vermiculite insulation, which is usually on the other side of a ceiling/wall membrane, but they've not said much at all about the vermiculite sitting there in all of those many thousands of open masonry fireplaces with the ceramic gas logs in this region and the little piles of crushed lava rock mixed with vermiculite piled beneath the logs and open to the interior of the house for decades. I'm pretty sure that my two or three or four pots of coffee a day will probably kill me too, but tain't no way I'm giving up my java. When I kick, they can put a full mug in my hand - cream and two sugars - before they sink the box. ONE TEAM - ONE FIGHT!!! Mike

Used to have one of those back in 1972. Bought it for $90 from a dude when I quit the Toyota shop in Schenectady and needed something large enough to haul my rollaways and tools to the Toyo shop in Brookfield, CT. Called it Labamba. The mains were so worn that she knocked like a cobbler nailing on soles. You could hear that engine knocking from 50 yards away. Filled up the crankcase with 50% motor oil and 50% gear old and tossed the dice that she'd make it the 200 miles. She made it and I sold her for $150 to some kid. Used to see him still tooling around town a year later, smoke pouring out of the tailpipe, happy as a clam. Should have asked him for $200 I guess. ONE TEAM - ONE FIGHT!!! Mike

Ooh...Yeah! Imagine the look on the faces when you roll up in this baby. Click to Enlarge 46.34 KB Click to Enlarge 64.91 KB Click to Enlarge 42.21 KB Click to Enlarge 48.6 KB Click to Enlarge 57.52 KB Click to Enlarge 40.48 KB Click to Enlarge 47.86 KB OT - OF!!! Mike

Hi, Well, I don't like to make excuses. An excuse takes away one's right to fail. I prefer explanations. I'd explain it the same way that I would with the moisture meter I use now; I'd just tell them that I hadn't scanned that area. Since those things are also digital cameras, I'd keep a separate photo record of everything I scan with the thing as a pemanent record to prove that I hadn't scanned a particular area. Don't disagree with the premise of more money for more time spent; that's part of my motivation for considering the technology. I'm in tech central here; most of my clients are young techies that love this kind of crap and are apparently willing to pay extra for it, based on what I've been hearing about those who use these devices. ONE TEAM - ONE FIGHT!!! Mike

I keep looking at Jeremy's avatar. Unless my reasoning is seriously flawed, nothing is going to happen to anyone sticking a scissors into a receptacle the way that one has been stuck in there. Now, do it corner to corner or both on that right side where the hot slots are and I bet there'll be a really loud pop, a shower of sparks, the tips of those scissors will be melted away and someone will have to clean out his shorts. ONE TEAM - ONE FIGHT!!! Mike

Thank you, We appreciate you re-posting that. ONE TEAM - ONE FIGHT!!! Mike

There's a ton of PEX around here. Most installs I see are decent. The nicks that Nolan talks about are important though. Went back today to do a preventive maintenance inspection on a house that I did for a client nearly three years ago. He told me that nearly two years into the house they noticed a wall was damp. When a contractor came in to find out the cause, it turned out that a tiny nick in a PEX line above the living room ceiling had been dripping for nearly two years. Water was running across the ceiling and then down the wall and eventually soaked through. They had quite the mess to get cleaned up; just because of some carelessness. I've been wondering since I left there this afternoon whether if I'd had an IR camera at the time of that inspection I would have been able to spot a leak that small. ONE TEAM - ONE FIGHT!!! Mike

If I were a resident and the board wasn't listening to me, I think I'd simply hire an attorney and get an injunction from a judge to stop the work until an expert can be consulted. ONE TEAM - ONE FIGHT!!! Mike

Nah, You've nailed it; some dingleberry built those and never bothered to suggest to anyone that those chases needed to be insulated. Now they're functioning as radiators for the outdoors. ONE TEAM - ONE FIGHT!!! Mike

Hmmm, I see that ACE hardware has an after Thanksgiving Dat sale on 2 D-Cell LED maglights for $9.99 each. They are identical to the one that I got from EBPHI; and, since that light does the job very well - I don't have a need to create sunlight where there isn't any - I'll probably pick up a few. They'll probably tide me over until I'm too old to do this stuff anymore. ONE TEAM - ONE FIGHT!!! Mike

Feeling adventurous? You might consider trying Blueskin VP - it's a new high-tech product that is supposed to be a vapor permeable air barrier. Tyvek and most wraps fail because they trap moisture against a building and don't allow the structure to dry the way felt does. The Blueskin stuff supposedly allows the home to dry to the exterior like felt but has superior wind stopping characteristics like wrap. Check it out at www.henry.com . ONE TEAM - ONE FIGHT!!! Mike

Hi, It doesn't have to be "taken out." If it truly is aluminum wiring (and that one in the photo can't be) the electrician can make your circuitry safer by using Copalum or Alumicon connectors to attach copper ends known as "pigtails" onto the existing wiring. Done right, there won't be anything to be concerned about. Done wrong, and there will. If your electrician hasn't told you this, he/she is either woefully underinformed for a professional or is intentionally not giving you all of the information you need to make a fully-informed decision. Go here, educate yourself and then decide whether you want to get a second opinion from another electrician in your area. ONE TEAM - ONE FIGHT!!! Mike

You're throwing money away. Go to DollarTree; you can get 12 AA's for a buck. Yeah, they're cheap and they don't last as long as a Duracell or an Energizer but at a buck for 12 it works out to be cheaper. My wife uses the SurveyMaster and keeps it on all the time during inspections and goes through a fair amount batteries. The DollarTree made it a whole lot cheaper. ONE TEAM - ONE FIGHT!!! Mike

Hi All, I was outbid for one of these on Ebay this morning. The winning bid was $1375. I tried to make a last bid to outbid this person during the last 30 seconds of the sale but I fumbled the keys and it cost me 5 seconds and I lost by about 3 seconds. It had been used only once. I know, it doesn't have very high resolution but if I could have brought one of this quality in under the Extech cheapo price I would have been pretty happy. The first one I buy I intend to use to learn with and to see how it benefits my business. If it turns out to be a fit, I'll then resell it or look at relegating the Yugo camera for stuff like energy audits (I'm thinking of taking a building analysis course) and only break out the Lexus camera for the more important stuff. Guess the next time I dink around with Ebay I'd better take something to ease the RA in my hands first so I won't dink up the input again. ONE TEAM - ONE FIGHT!!! Mike

I'd go with "grounding" lug, since the larger one next to it is the "grounded" lug. Pretty sure that's where the service grounding conductor is supposed to be; not those equipment grounding conductors (grounds) or the grounded (neutral) conductors. If I've gotten it wrong, Jim K. or Douglas will be along shortly to set me straight. ONE TEAM - ONE FIGHT!!! Mike

The button switch just went out on my venerable old Maglite but the bulb is still going strong. Gonna order another button. Someday I'll get one of those suns in a box but right now, after just replacing the Protimeter SM with a new one and getting the Pentax digital I've got to just thank my lucky stars Santa came early this year. ONE TEAM - ONE FIGHT!!! Mike

http://abclocal.go.com/wls/story?sectio ... id=7804934

These are connected crawlspaces with vents opening into the houses, right? That means if your neighbor is smoking the foulest of the foulest cheap nickle cigars you'll be smoking them too. If you have a neigbor who is a Korean and is making kimchi, and you are one of those people that just can't abide the odor of kimchi, you'll need to get used to it, 'cuz you'll be exchanging crawlspace air with the neighbors and that smell will travel into your home. How about airborne contagions? If one person catches the flue and is weezing and coughing and dumping all of that bacteria in the air, isn't some of that liable to end up being carried on the air into your home? It sounds like you'll be heating the crawlspace with your hard-earned dollars. Is everyone going to be doing the same thing? If not, is everyone else going to pay you for the energy you lose to heat that crawlspace? This systems makes about as much sense as a screen door on a submarine. ONE TEAM - ONE FIGHT!!! Mike