kurt

That's plausible. There's a definite random spray pattern to the mess.

I must be slipping...... Was it the wrong response? Should one lay out the litany of just plain crappy design and manufacture issues? Most of my customers don't get technical explanations, so I don't use them too much unless they seem interested. I had a couple of these the other day, tried to explain all the technical elements, saw the clients glaze over, went with the falsified test results commentary, and got a response. So, I go with that most often.

There's never been a recall that I'm aware of. The company was charged with falsifying test data on their breakers. The company (sort of) vanished into a blizzard of corporate proxies and owners, so there wasn't a company to charge with an official recall. I think that's about right.....there may be more details I'm not aware of.

He was trying to sell his biz a few months back. Anyone know if he did?

OK, not spray can snow then. That stuff was soft and fluffy. I got no idea.

Remember that weird spray can "snow in a can"? It looks like that stuff.

Maybe. Plausible, anyway. This is an excellent reminder, though, of why straight statistics don't tell a story. Lots of depopulation, Chicago lead the nation's cities in population loss, etc., etc. Chicago was net gain, though, on college educated professionals with good jobs. IOW, it's poor people being forced out through increased rents and gentrification, and no mfg. jobs. Actual proportions are consistent with a lot of other gentrifying cities. Chicago lost largest numbers because we're a lot bigger than other cities. As far as percentages, we're not that whacked out. None of this says anything. It only means what people bring to it. And I will continue to cut my swath through the realtors of Chicago. I'm in this gig long enough, I'm running into my own legend this year. It's my gig. I run it. Realtors don't like it, they get politely stiff armed. If they want to play with me, it's my rules, and there doesn't seem to be a lack of folks wanting to play with me. If that's abrasive, I'm proud of it. I hope the next generation of inspectors don't wimp out, and expand on what we've done.

Counterintuitive note..... More hardener makes things gooier and less hard. Less hardener makes them more brittle. The spec'd proportions coming out of the pumps are pretty darn good, but you can tweak it a little here and there depending on what you're doing. Don't make the big mistake of mixing too much at one time in a deep cup; the stuff is exothermic...gets damn hot in a cup. If you mix a large patch, you want to spread it out on a cookie sheet covered in wax paper so the heat dissipates. Heat makes it set quicker, so when it starts warming up, you are being notified you need to spread it out to dissipate the heat. It just takes a little practice. It's not complicated.

Yep. Experiment with small batches. It'll change your life.

I don't think you're necessarily looking for a paint. You (probably) want a penetrating epoxy sealer. Thin epoxy is one of the most aggressive penetrants there is; it goes deep. Paint it with whatever is compatible with the epoxy sealer. I use WEST system because I can get it in quarts or gallons (don't buy too much, epoxy has a shelf life) from Amazon, and they have a very nice metering pump system. Everyone should have at least a quart on their bench, w/pumps, and some microfiber or micro balloons for fairing out and filling stuff. I've still got a bag of Cabosil, and I make structural putties with it. I cut with lacquer thinner to whatever viscosity I'm looking for to use as a sealer. Smith may be "the best", but you'd have a hard time convincing the tens of thousands of other system users. Steve is a little weird, claiming to have "invented" a process where a lot of practitioners were all on the same parallel path with regards to wood restoration. All the things he claims only his material does, I've done with WEST, Abatron, and plain old epoxy out of a tube from Ace Hardware. It's not complicated. It's more about process, temperature, proportions, and understanding the materials you're working with than a specific epoxy imho.

That's right. Boats. And it's not paint, it's either injected or soaked into the wood in dilute form. And I'm not convinced it even needs that the more I look at the pics. I'd be doing some probing, drill a few small holes, and looking deeper before I decided anything.

Agreed on the Bahai's......this place is about 10 minutes from my house. It's peaceful, and it's beautiful. Click on the history link...built from white portland and crushed quartz crystal....it's incredible. https://www.bahai.us/bahai-temple Looking at it more, I don't even think you need to wrap it in aluminum. I'd forget boiled linseed; it breaks down. I'd coat the thing in plastic of some sort, probably epoxy, and paint it again. I don't think it's bad; it just needs love. I've seen similar stuff where it looks like total hell, but it still passes an engineering review.

I think so too. I doubt it's delam'ed. I don't think you even have to cover it with metal. If it was fully delaminated, those things look ridiculous. Determine if it's actually delaminated, then figure out where to go. It doesn't look all that bad to me.

Post crossing....I agree with Jim. They probably used resorcinol. That was pretty good stuff.

Steel, primed and coated with a rust inhibitor, would last longer than anyone would care about. Expensive.....replace the entire thing, wood or steel, doesn't matter. Total ****ing mess on every level. Cheap....wrap it in metal, details for drainage, drips, etc. Copper if you got the dough, aluminum if you don't. It'll dry out and be fine. If it's lasted this long in the LA climate climate with only this much delam, it'll last wrapped. I'd pay close focus on the base so it doesn't wick; gotta isolate the base from wicking. I'd soak the thing in Abaton. The largest problem is it's a church. My #1 business rule is never get between anyone and their obsessions.

A general caveat and a hard rule.... 1) Avoid church work. 2) Never work for your own church. Yeah on the stamped part, sort of, but in our experience, engineers always come up with the most cockamamie ideas imaginable. Got a close up pic? I don't know which beam you're talking about. We did one where we simply capped it with an offset horse collar flashing. Copper. Ended up looking like an architectural detail. Cheap. Moisture equalized out from under the copper just fine. That might not work in this case because I don't know which beam you're talking about.

OK, I understand about the inspection.....but we're allowed to be abrasive, aren't we? How does one deal with realtors without being abrasive?

I wrassled with this some years ago. Sometimes both depending on how bad they are, but mostly, like >95%, go into Exterior. I do that because the repair options, cost, and general hassle are about exterior masonry. That's how people think about it anyway, if they think at all. In my inventory descriptions of all the crap in a building, I put them under Structural, though. They're a structural element. But, my format is such that I can describe them in either place and it makes sense in the list of defects. The beauty of designing my own system......I can make it any way I want. So, I got a dichotomy in reportage that I lose absolutely zero sleep over.

That's the spirit. I was worried when so few felt compelled to pursue conflict. Already tried aluminum. Working in a manner I thought reasonably mimicked a mildly competent tradesman, I wrapped some #12 around my needle nose in a loop about the size one would wrap a recep post. it's surprisingly resilient. Of course it was strained after 3-4 twists, but not bad. Copper, #14, you can work that stuff. I presume we've all wrapped at least a few thousand posts with #14. I'm sure I've busted a few wires, but damn few, and I'm sure they were done when I was fiddling with the umpteenth iteration of a repair or otherwise behaving like a cretinous moron. We've inherited wondrous metallurgical material unimaginable to previous generations and are so wimpy we imagine that by working something a few times, it's going to disintegrate. Ok. We live in dangerous times. I am now old enough to actually know something about this thing we do, and have knowledge about things such as bending wires and hitting one's head without a bicycle helmet, and the likely effects that ensue. Which is to say I've achieved complete irrelevancy, a fact oddly comforting to me.

No one that's overly sensitive would stay around here for more than a few posts. It's the beauty of the place. "We don't need to hear how many times somebody has straightened a bent wire, or how many times he rode a bike without a helmet." Similarly, no one needs to hear about how one can take a piece of wire, subject it to ridiculous "tests", and then make claims that are equally ridiculous. Of course one can snap a wire if they put their mind to it and develop "tests" to fit a predetermined result, but for chrissakes, is there no end to taking stuff to ridiculous conclusions in this biz? No, there is no end.

Let's see..... Bare wire, not insulated....check. Linesman pliers bending in a tight kink....check. Working it specifically to make it snap....check. Crazy anal retentive HI intent on proving a point....check. I just got out of the basement from mangling some #14 NMC, bending, stomping, twisting....no snap. Took some #14 THHN, did the same thing, no snap. There seems to be a discrepancy in our results.

I'm stumped. No idea.

I've never seen anything like it. I'd probably turn one off entirely and see what happened, then experiment turning off different heaters, 'cuz I have no idea how it would work.

Yeah, I don't think one can snap copper without working it like crazy. Some reasonably gentle tweezing on that radius would straighten it out OK, but I'd not bother.

Never seen one. Makes sense for the freezer in the garage or a sump.