kurt

Think what you would say in court. Would you provide a bunch of vague generalizations like you're talking to your buddies, or would you want to look smart and give them a list of specifics?

"The floor platform and supports have multiple defects, including but not limited to: 1) blah 2) blah blah 3) blah blah blah 4) etc. until the list is finished These conditions should be repaired. Have a contractor tell you how much. There are a number of repair variables effecting cost, call me at my office to discuss them." I would have several pictures with red arrows pointing at the issues.

Why is 3rd person passive voice easier? Blum's comment is as easy it gets. It's wrong because of XYZ, fix it.

I think it's mod bit with a flood coat. This is one of those weird Chicago things with no explanation. I see it occasionally. When MB started getting market penetration, morons would do all sorts of weird things with it. They didn't know what to do with it. Tar pots ruled for so many years, folks couldn't give them up. 25 years ago, I saw a lot of mod bit getting hot mopped instead of torched. The flood coat was another variation.

I see old buildings where every joist is sistered. Certainly not lovely, but necessary and it works.

Yep. I've tracked this stuff down in so many different directions without being able to unequivocally identify the culprit(s), I've stopped caring about minor delta between conductors, and FTR, I think anything <10degF is minor. If someone's got a reference that says that's wrong, I'm all ears. Yep again. The whole "loosen due to use" thing is a new one for me. Same here. Question....do your batteries have that "charge indicator" light on them? Mine do, but the lights have never worked.

[:-thumbu]

I have not ever heard about the cookstove wire loosening phenomenon before this. I am sure there are loose wires out there and am not surprised that you've found a few wires overheating. Anyone in here heard that cookstove wires loosen because of use? I'm not talking about old aluminum wire creep....I mean wires that loosen due to carrying current.

I'm still trying to decide if this is a big deal. Meiland's got a 4degF difference in a "perfect" setup. I've done similar experiments resulting in temp differences of 3-6 degrees with everything tight. Are you proposing this is a necessary inspector task, or are we gloating in a "gotcha" kind of way? IR is a good thing to have, maybe even necessary nowadays if for no other reason than the competition has it. I use mine for radiant heating analysis more than anything else.

The beauty of DB. We really gotta get together so I can show you what FM can do.

I'm sensing the setup, so cut to the point. What do you think is wrong? If nothing is wrong, where does it say 7degF delta is OK?

Well, thanks. I've built a report software system based on providing information in list formats, including lists of photos. I've got boilerplate comments that can plug into any system....you punch in the boiler plate, put the cursor where you want it, clack out the list of specific items. Attorneys love it, even realtors can read it, and my clients that have experience with other systems tell me it's the best thing they've ever seen. I know that I'm tilting at the ultimate windmill, but the entire HI report writing ethic is completely and totally screwed up. One can be descriptive while at the same time providing easily identified concerns in a list format. To do that, one has to toss out the last 25 years of everything folks in this biz thinks is the way to write reports. Yes, I'm comfortable having the entire profession consign me to the looney bin.....

Division 29 Chapter 18 is about as close as I can get....... Highlighting at end seems to address the issue....sort of.... 18-29-708.3.5 Building drain and building sewer junction. There shall be a cleanout near the junction of the building drain and the building sewer. The cleanout shall be either inside or outside the building wall and shall be brought up to the finished ground level or to the basement floor level. An approved two-way cleanout is allowed to be used at this location to serve as a required cleanout for both the building drain and building sewer. The cleanout at the junction of the building drain and building sewer shall not be required if the cleanout on a 3-inch (75 mm) or larger diameter soil stack is located within a developed length of 10 feet (3.05 m) of the building drain and building sewer connection.

Not bad. On these sorts of multiple issues with a single item, I've taken to writing..... "The XYZ has several concerns including but not limited to: 1) blah 2) blah blah 3) blah blah blah 4) etc. Any one of these items is a hazard/defect/issue and collectively they represent blah blah blah. Correcting them could mean removing and reinstalling etc etc. Get a guy etc. Have them check etc. Whatever else etc. " Punching the specifics to a point list makes it easier for me to write and easier for the reader to pull out the specifics.

That's easiest. In my own life, I own a fair amount of equipment with picayune anomalies that I ceased caring about years ago. I'll love seeing the home inspection report when I sell my place someday.

There's a fair amount of that in this job nowadays. I see this done by Local 134 guys and no one squawks. There's no hazard other than the next guy saying it should be fixed.

Yeah, we had a party line. Pick up the phone and hear someone talking. Sometimes cut in and say you had to make a call. We even had a situation for a while where we had to ring up the operator and have her (it was all women) dial for us.

Redead the previous two posts over and over. And over. Big chunks of my biz involve consulting to massively huge rental property management operations. Some of these folks own >3000 units and manage another 10,000. I can give you every permutation of every conceivable outcome of your conundrum with all odds favoring you getting ****ed in just about every one, with the very few that might give you an ounce of satisfaction taking years to accomplish. Think hard about where you want to plant your flag on this one.

Don't think too much. It's your last house. You want heat when you want it. Put in a big tank, a gffa 95%'er, clean up the flex, put an ice cube in a glass, fill with bourbon until the cube is covered, find comfortable chair with nice view, assume semi horizontal position, contemplate the miracle of finely distilled spirits and pleasant company in a warm house.

Someone else said something like that and I'm sure you're both right. I'd forgotten. I think the school was spun off by ASHI and it now has a life of it's own, albeit with an ASHI interdependent relationship of which I don't know the details. My best hope is that it will slither along for a while and then crawl off somewhere to die.

I'd put as much thought and energy into cleaning up the floppy duct as I did the furnace.

That's good advice.

Money is right. Other professions have schools wherein one learns the trade. No schools in this gig. There's a large number of gerry built vocational programs cranking out bumwads, but no school. So, folks thought they had to build one, and when they did, they built it in their image.....confused, directionless, and without principles. A real piece of sausage. I recall one of the instigators telling me "we need to get it going and then it will take care of itself", or something like that. Mmmm hmmmm..... I wrote a long, mildly humorous, and entirely scathing excoriation of the ASHI School a while back, but I lost it in the ether.

Wet cellulose turns to paper mache. If it's not soaked all the way through, it can still provide some insulating capacity. Density is good; it provides some decent level of air sealing.

Ok, I'll stop. It really does hurt the profession. A complete embarrassment, and I don't embarrass easily.