Tom Raymond

At my house the doors get locked at night when we are all in bed, when we go away on vacation, or when my wife is home alone and in the shower. All of those occasions are to satisfy her, I could care less if it's locked or not. In fact when I replaced the doors I specifically chose functionality that requires you to insert a key from outside to lock them behind you. Before that little intervention the doors were only unlocked if someone was walking through them. Tom

Why might we need a code cite to see that whoever installed that thing was a bone head? Lemme guess, the homeowner was an electrician[:-banghea Tom

Is it just me, or does any one else find it amusing that the disco is installed directly between the hose bib and the fire ring?[:-jump] I can't tell you how many times I've been jingled hooking up my camper to a set up like that, no way I'd go near it with that cord in the water. Tom

Still waiting for that ride to the moon, huh? Where's Mike Lamb? I think that would make a great cartoon[] Tom

Ain't that the truth. I once saw a brand new house loaded with all the roofing material concentrated at the center third of the ridge, to be shingled the following day. When the crew arrived in the morning to start on the roof they found the load had pushed the back wall of the house out far enough for the second floor platform to fall, and with nothing left to tie it together the roof collapsed, pulling the gable ends in at the tops so they faced skyward. Oops! Tom

I looked at a repair job this past deer season on a beautiful house in the woods on the crest of a ravine. A 12ga deer slug went through a thermo pane window, clipped an ornament off the christmas tree, grazed the casing on a window on the adjacent wall, went through the mull post, and lodged itself in extension jamb on the opposite side, flying through about 10-12 feet of the living room. My customer had just walked into the room as the bullet entered only a few feet in front of him. The hunter was tracked down by the DEC, and it was determined via GPS that the round traveled nearly 700 yards through fairly dense woods, over two ravines, and changed direction at least once before coming to rest indoors. Tom

The old saying is true, "the cobbler's kids have no shoes". Tom

?? OK I'm sorry, but that's really funny[:-monkeyd Tom

The most common plastcizer used in thermoplastics is lead. What do they use in mod bit? Lead is not nice stuff to put a torch to, it vaporizes at around 1100 F, easily reached with a heat gun let alone a roofing torch. Tom

Well Jimmy, we'll never get the chance to vote on it precisely because it's that far out there. I mean, we're simply not talking about enough money to attach earmarks to, and there isn't anything in it for politicians or special interest groups with out them. I gotta say it makes more sense than TARP, Cash for Clunkers, or the silly Cash for Caulkers programs. Lots more bang for our buck. Tom

Engineered floors still exhibit considerable movement that will vary greatly based on the quality of the floor, the various species in the matrix, and the permiability of the finish. High quality flooring use veneers optimized to perform together, have anti-check grooves machined into them, and are perforated from the bottom through to the face veneer to equalize the moisture content and prevent curling. Cheap flooring has a face veneer and finish slapped onto base and core layers made of inferior veneers, and is very often only three plys thick. The moisture content of the face veneer is essentially frozen by the poly finish on top and the high resin adhesive below, while the base and core are free to expand and contract and do so unevenly because of splits and voids in the veneers. A high quality floor will acclimate nicely in 24 to 48 hours, while a cheap floor never will. Still considerably better than waiting a week or more for solid hardwoods. What ever happened to the strip oak of the first half of last century? That stuff was bullet proof. Tom

"or decay- resistant heartwood of redwood, bald cypress, black walnut, black locust, or cedars…." Cool, so there was a choice of a $6 treated 2x6, $2-3 per foot for cedar, or $4 a board foot and up for the others. Black locust has such a small native habitat (see map) I can't imagine it being a viable option, and where exactly does one find a black walnut 2x6 anyways? Given the layers in the OP it's no wonder they used SPF. Click to Enlarge 31.55 KB Tom

That, plus when I put it in my kitchen over the hydronic loop in the floor there were about 2000 less chances of nailing it to the PEX. Tom

Hmmm, a hot shower and cold A/C or a cold shower and hot air, exhilarating either way. Don't you think?[:-eyebrow Tom

Citadel makes numerous panel systems as well, although I think most (if not all) of their skins are aluminum. http://www.citadelap.com/ Tom

That's not the case here. The service entry cable and meter box do not "belong to the electric utility". Same here, except that some utilities require you to purchase their meter box. That was the case when I did my service 10 years ago anyway. Tom

I didn't see anything in the OP that would have made me jump to the conclusion that we're talking about a ventless unit, but those are all valid concerns. It gets pretty damned cold in Ottawa, so I would imagine that they have a code requirement similar to ours that mandates heating for every habitable room. I don't see how a single gas stove would satisfy that requirement for several rooms, let alone several floors. Tom It is a row house after all, not an igloo.[]

That door is toast, that jamb will be mush in a year or so. The crappy caulking job leads me to think the pan flashing is also missing. The brickmold has wicked so much water already that it won't hold paint. Then there is vinyl siding and no trim, if the sider didn't have a brake to wrap the door frame and brickmold do you think he got any of the siding details right? The good news is they'll be able to see how rotten the rim is when they replace the door. Tom

While I appreciate your defense of Home Inspectors, I find it contradictory that you state a professional inspector shouldn't be expected to identify a grow, immediately followed by advice for home owners and perspective buyers to do so for themselves. Kind of makes us sound unnecessary. I think it would be far more helpful if you started by indicating the signs, telling them to mention any concerns to their inspector because grows are not included in our SOP and may not be on our radar, then indicating the need for further analysis by an IAQ guy or Hygenist. Leave Mr. Holmes out of it, he gets enough press on his own. Tom

I was thinking more along the lines of a burst pipe or similar major spill, it generally takes a pretty good soaking to make a wood floor buckle like that. Maybe it's just a combination of factors like missing underlayment, poor fastening from plank to plank, and no room for expansion; they obviously had no clue what they were doing when they laid it. Floating floors are strange animals, especially wooden ones. There are as many different ways of fastening them as there are substrates, cores and surfaces available. The manufacturers instructions are really the only way to know if it was done right or not. Tom

I thought so. You really do have ADD if you can post here while you inspect.[:-angel] So if this is the next evolution of TIJ, when do we get the video feed? Tom

Uhm, are we all on an inspection in real time? Tom

That depends on how the panels are connected to one another. Clips or glue and you might be able to remove and replace panels, click lock type T&G will be damned near impossible to snap in the new planks. Based on the third pic I gotta wonder what else going on there, that looks like water damage not just binding issues. The scratches in the finish are typical. Hard polyurethane finshes have no business on floors, yet they're the staple of the prefinish market. A softer finish won't scratch nearly as easily and is far easier to repair. My personal favorite is antique oil and paste wax, ever see a gym floor with gouges in the finish? Tom

There's a link to the Kerdi system in the article a posted. The whole thing is brilliant except for the damned EPS. No way I'll ever be convinced that styrofoam is a suitable substrate for tile, especially on the floor. Tom

There are dozens of systems out there designed to make showerpans easier to build, but in my opinion there is no substitute for a good old fashoined mud bed. They simply aren't that tough to build, I think I was a teenager when I built my first. Follow the proven standard and you'll be just fine, let someone else experiment with plastic wedges, foam shims or the miriad other silly systems out there. As far as the bench is concerned; you can either rigidly install it in the framing stage and detail it with membrane, or provide ample mounting surfaces for it at the framing stage then install it as unit after the surround is tiled. Personally I'd rather see the latter, a few bolt holes will be far easier to deal with than detailing and tiling around a bench. I googled 'best practices for tile shower' and came up with lots of DIY type info. This explaination is a little general but it might get you or your client at least looking in the right direction: http://www.hgtvpro.com/hpro/nws_ind_nws ... 86,00.html Tom