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Official Pit Home Improvement/DIY thread

discdude said:
It sucked but could have been worse, and yes, 50 years later I bear the burden of ignorance past. I wonder if plastics will present some future issue 50 years from now...
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There have already been issues identified with some kinds of plastic pipe used for hot and cold water. Some of that stuff didn't last a decade. Great fun to have all the piping for water all over the house replaced.
 
discdude said:
I have a infiltrated cast iron pipe that runs off a my kitchen sink/dishwasher/clothes washer waste line. It is below the concrete. It looks to be clogged at the 7 ftish mark, and the floor drain links past the clog/infiltration. My ground is super saturated and I am leery of having to excavate and follow the line out. I have the option of rerouting to the main line above ground, but the last (of many plumbers) spooked me by saying that rerouting and cutting into the main line could cause other problems, and he would prefer excavating. I really would prefer to just reroute and avoid the excavation and line chasing. Should I trust my gut and go with the reroute?
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I have had my pipes cut/or re-routed a couple times without any trouble. Also, cast iron pipes are excellent but they can fail, too. My house was built in 1952 and I ended up with a leak in the drain pipe. So my contractor cut the section out and installed some PVC. Also, the build up of gunk in there over the many decades was amazing.
 
AMCDeac said:
I have had my pipes cut/or re-routed a couple times without any trouble. Also, cast iron pipes are excellent but they can fail, too. My house was built in 1952 and I ended up with a leak in the drain pipe. So my contractor cut the section out and installed some PVC. Also, the build up of gunk in there over the many decades was amazing.
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Yeah the gunk was a thing to behold
 
discdude said:
Yeah the gunk was a thing to behold
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Speaking of which, anyone else on a lot necessitating a grinder pump? Talk about a literal shitshow when that thing locks up. It has been a few years since ours jammed up and several of our neighbors with houses in the same age range have had to completely replace theirs over the past couple of years, so I am expecting ours to burn out pretty soon. Nothing quite like coming home or waking up and hearing that siren going off and the lights flashing.
 
What is a reasonable price for 4 yards of good quality topsoil including delivery and installation?
 
tiltdeac said:
What is a reasonable price for 4 yards of good quality topsoil including delivery and installation?
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This is another one of those "it depends" In this case the big variable is going to be the nature of the "installation" you want done.

Most prices for top soil are based on a truck load delivered and dumped in a pile. Prices for that range from $30 - 75 per cubic yard. Depends on the topsoil quality, haul distance and area where you are. Some suppliers have a minimum delivery size, others don't. Some charge an additional delivery fee, based on distance, others don't. so figure at least $100 and probably up to $400 for a pile of dirt in your yard.

For reference, big box stores sell 0.75 cubic foot bags for about $2.00 That is about $72 cubic yard. But that is pick up at their store.


Installation charges are going to be hourly, or calculated by the job based on the tasks to be done and the installation company rate. A landscaping company is going to cost more than a few laborers with wheel barrows anda shovels. Each yard is almost a ton of weight. So figure about 15 - 20 wheel barrow loads to move each yard from the pile. How far from the pile to where it goes? How much spreading/raking do you need to have done after placement?
 
ImTheCaptain said:
so....$400?
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In some areas $400 would get a pile of dirt dumped in your yard. In other area it might not cost that much to get it spread as a 2 inch thick layer over 100's square feet. tilt hasn't provided details about "installation."
 
So we live in NoVA, and about a mile from our street is another street with the same name, but with Ridge added to the end of it, e.g. Happy Ln and Happy Ridge Ln (real name changed to protect...something?). The real fun part is that houses on both streets share almost all of the same numbers. 2 falls ago, I had my entire yards (1.2 acres) aerated and overseeded by TruGreen, when they were in fact supposed to go to Happy Ridge Ln (which is probably a 1/3-1/2 acre lot). This past Wednesday, a guy had a load of dirt delivered to his house, enough to cover probably 75% of his driveway, without anyone even bothering to ask if they were at the right location.

Not really home improvement, but I thought you'd all get a kick out of it. My road is probably 30-40 years older than the Ridge version, it constantly blows my mind that whoever picks road names would have done that.
 
Thanks for sharing. Developers lack imagination.

When I was growing up my folks lived on tree road. Way across town was tree lane. It was a regular occurrence to get mail for someone on tree lane.
 
Thinking about installing another dimmer switch this week since it's a holiday. Incandescent not LCD.
 
BiffTannen said:
Thinking about installing another dimmer switch this week since it's a holiday. Incandescent not LCD.
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Many styles of incandescent bulbs are being phased out for energy efficiency reasons. So you might want to check and make sure you'll be able to keep your installation in bulbs.
 
Just got done dealing with some plumbing stuff. Hard water had made it difficult to turn on the water with those "pull on" single handle faucets. Plumber wanted $140 per faucet to repair. I pulled the cartridges out, gave them a vinegar soak to loosen the crusted on lime deposits, scraped them off, cleaned up the faucet cartridges with superfine steel wool, greased everything with plumbers grease and everything is working well.

What could have been a multi hundred dollar plumbing Bill ended up as a few hours work and cost only pennies for some vinegar, steel wool and elbow grease, and plumbers grease.
 
Anyone had their house brick repointed? Does this cost all of the money?
 
TownieDeac said:
Cut and stained and hung some shelves

bt3KgAW.jpg


Pardon the WAK E

That's where the studs were though

Weird ass walls
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I had a similar situation. Builders have strange ideas about spacing. I ended up putting a 1x8 horizontally on the wall just below the shelf, screwed that to the wall studs wherever they were, then put the shelf brackets on the 1x8 at visually pleasing intervals. A little more work and cost to eliminate that bad spacing.
 
This is more of a home question than an improvement one: our property tax was just reevaluated and went up ~7%. Naturally, I'll be paying more taxes but are there any benefits to this reevaluation?
 
HailToTheDeacons said:
This is more of a home question than an improvement one: our property tax was just reevaluated and went up ~7%. Naturally, I'll be paying more taxes but are there any benefits to this reevaluation?
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your tax value will now more closely resemble any recent comparable sales in your area/neighborhood.
 
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