All Forum Posts by: Don Meinke

IF you dont have an outside faucet,,,get one!!  Its not hard to tap into something somewhere to access YOUR water.  First place to look is the aprox. same place as your tenants,,,since most duplexes are exact mirror image.  I would put a faucet on BOTH front and back of the building to avoid dragging hoses around.  Make sure you use a freeze proof one, tip it down on outside so it drains, and make sure you disconnect the hose in freezing temps.  Pex is a good diy easy install

This wont be the last time you want outside water.  Some even put a soft water faucet for car washing too.  OR hot water mix faucet.

You can even get fancy and put landscape water system so your flowers and bushes look great with a timer and drip or bubbler system with very little water use.

Do NOT tile over oak flooring.  Ask ANY good pro and they will agree.  They call oak floor unstable and it is.  You NEED 1 1/4 " without the oak.  You prob have 3/4 inch sheathing or shiplap as subfloor on joists now.  I took oak off and fell thru subfloor cause it was so poor, rotted and knot holed.  Took it ALL out down to joists and started over with 2 layers of 3/4 plywood layed so no seams matched top and bottom.  Now going to cement board and tile.  It is solid now,,,unlike before with oak and worthless subfloor.  Rip that oak out and look close as to whats underneath.

  IF you leave oak in there and it gets wet,,,yikes what a mess, it will curl and cup badly.  Thats why they call it unstable

Dont take MY word for all this ,,,go to a diy site and see what they say.  Guess what that will be. BTDT.

I have never done this YET!!  I have a small bedroom about 9 bye 12 plus a closet and small hallway.  The different thing I have never seen discussed is its a pine or fir floor(pretty much the same thing).'Some" people call it a hardwood floor but it is NOT,,,very soft wood.  Do you start out with a finer sand paper than oak?  The coarser paper might tear too much off.

I do know that floors can be sanded so many times and then you are down to the nails

I know for SURE you cant have a 4 wire junction box or ANY box in am enclosed ceiling.  That means no access cover visible in ceiling you can get to.  What is NOT allowed is to drywall over or hide in a drop ceiling.

Here that is a moot point anyway.  We come UP from the basement for the wall outlets.  Lots shorter and more direct cause the box is also in the basement.

Heres what "I" do,,,use #12-2 with ground 4 wires total,,, that nobody LIKES to work with cause it is so stiff.  Put 3 or 4 outlets on 1 circuit and run another circuit to next.. Double up those outlets more than the code allows,,,like every 4' or no more than 6' apart.  Reason is the less extension cords the better.  Put them everywhere,,,they will only use so many anyway.

You NEED grounded for some items like computer, some appliances, generally a vacuum cleaner, modern tv's etc.  Those houses out there with the old 2 wire,,, or 2 and skinny ground wire,  or heaven forbid knob and tube,,,,needs rewired.  If you can add extra modern plugins between the non grounded better than nothing.  Then you could come back and replace those later if needed.  IF your house has knob and tube,,,,anyone reading this,,,you WILL have a tough time getting or keeping insurance,,,its so small and disfunctional it is really dangerous.  They just skinned the wire and spliced in wherever they wanted.  The MOST used to join them was black tape.  Most were not soldered or nothing,,,just wrapped

Okay,,,,wall outlets 12 wire,,,ceiling lights can be easily on #14 wire,,,especially if you put all cfl OR LED lightbulbs in unless you have ceiling fans.

Of course all circuits have to be on gfi's or gfic's as code determines.  IF you ever have drywall off or walls open dont pass on doing all you can both plumbing replacement and WIRING...Just my .02 cents from a die hard do it yourselfer,,,NOT a licensed PRO

It helps to be helped by a licensed tech.  What bites is there is a bazillion code set backs, space requirements, separation distance, clearance etc.  Like electrical they have certain bonding and ground rules of things you cant do and have to do.  Unless you have 'some' direction on these its hard to get right.

That being said some of the trades guys dont like doing grunt work,,,like rewiring an old plaster walled house that sported knob and tube crappy overloaded...looking for a place and time to burn.

Electrician (licensed) says you drill holes and pull wire in, label everything, it doesnt take a rocket scientist to pull wire in place.  He said 'MINIMUM' of 5 to 6 K if I do all of it.  Otherwise you pull wire and I hook stuff up for a few hundred.  The scope increased by replacing the old dangerous box too.  He hung the box and made all connections in there(Translated means pro neat job).  Bonded it grounded it.  He told me to start with all the plumbing had to change to get seperation.  Hooked up my 3 way switches and all the 220 stuff . Let him come and go do emergency calls as needed.  think he worked most of 4 or 5 days partial hours,,,bill was like $750 which I thought was a good deal compared to  minimum of 6-8K or more if he did it all.

Looking back on that it took me a few weeks to do my part.  IF I would have had even a small person,spouse,or ANYBODY that could see and hear a wire wiggle in a wall and reach for a cold new wire with NO hot stuff anywhere would have saved half my time.  Crawling up to attic,come down to see,crawl back up to push farther thru etc takes a long time.  You could chase numerous wires at a time with help.

Now I had a guy who was not licensed put in a HVAC system.  That did not end well at all.  Ended up moving , ,change water heater locale, washer and dryer into kitchen where didnt want it.  Wrong gas line.  Required reccertifiying by license HVAC which costs about as much as a new install,and pro plumbers under inspection that cost way way too much for what they did

So long story short,,,,maybe.  You start out thinking this is easy and find nothing but headaches.  I dont touch HVAC at all.  I dont have the skill or knowledge or tools to do it right.  Plumbing and light electrical I can sneak some within the rules.  And YES It does make a diff here if you live in the house or rent it.

My advice,,,do it right

FIRST thing you HAVE to do is asbestos inspection and removal.  Costs on those may make your knees weak

Reason no burning is allowed is the possible burn of treated wood.  If you get a burn permit around here it gets inspected first and there better not be even an old wood pallet in there.  ALL lumber needs to get hauled to building material landfill which is about 1/2 price of garbage 

Cheapest way is back up a dump trailer carefully so tires dont hit nails,,,hammer and wreck bar and tear out piece by piece, tarp,haul to build landfill,,,rinse and repeat.  BUT still have to get a permit and inspect and properly dispose of asbestos  

Just thought of something.  They do make a lifetime warranty tank now.  I think they are called Marathons.  they are alot more expensive,,,like 1200 to 1400 bucks.  Never bought one but heard they are good.  If its a tough install with bad access on a Holiday weekend emergency basis we are closer on his bid vs real world.  But I would never buy it.

Where is this located.  Most here are in unfinished basements with floor drains.  I agree a new one is probably a better choice if they lime and scale up like here. A softener before the heater helps.

What other posters have not said,,,they make a metal pan that fits under the heater.  With a fitting to run to a drain,just in case.  Both for finished and unfinished spaces. Good protection for the next dripper

They also have neat flex lines to connect that years ago never had and that was the major fight.  I knew an unhandy guy about 67 years and 100 pounds too heavy and he thought it was really easy with the flex pipes.  (he couldnt change a stool flapper).  Draining the OLD tank is the hard part, dont let the crap inside run into the floor drain.  Dont ask how I know

electric rates in Nebraska is among the highest in the nation when not long ago the cheapest.  hi eff gas furnace is way less cost.  Vented with the 2 PVC 2" pipes.  Chimneys are also energy wasters as its like leaving a window or door open all winter,,,its always flueing warm air and dropping cold air within.  I see several putting gas services into Omaha houses that had none.  My highest gas bill this winter was less than 80 bucks,,,wish my electric was as low.

If you have an unused chimney like in an older house seal it tighly top and bottom,,or remove it

On your house who controls the temp? Also when they went to smart meters here the bills literally doubled

even IF you were paying 3 times as much,,,go out front and connect up close.

Liability of the three way share is more than you think.  What happens if one of those 2 have a backup and your upstream.  Think their lawyers will not come knocking looking for the deepest pockets???  Even if your not at fault,,cost you big bucks to be innocent(attorney fees).  Imagined damages are another.

OR one of them wants something on their end,,,they will still look to you to pay 1/3.  IF you go that way see if a 8 inch upgrade would be much higher,,,especially if additional hookups are possible.  OR pushed the route outside their lots.

I will bet if you 'shopped' and got lots of bids your up front costs could come down.  Seems a bit high even if they cut the street.  Here the city would require city tamp back and their pour the patch work .  But its a once and done deal,,,the share never will be.