Home Improvement Thread

[NTP66]

Usually just a really hot, long wash. Not sure how worth it is to run it without some sort of cleaning agent.

[tifosi77]

We use Downey scent beads (I think they're called) with every load of wash, either Unstoppables or one of their other kinds. I think we run the clean cycle with Affresh tablets once every two months or so.

These are stupid expensive if you ask me.

One of us is complaining about the odor of their laundry, one of us is not. *shrug*

[meow]

Meat sweats of days gone by.

Im dead

[blackjack68]

After 25 years and two kids, we are finally having our contractor start to consult about our Formica and linoleum based kitchen.

They can’t start until September but they are worth waiting for.

[tifosi77]

Bathroom SITREP

4/2 - First shipment of items from plumbing vendor included wrong vanity (floating instead of freestanding). We decided to roll with this so as not to incur any delays.

4/22 - Three weeks into work, the contractor informed us that they'd have to reroute plumbing to accommodate the floating vanity, would be cheaper to swap to what we originally ordered. Supplier told us the replacement - the item we actually ordered and paid for nearly a month ago - is a special order and would take a week to fulfill.

4/26 - Vendor picked up wrong vanity and separately packaged sink basin+countertop with note that the replacement will be delivered the following Monday.

4/29 - Replacement vanity arrived..... it is a freestanding unit, but it is a different manufacturer (who isn't even on the supplier's website), and the color variation is substantial, along with mismatched hardware mountings. Return and please replace with what we ordered. The sink basin is from the correct manufacturer, so they leave this behind since that is 'universal'.

4/30 - They are able to replace the special order item on 24 hrs notice, but they replace the replacement with the wrong item again. (Same incorrect manufacturer as the delivery the day before, just a different color.... three vanities, three colors, none correct) We decide to not press our luck and accept the delivery of the new unit despite it being a different manufacturer and color than what we paid for, and the basin is still from a different manufacturer. The delivery guys swear they spent an hour in the warehouse prior to loading everything onto the truck to make sure everything was right, which to my surprise does not fill me with confidence.

5/1 - Glass guy comes out to measure space. We receive the formal bid and pay the deposit. They will call with scheduling info.

5/3 - The sink basin they delivered on 4/29 is for a floating vanity. It is not marked as such in any visible way on the packaging, but when test fitted into place the flat surface of the basin was at 39" instead of 36". That means the basin is roughly twice the thickness of the correct piece, and the faucet operation is impinged by the bottom of the medicine cabinet mirror because the sink sits so high. If we had known the sink was wrong we could've addressed the issue four days ago, but now we have to wait until next week. The earlier remarks about spending an hour in the warehouse getting this order right ring in my head.

As of this writing, we are 30 minutes from COB Friday and we still have not heard back from the glass vendor. We cannot schedule inspection until that installation is complete because we have a bench in the shower and can't just put up a temporary curtain.

[NTP66]

What kind of monkey's ass contractor did you hire?

[tifosi77]

The contractor has been great. This isn't a contractor issue, this is a vendor. The vendor is 5-stars on Yelp and Home Advisor, 4.9 stars on Google, 4.3 stars on Angie's, they were about as vetted as they could be. Everything else was totally fine or resolved within the day we raised an issue (the vent fan they initially sent us didn't have a humidity sensor, which is a code requirement if you only have a single vent/fan; that was corrected within like 3 hours). But this f**king vanity, jesus tapdancing christ what a stupid ordeal.

We'll gladly work with the contractor again. But I'm more predisposed to chuck a brick through the vendor's window as I am to give them any more business after this.

They have been saved by the tardy tempered glass guy at this point. If our finish date got pushed because of a supplier issue that has persisted for a month, I'd go mental. As it is, we have less than one full day's worth of work left. We just can't even schedule that work right now, and that's massively frustrating.

[NTP66]

Source of the post he vent fan they initially sent us didn't have a humidity sensor, which is a code requirement if you only have a single vent/fan

I'm not sure how I feel about that code requirement. Great that a fan is code, because where I live having a window in the bathroom will suffice (nobody opens bathroom windows... ever). My master bathroom fan is on the same switch for the light next to the shower. I did install a timer in my daughter's bathroom because she kept turning it off too soon.

[count2infinity]

We ripped out the 150ish sq foot deck last summer and replaced it with trex. If you cut the tip of a home plate off (the part that points to the catcher) that’s the shape and it just had one set of stairs on the one diagonal part. We opened up the other side to put in a paver patio. I ran out of steam and decided to push that part of it off to this year.

I was going to hire someone to come do the digging and sod/dirt removal but then I thought: let’s just hire someone to do the whole thing. Got a few quotes for paver patio and they were 8-10 K for a 150 sq foot area. Got a concrete guy out to give me a quote one stamped concrete: just under 5K for the same thing. Going with that for sure.

[NTP66]

Stamped concrete

If you decide to have yours colored, make sure that they mix the dye in the actual pour and are not just throwing it on top. In case it chips or cracks (when, really), it’ll be much less noticeable.

[Nuge]

My only complaint with our concrete patio is that we didn’t make it bigger. We had it done about 6 years ago and it’s been awesome

[NTP66]

My only complaint with our concrete patio is that we didn’t make it bigger. We had it done about 6 years ago and it’s been awesome

I actually used a landscaping app to design mine because I wanted to make sure that I wasn't going too small or too big. I think it helped, and I'm glad that I designed a bump out in mine for my grill so that it didn't actually take up that usable patio space. Also really glad I never installed railings or anything, too.

[NTP66]

Design:



Actual patio: