The Home Improvement Thread

[Oswego]

New window in. Last old one out. I just rolled up a foot of tyvek and tucked it in the jambs so I can tie it into a full 9' roll later.

Beautiful brisk fall weather today to boot.

This time next week I'll be able to pass on "The ugliest house in the hood" trophy I've held the past 17+ years running.

 

[Oswego]

"Last stick" installed for my framing inspection. Throw in last window tom then schedule it so I can insulate.

 

[Silverback]

I like how you put the studs where the toilet paper roll holder will go.

 

[tex]

@Silverback you are wrong. The studs are there to mount the power shit handles. Grab on and bear down.

 

[PSU Taco85]

@Silverback you are wrong. The studs are there to mount the power shit handles. Grab on and bear down.

The phrase “Taco Bell Rated” bathroom will be the sales pitch when it hits the market.

 

[Silverback]

I expect some DOM tubing to be involved at some point. Remember the triangulation!!

 

[CowboyTaco]

Y'all ever heard of Ethernet-over-Power (not PoE). Essentially uses your homes electrical system to transmit data. I've heard of people using it with great success, some first hand....not just "i read it on the internet" folks.

Well, I've decided to try it for my home office. Ordered the kit today, should be here tomorrow.

All of my remote proctored certification exams have experienced extreme latency during the course of the exam (usually about 3 hours) and lately my video conferences have been poor. So we'll see if it has much improvement. If it works, $60 is cheaper than an electrician doing a network drop. If it doesn't, then I return it and I'm not really out anything.

Pre-test measurements: 70Mbps down and 144Mbps up.

Plan B is to do the network drops myself, but that will require more drywall repair than I really want to do. Don't get me wrong, I still think a wired drop is best, but getting the drop on the lower floor of a 2 story home with walls that don't necessarily line up doesn't seem like fun.

 

[Silverback]

A friend had it and it worked great. His internet came into the very front corner of his house, not a great place for a WiFi router. He got one of those and had it go to his living room (middle of house), put wireless router there and it worked great. I don't recall his speeds, it was a few years ago and maybe 100 meg was about max. I have the Google Wifi Mesh network with 5 pucks, works great. Thinking about upgrading it though as there are better ones out there at this point.

 

[CowboyTaco]

I also considered doing a mesh network. I suppose that is Plan C.

The reality is that my home office is about as far from the router/modem as anywhere in the house can be, except for maybe the garage or guest room, and I've been working from home almost exclusively since COVID started. So it works well for the most part, but will have periods of inconsistency. I just need reliable more than anything else.

The one I ordered is supposed to be Gig speed. We'll see.

 

[Oswego]

I like how you put the studs where the toilet paper roll holder will go.

Nah, just rolling with the punches. Stupied 1/4" plywood is installed horizontally and the left studs on a seam.

If I was building new there is no way in hell I'd have so much wood in the walls.

I do find it interesting that under normal circumstances the structure is fine. Got 1/4" asbestos shingles/30lb felt/1/4" plywood/good 2x4's/old ass paperbacked rockwool insulation/1/2" rock. No moisture barriers. No moisture issues or rot. Only issues caused were moron homeowner modifications. Well besides my chimney having no foundation and not bring tied into the structure

 

[Silverback]

Well the upside is now you can screw the toilet roll holder to the studs and use that thing to help yourself off the toilet after a long one.

 

[balakay]

I need to do something about my internet as well. I bought the stuff to run a drop back to the man cave but my attic is so small, I haven't found the motivation to do it. I may give the EoP a try if you have any luck with it.

 

[PSU Taco85]

Got tired of retrieving my trashcan from the neighbors yard after trash day, found this online and decided to give it a try. Dont' think it's going anywhere unless someone steals it

 

[PSU Taco85]

Y'all ever heard of Ethernet-over-Power (not PoE). Essentially uses your homes electrical system to transmit data. I've heard of people using it with great success, some first hand....not just "i read it on the internet" folks.

Well, I've decided to try it for my home office. Ordered the kit today, should be here tomorrow.

All of my remote proctored certification exams have experienced extreme latency during the course of the exam (usually about 3 hours) and lately my video conferences have been poor. So we'll see if it has much improvement. If it works, $60 is cheaper than an electrician doing a network drop. If it doesn't, then I return it and I'm not really out anything.

Pre-test measurements: 70Mbps down and 144Mbps up.

Plan B is to do the network drops myself, but that will require more drywall repair than I really want to do. Don't get me wrong, I still think a wired drop is best, but getting the drop on the lower floor of a 2 story home with walls that don't necessarily line up doesn't seem like fun.

I've heard of it, never knew anyone that tried it though. Worst case for running a wired drop, go from the first floor up an outside wall into the attic and drop down to where you need to on the second floor.

 

[CowboyTaco]

I've heard of it, never knew anyone that tried it though. Worst case for running a wired drop, go from the first floor up an outside wall into the attic and drop down to where you need to on the second floor.

One of the guys who worked for me 5+ years ago used it and swore by it. I thought about the exterior wall, but figured insulation would be a PITA and add another degree of complication. The wall in my office where I would want a drop is "mostly" in line with the wall above it. Measuring from the exterior wall, there is about a 6" difference. There could be variance in the wall or the construction crew might not have lined them up perfectly.

I figure worst case scenario, I cut a hole in the bathroom wall (other side of the wall in the office) and drill my hole upward. Then go up into my daughters closet and cut a hold in the wall in there too so that I can feed the wire through. Or maybe I could get away with just a single hole in her closet.

The builder did wire my home for access points in the ceiling, so I'm also looking at getting some of the newer Wifi 6 access points that advertise 3.0 Gbps and 3.6 Gbps. Just one of those on my lower floor should provide enough improvement in signal over the 867Mbps that my current ATT provided router supplies. That's 3.5-4x the speed.

 

[Anathollo]

A friend had it and it worked great. His internet came into the very front corner of his house, not a great place for a WiFi router. He got one of those and had it go to his living room (middle of house), put wireless router there and it worked great. I don't recall his speeds, it was a few years ago and maybe 100 meg was about max. I have the Google Wifi Mesh network with 5 pucks, works great. Thinking about upgrading it though as there are better ones out there at this point.

I put a Google router in at my aunt's and I was pretty impressed with it. Great wifi speeds.

 

[tex]

I have internet over power for my man cave. Works well. Just have to plug the box directly into the outlet and not a power strip.

 

[PSU Taco85]

Picked this up today. HF had 15% off predator generators for inside track members, and took another 10% off for opening up credit card so I got $500 off. Going to fill with oil and fire it up tomorrow

 

[Taco Loco]

Picked this up today. HF had 15% off predator generators for inside track members, and took another 10% off for opening up credit card so I got $500 off. Going to fill with oil and fire it up tomorrow
View attachment 39166

Gas or diesel welder is the way to go, atleast it provides a second purpose for use, a generator or mobile welder....
I rarely use my generator, but it was a gas welder, it would get used more.

 

[PSU Taco85]

Gas or diesel welder is the way to go, atleast it provides a second purpose for use, a generator or mobile welder....
I rarely use my generator, but it was a gas welder, it would get used more.

i plan to swap the carb out so I can this off natural gas. I don’t have any need for a mobile welder here, at least at this point in my life