Category Tip of the Week

We answer lots of questions about getting soap scum off of shower walls and shower doors. Success in this area is usually a combination of routine cleaning and the appropriate chemical. However, if you are like most of us, every once in awhile priorities get shifted and you just don’t have time to clean the shower door and the next thing you know it has a significant build up of soap residue on it.

Here’s a quick and effective solution. Buff the residue away. Get out your palm sander or orbital sander and a Scotch Brite™ pad and let electricity replace elbow grease and caustic chemicals. If the doors are the type that slides in a track take them out of the track. (Lift them straight up then swing the bottom out of the lower track toward you and the top will follow) Lay the doors on a flat surface so there is no stress on the glass. Attach the Scotch Brite™ pad to the sander and go to work on the door. The green Scotch Brite™ pad works best. It is abrasive enough to remove the scum but does not harm the glass. Let the sander do the work. Do not press hard on the glass. If the door has a towel bar / handle built into it you may want to remove that. It is usually as simple as removing 4 screws. This will also give you a chance to clean up any residue that may have gotten into hard to reach places on the handle.

Once you have the soap build up removed you can give the doors a good cleaning with a glass cleaner then apply Rainex™ per the directions on the product. The Rainex™ will make the glass easier to clean next time.

If you are a regular listener to our show you know that we caution our listeners about making a house too tight. That is sealed so well that moisture cannot escape. That is good advice but today we will talk about a situation where tight is right. If you have noticed dark lines or a dark area around the perimeter of a room that has light carpet in it you may be puzzled as to why this area that gets no traffic appears dirtier than the rest of the carpet. The answer is simple. Air is being drawn form the outside or from an unconditioned space because there is not a tight seal between the bottom plate of the wall framing and the floor. This is particularly prevalent in homes built on a slab.

We have told you about a product called backer rod, also known as Caulk Saver. It is a gray foam product that comes in multiple diameters from 3/8” to ¾” of an inch. Folks who sell Commercial Products may actually have it in bigger dimensions. Typically it will come in lengths of 25 or 50 feet. I have found that a 5/8” diameter is usually best. Take the backer rod and a blunt tool, like a stiff blade putty knife, and push the backer rod into the gap between the base and the floor until it is out of sight. If it is not going in with relative ease you may have to step down a size in diameter. I always buy a couple sizes because I have found that the size of the gap can vary. Not only that I have found hundreds of uses for the left over product. In my book, backer rod is right up there with Duct Tape and WD 40 on the multiple uses scale.

Tightening up this gap will eliminate the dirty ring around the room and it will also help form an energy efficiency perspective as it seals out cold or hot outside air.

Ceramic tile can add character, beauty and durability to almost any surface. However, like any other product, level and square are your two best friends in a proper tile installation. They are also the difference between a great new look and a great big mess.

Here’s a simple tip for installing ceramic tile on the wall. Mark the wall at the point where you want to have one of the joint lines in the tile. Attach a piece of 1 x 2 (batten strip) horizontally to the wall with screws. Use a level to make sure that the batten strip is level. This will become your starting point for a course of tile. Install a row of tile along this batten strip. Once you have installed this first course all the other rows of tile above it will be level. (If you are using tile larger than 4-1/4” that does not have spacers formed into the tile itself, it will be necessary to use spacers you insert manually and remove before grouting.) With all the rows above the batten strip installed you can go back and remove the batten strip. Then install all the rows beneath and you will have nice level grout lines and a great looking job.

If you have listened to our show, “The Home Improvement Show” on WBT 1110 AM and 99.3 FM, or on line at www.WBT.com, you have no doubt heard us talk to callers who had problems with consistent coloration in grout for their ceramic tile. There are a lot of things that can cause this but there are some steps you can take before you start to ensure a great end result. By the way this trick works for paint too.

If you have to use more than one box of colored grout this is especially important. Combine the dry grout in a large container and “dry mix” it. Use a trowel and thoroughly mix the grout before adding any water. This will ensure an even mix of pigment through the grout providing an even-colored end result.

If you have a large room or large surfaces to paint and you need multiple gallons of paint that has been tinted to a custom color you can apply a similar principle. Get a large, 5 gallon, bucket that is clean and dry. Pour the paint from the smaller pails into the large bucket and using a drill and a paint mixer, mix the paint. This will ensure one consistent color for the entire job. Professional painters frequently call this practice “Boxing” the paint.

This week’s tip comes from our friends at the Home Depot.

One of the hardest working machines in the house that often is forgotten about until it doesn’t work is the garage door opener. Garage door openers are rugged devices that are expected to do many years of hard labor. An opener has both mechanical and electrical parts that could use a little maintenance and care. Always be sure the power is off to an opener before making any adjustments.

Speaking of electricity, the first thing to check if an opener doesn’t work is the power supply. Is it plugged in? Are electrical wires loose or disconnected? Lots of household fix-its are just that easy.

Eliminate a sagging chain by adjusting the chain tension. If the chain sags more than 1/2 inch below the rail, it may bang against the rail and cause undue wear on the drive sprocket. Tighten the chain until it rests 1/2 inch above the base of the rail, but be careful not to overtighten.

A door that fails to open fully can be fixed by adjusting the limit screws. Unplug the opener and locate the up-limit adjustment screw on the power unit. Turn the screw clockwise. Plug in the opener, run it through a cycle, and see if you need to adjust it more.

Safety reversing sensors are those two little light-beam devices near the bottom of the door. If something breaks the beam while the door is closing, the sensor reverses the door. Sometimes, the beams can get out of alignment. Make sure the sensors face each other across the garage door opening in order to function properly.

Clean and lubricate the drive chain and track of the automatic door opener once or twice a year. Use a light penetrating oil instead of grease to keep from collecting dirt and grit.

Just an hour or so of basic maintanance will keep your garage door opening for many years.

It is not uncommon, when doing remodeling or when changing out a switch for one to encounter wires in an electrical box that are too short to work with. Instead of running the risk of loose or improper connections take advantage of easy to install “push in” wire connectors. These devices work on the same principle as the push in connections on the back of switches and duplex receptacles. You can get them in varieties that will accommodate multiple wires if needed.

Using them is simple. Cut a new piece of wire that is 5 or 6 inches long. Add it to the short wire by inserting the short wire into a push in wire connector and then inserting the new 5 to 6 inch wire extension into the other opening on the push in connector. Now you have wires long enough to make the proper connections.

Lots of our callers are looking for solutions to vibrating pipes or pipes that “creak and pop” as water, especially hot water, moves through them.

While creaking and popping are typically the result of the pipes expanding and contracting as they heat up and cool down, the vibrating can be the result of pipes that have come lose in the pipe clamps that fasten them to framing members (Studs, Floor Joists etc.) of the house. Nice secure clamps will also reduce the amount of creaking and popping.

Fixing the clamps is easy when you have access in a crawl space or basement but when the pipes are in a finished wall the fix does not appear to be so easy. The truth is that the fix for these out of the way pipes is not really so bad.

Locate the vibrating or popping pipe in the wall cavity. Purchase some Expanding Foam. “Great Stuff”TM is a brand of expanding foam. (The type in the red can is the expanding type) Bore a small hole in the wall that will allow you to place the tube from the spray can of expanding foam into the wall with a snug fit. Shoot the expanding foam into the wall and let it set up. Move on to the next pipe and repeat the process.

When the foam cures it will expand to fill the wall cavity and it will hold the pipe in place thus eliminating the vibrations.

One word of caution: expanding foam grows in size significantly. If the wall cavity goes from floor to ceiling you will have no problems. However if there is blocking or a fire stop in the wall do not overfill the cavity as the expanding foam can push the drywall away from the studs if it has nowhere to go.

A beautiful deck is a great feature of almost any home. One of the things that make a deck beautiful is properly spaced deck boards. You want the boards spaced far enough apart that they do not buckle in the heat and yet close enough that your pets and small children do not fall through the cracks.

While this seems like a relatively simple concept it can be difficult to get the final spacing of deck boards right because the boards shrink as they season. The treatment used to preserve wood is a “water-born” treatment. That means it is dissolved in water and then through pressure the water is forced into the wood. All this water in the wood causes the wood to swell. If you put the boards down with an acceptable space while the boards are still wet the gaps will be too big once the wood dries.

A simple way to get the right spacing is to use an 8-penny nail as a spacer between each board. Just gently tap the 8-penny nail into the deck joist between boards. Once the board is screwed into place remove the nail(s) that are spacers and start the next course of boards.

Another way to achieve the correct spacing and a very attractive finished look is to use hidden fasteners. Both Simpson Strong TieTM and TecoTM make a fastener that attaches to the joist and to the side of the deck board so that as you add each row of boards it covers the fasteners used on the previous row. These fasteners will also provide the correct spacing.

A few weeks back we had a caller talking to us about a problem he was having with a ground fault receptacle. (GFI) A GFI receptacle is one that must be installed in any wet location, for example, a garage, kitchen or bathroom.

As we were troubleshooting the malfunction we discovered that he had the receptacle wired incorrectly. The GFI must be wired correctly to provide the safety of ground fault protection. The problem with an improperly wired GFI is that it will still work, that is it will still provide power to whatever is plugged into it. By the way, if you are adding a circuit you should leave that to the electricians. The following advice is for anyone who needs to replace a defective GFI that has already been installed.

To make sure you are wiring the GFI correctly check the back of the receptacle. You will note that two of the terminals are marked “Line” and two are marked “Load”. The terminals marked “Line” are where you attach the wires coming to the receptacle from the power source. The “Load” terminals are for the wires leading away from the receptacle to the next outlet or device.

If you are not sure which set of wires is coming from the power source you can separate all four wires the two black wires and the two white wires. They must not touch or be close enough to arc. With the wires separated you can turn the power back on and with a current tester or voltmeter test each pair of wires. The pair that shows current is the pair coming from the source. Turn the power off, label the wires and finish the project.

As with any project that involves electricity please turn the power off and use extreme caution. If you are not an electrician most electrical jobs are out of scope for you.

It’s not uncommon to have a cocktail on the rocks but did you know that ice can make more than your favorite drink better? Some of our callers have complained about slow draining garbage disposals or bad odors coming from the garbage disposal.

Garbage disposals, like a few other things in life, can benefit from a good flushing out. Over time some food particles can build up in the discharge of the disposal unit. If you take a couple of cups of Ice (Cubes, not crushed) and drop them in the disposal and then turn it on you can clean the residue up and eliminate the odor. The hard ice moving quickly through the system knocks the deposits loose. You could say it is similar to roughage or fiber for the disposal. So once a month or so you should serve the garbage disposal “garbage on the rocks”.

Thanks for visiting Ask John and Dave.com and we’ll see you on the air,

John and Dave