At Home In The Woods

[hitekcountry]

I'm not a fan of knock down texture on walls. First off, the door and window jamb widths have to be increased. Custom jamb widths can get very expensive.
Secondly, it can be tough to patch knock down without the patch being visible.
Third, it takes more paint, and makes cutting in around trim much more difficult.

Cutting in paint on trim is EXREAMLY time consuming. On new construction you can avoid all of that by painting all the trim prior to installation, then after installation caulk and a quick paint touchup goes very quickly. Spray paint your doors and trim prior to installation and you will have a very professional looking finish with very little time involved. Paint your walls just after the application of the texture is dried and all the windows and rough electrical is still masked off.

 

[hitekcountry]

On bath fans I put them on their own timer switch so that the fan can be left on for any length of time you chose after you leave the room to clear out the steam or Ah whatever otherwise you have to remember to come back 5 min later to shut off the fan or in some cases 15 min.

 

[hitekcountry]

In Calif. It's a code requirement in new construction to hard wire in all the smoke detectors, which is good to do because it saves you having to remember to change out the batteries every year.

 

[firefighter9208]

On the subject of smoke detectors. They have a life a life expectancy of 10 years and should be replaced after that time.

Chris

 

[VitaBene]

In Calif. It's a code requirement in new construction to hard wire in all the smoke detectors, which is good to do because it saves you having to remember to change out the batteries every year.

I have to respectfully disagree. Hardwired smokes still require backup batteries (usually once a year- once the first one chirps, I do all of them now that daylight savings time is all messed up!). The benefit to hardwired smoke detectors is that they all alert at the same time so if the fire started in the basement the upper floors will get an early alert.

One final thing on smoke and CO2 detectors for kid's rooms, spend the extra $$ on voice alerts. Kids are more reactive to voices than they are on sounds, as they are more likely to incorporate the sounds into their dreams.

Firefighter is right on with the life expectancy of the detectors.

 

[EddieWalker]

On the subject of smoke detectors. They have a life a life expectancy of 10 years and should be replaced after that time.

Chris

That something I didn't know. Is this for hardwired detectors too? Or just battery oporated ones? What about CO2 and Carbon Monoxide detectors?

Thanks,
Eddie

 

[woodlandfarms]

They did a very interesting study I can search out, but basically it turns out kids will NOT wake up to fire alarms. They sleep very hard. I have heard rumour of the voice alarms, but have never seen one.

Not to put the fear in you, I think these days house fires are pretty rare but none the less, take all the precautions that are reasonable.

 

[Pops15]

Don't forget the hard wired (with battery back up) smoke detectors need to be on a dedicated circuit.
I've never heard the 10 year life expectancy thing either.

 

[Obed]

After work today I dug some more.

The CM backfilled the footers around the garage will gravel. Why he did this, I have no idea. So now I have to remove all the gravel so the brick can be laid.

I paid for this gravel. I'd like to use it for something useful so I'll move this gravel to my gravel pile. After the brick is laid, I'll back fill this area with dirt.

 

[CurlyDave]

On the subject of smoke detectors. They have a life a life expectancy of 10 years and should be replaced after that time.

Chris

You really have to read the fine print on the box.

Some work by having a very small amount of a radioactive element in them and these have a limited life. Others work on a different principle and have a longer life, but nothing you install is going to last forever.