Mimi wrote:
Mimi wrote:
Snapman! Is there anything you can’t do?
DBSnappa wrote:
When I was redecorating the sitting room late last year I noticed what looked for all the world like rising damp on an internal wall, which appeared mysteriously post decorating. I initially thought we'd accidentally pierced a radiator pipe screwing in the skirting, but on investigation and removal of all the blown render there was no pipe to be seen and the wall was solid brick anyway. I treated the wall with damp rods and left it to dry out over Christmas. During that period, more evidence of damp appeared around the front door and in the downstairs shower room, all affected areas close to one another. I thought "shit" we've got a leak somewhere in the water main, somewhere near the front of the house and it's likely to be buried in concrete somewhere.
Yesterday, I did some poking around all the exposed pipework I could find and finally removed the panelling at the back of the toilet in the downstairs shower room — it has a concealed cistern. Lo and behold, the tarbeck valve on the loo was blown and every time you flushed the loo, the valve pissed water all over the floor, which had been seeping through the cement and climbing up the walls when it reached them. I put new flooring down when I renovated the sitting room last year, which was glued down on top of the vinyl/marmoleum/lino floor that was already down throughout the ground floor, so the water was seeping under this to the walls and then rising up. Fortunately, other than some slight cosmetic damage to a couple of walls near the loo, there doesn't appear to be any lasting damage.
I fixed the toilet today, which fortunately had an isolation valve on the feed pipe so I didn't have to switch the water off.
That’s a no, then?
There are plenty of things I can't do
But most DIY stuff, property maintenance I can do and if I don't know quite how, I do research. Very little of it is that difficult. Some things are proper crafts, such as plastering, and I'll always get a pro' in if it's anything bigger than a patching job. I'll also defer to friends who are qualified in plumbing or electrickery if the job is complicated/dangerous, but domestically that covers only two things, like putting a new boiler in or wiring up new consumer units. You also need to be certificated to do this work. The rest I can do.
I play no musical instruments, I speak no other languages, I can't fly a plane or a helicopter, I can't sing... there's more, but I suspect you didn't want a list