D.i.y.

[dealmaker]

For me means Dumb Idea Yet again.

So yesterday I decided to repair and paint a set of our weather- and termite-damaged french doors. What a f-ing mistake that was. I'm now about six hrs. into Day 2 with 3-4 more to go, and would guess about another 8-10 hrs. (tomorrow) still to go. Murphy's Law has dictated policy since the first minute. Collateral damage includes a mixture of liquid wrench and rust on the white carpet, assorted scraped and dents in the newly-painted walls, a mixture of green and white paint dust and Bondo dust from sanding is covering everything in the garage, one pissed off baby bunny and a bad incident with its haybox (I sneezed for an hour straight), and a broken plastic windowblind bracket that is about 18 yrs. old. I wonder how much fun that'll be looking for a replacement!

Now, after all that and many trips to the hardware store and close to a couple hundred $$ in materials and a power sander later, I'm trying to look within to find what out what is it in me that gets a hair up my @$$ to even think about wanting to do this crap!

Have any of you guys ever had DIY remorse? What kind of goodnatured household task-gone-bad did you attempt?

 

[fsusteve]

I fix at least one thing a day around here. It might be small or lately a large item, so I now take a M.A.S.H. attitude towards some of the repairs. Just enough to keep it working till I have more $$$ or desire to make it right. The fuel tank on the boat just sprung a nice leak, so I've been dealing with that and now the a/c in the van quit and I can't trace out the problem.

It is always sumthin....


BTW, got that pic of us fishing?

 

[e rock]

So my buddy Barry was recently activated in the Army; he's been a drill sergeant on reserve status for several years. My wife is good friends with his, so they hang out a lot in his absence and I've taken over maintenance duties at their house. The girls requested that I fix the hot tub that Barry got too pissed at and has left sitting for about a year.

During it's period of inactivity, he didn't drain the pump and without heat, it froze up solid over the winter and cracked the impeller housing about 3/4 of the way around. I figure 'no problem'. After fixing a few other minor issues, I pulled the housing and impeller (which is also cracked). I ground the crack out with the Dremel, drilled the ends so it wouldn't spread and filled it all with epoxy. I'm telling you - it looked GOOD. I put it all back together the next day and started filling the tub. No leaks, all good. Start up the pump and heater as the tub gets half full, still good. The pump is working fine and water's circulating well, so the impeller is holding up just fine.

Then the jets kicked on and the pump motor hit second gear (who knew these things had 2 speeds?). The housing split all the way around from the pressure and got everything within a 12' radius soaking wet.

The pump housing is NLA, so it's still sitting there, waiting for me to find a good deal on a complete pump assembly.



Usually, if something isn't going to work, I have an inkling beforehand, but this caught me completely off-guard. That's probably why it pissed me off so much.

 

[dealmaker]

...BTW, got that pic of us fishing?

yup...right here. What's your email? Man, the water was nice that day.

 

[fsusteve]

just post it up here, I'll right click it....

 

[stayalert]

Brake lights stopped working in my '67 landrover. checked bulbs, checked wiring, replaced hydraulic pressure switch (same part as old VW bug) tada fixed it.....while fixing the brake lights I observed some rusting brake lines. took the vehicle of the road, since its off the road better address a couple of other wonky wiring things......Now ~2 years later its in the garage with every single piece of wire out, new brake lines, vac. assist dual circuit conversion (different master cylinder, pedal assembly, and a few other bits) nearly complete, a dissassembled front end a repaired (welded and painted) bulkhead/firewall...Someday I will finish it.....Meanwhile the 80 humms nerrily along...

 

[Koffer]

For me means Dumb Idea Yet again.

Have any of you guys ever had DIY remorse? What kind of goodnatured household task-gone-bad did you attempt?

My 1st house .
After 11years of everything I got near going to s*** ,I had it . Bought a house that needed nothing (other then a bigger garage and im paying someone to do that )
Sold the old house for a profit even not finshed to a friend who sold it 2 months later to the guy next door who hasnt finshed it eather
Im pretty sure that house will never be done

 

[mabrodis]

Then the jets kicked on and the pump motor hit second gear (who knew these things had 2 speeds?).

I did...

Those pumps put out ALOT of water, not something I would even attempt to fix with epoxy at all. At my mom's house we had a air blower fan go out while we were in the hot-tub...eeek...smoke started pouring out from under it, then it kicked off (it tripped the GFI breaker, which boys and girls is EXACTLY why you have to have a GFI breaker on a hottub, full of water...and people)...anyway, during the inactivity time one pump seized, blower had to be replaced, numerous pipes were cracked and/or leaking...so it was a mess. My stepdad finally got it all together, found out it's a pain to find parts for them, unless you want to get reamed and by from the actual spa dealer...but most parts are identical to others, but you just have to find a place that sells just parts, which was not easy. But it's all back together, he had to replace atleast 1 pump, maybe both, but the motors were fine...lot of work but nice now...

 

[alia176]

I love working on cars...hate working on a house...

We started this master bath remodelling project last (yes, as in '04) October.. Finally got the sheetrock mud and taped three weeks ago Now, let's see how long it takes for me to actually finish with the freaking sanding before the primer is painted on. At least all plumbing and electrical work are done. And the only reason they're done becuase I didn't do them Traded some work on a friend's LR D-90 for electrical work and paid a handy man to do the plumbing.

I hate doing house construction work

Thankfully my wife ain't pushy and is about as motivated to finish the bathroom as I!

Sad thing is what would I do differently...prolly nothing!

 

[fj40crusher]

Oh yeah. Our old house, which is now a rental property. We moved out into a house we had built. I go back to the empty house we had lived in for 8 years and realized it needed alot of work. I figured I would just redo the upstairs bathroom floor. Pulled out the old floor and toilet and vanity. Tiled the new floor. Figured I would replace the toilet with new and might as well get a new vanity and sink. Now the new tile looked bad up against the old carpet in the next room. Out comes the carpet to find a poorly built subfloor. Up comes part of the subfloor and the upstairs stair railing. Took out the old cabinetry up there too to really see in the floor. Fixed floor, down goes the laminate, installed new bar and rebuilt a wall where the old stair railing was. Now the stairs look like s*** so I tear them down. Figured if I am going to rebuild the stairs I might as well do something with the entire downstairs first. So out comes the old flooring and in goes tile, yes-I tiled the entire downstairs. Figured before I tiled I might as well gut the kitchen, build a new closet, reframe the laundry room and gut the downstairs bathroom. Since I had walls torn open I replaced all recepticles and lighting. Repainted everything. Installed cabinets, counter top, sink, new appliances, new tile, built stairs...finished everything. Looked great. Decided I didn't like the new stairs (dad helped me, only assistance I had by anyone for a reason). I tore them out again and built a brand new set that look beautiful (wood).

Now the wants me to redo the siding. So I figure if I am going to go through that trouble I might as well replace all the windows. It never ends.

End of the day, price of the house has gone up about 250k from purchase price. All the work I did by myself only cost about 10k in material. Just had it reappraised to the surprise of the . Been telling her for months what that work I did was worth but she never listens....she listens now

 

[dealmaker]

just post it up here, I'll right click it....

There ya go! I'm gonna plan on May or June next time so maybe the fish will be more cooperative.

 

[fsusteve]

Damn my kid takes a good pic. Make it June, snook will be on the beach, plus I actually downloaded all the reef coordinates finally....

 

[Jman]

Damn my kid takes a good pic. Make it June, snook will be on the beach, plus I actually downloaded all the reef coordinates finally....

Which one are you? The tall guy with the beer gut on the right, or the short guy with the beer gut and girly hat on the left?
















Where's the fish?

 

[fsusteve]

Which one are you? The tall guy with the beer gut on the right, or the short guy with the beer gut and girly hat on the left?
















Where's the fish?

I'm on the right, that ain't beer gut, it's my dick wrapped around my waist

Ummm about the fish, yeah ummm they were ummm in the cooler, ummm yeah that's it.

 

[dealmaker]

Which one are you? The tall guy with the beer gut on the right, or the short guy with the beer gut and girly hat on the left?

Where's the fish?

It's not that I'm short (5'11), it's that Steve is tall. As for the girly hat, that's a 20-yr. old Quicksilver Tavarua classic!

And the fish...umm...there were fish in the bait box. And shrimp too!!

EDIT: Actually, the lack of biting fish was not for want of trying. We covered a lot of ground in Steve's boat! It was still a good time.

 

[semlin]

yup, built a 10' x 3' three bay composter this weekend for my parent's summer place. Spent an hour at the lumber store and an hour precutting most of the lumber to length at home so I could slap it together quickly in an hour once i got there. Took me 4 freaking hours. Half of it was working with that square grid chicken wire stuff especially when i realized I did not have enough so had to cut a bunch of short strips to use the sideways width as length. that stuff has sharp ends and a mind of its own and won't lie flat to cut even with two wet 4x4 posts weighing it down.

If you see a bay composter at the despot with the panels assembled already, just buy it.

 

[archie]

I have DIY remorse everytime but at least I can say I screwed it up myself. I just hate it when you get somebody else to do some work and they screw things up and even deny it.