Comment on House Painting Tips by Tim Carter

DEAR TIM: There is still some time left to paint my house before the weather turns. I have the time to do the job right and I would really like the paint job to last. I am interested in knowing any secret tips you have discovered that really make a difference. In other words, are there a few things I can do that will allow me to get the new paint job to last an additional five to seven years? Russell W., Riverside, CA

DEAR RUSSELL: There are several things you can do, all of them quite simple, that will extend the useful life of an exterior house painting job. Some of the tips you have heard before, but some may shock or surprise you. The ultimate exterior paint job, in my opinion, blends the best paint with attention to detail in all preparation steps before you even shake the can of paint and pop open its lid.

Caulk is a powerful weapon to stop water intrusion that can ruin a new house painting job. PHOTO CREDIT: Kathy Carter

How many homeowners do you think read the entire label on a paint can? If past emails I get are an accurate barometer, I would say less than 5 percent of the public truly reads and understands the instructions. Reading the label on the paint can is the first thing you should do. Pay particular attention to the advice given about compatible primers and the amount of time you must wait before you apply a second coat.

When you read the label, my guess is you will see language that tells you to apply the paint to a clean, dry surface. Unfortunately many people do not follow this critical advice. It is important to understand that paint is simply glue with color added to it. If you want glue to stick well to an object, it really helps if the surface is totally clean and is dust-free.

It is very tempting to use a pressure washer to rapidly clean the outside of your home. The trouble is, they don't always remove all of the dirt. You can prove this on your home or on a dirty car. Use a pressure washer and get the tip of it as close to the surface as you feel comfortable so as to avoid surface damage. Let the surface dry. Then come back and hand wash a section with soapy water using a sponge and/or mild scrub brush. I guarantee you will see a difference and the brush and sponge will remove dirt left behind by the pressure washer.

To make matters worse, these tools can inject water behind the exterior skin of your home and cause paint failure problems soon after the job is finished. Water that is driven deep into the structure will eventually make its way back out as a liquid or a gas and can cause bubbles, blisters and peeling in the brand-new paint.

Once all loose paint has been scraped off, look for cracks where water can enter the skin of your home. Caulk these cracks and wipe the water-based caulk with a damp sponge to produce a professional looking joint. Make sure the caulk tube says the caulk is paintable.

Priming new masonry surfaces or bare wood is very important. Even more important is covering the primer as soon as possible with the finish paint. If the primer says it can be top-coated with the finish paint in 24 hours or less, then do so immediately after the time has expired. The finish paint can actually bond both mechanically and chemically to the primer if you do not wait days and days to apply the finish paint. My advice is to only prime as much area as you can finish paint the following day.

If you are working with paint on an older home, be very cautious. Houses built on or before 1978 can be coated with paints that contain lead. It is estimated that there are tens of millions of homes that have lead paint on either their interior or exterior surfaces. Scraping, sanding and removing the paint can create lead dust which is very toxic and poisonous. The Environmental Protection Agency has very helpful tips at their website to help you deal with this hazard.

High-quality paint is easy to find. Look for products that have two important ingredients: urethane and acrylic resins. These two components are the glue part of the paint. Urethane is extremely sticky and once cured and dried, it acts much like epoxy. Paints that contain these resins can be found at national brand paint stores and at large retailers that have hardware and paint departments. Unfortunately I have not been able to locate these paints at home centers.

Avoid painting in direct sunlight and on windy days if possible. Direct sunlight can cause rapid drying which creates a skin over the freshly-applied paint. As the remaining water in the paint dries, the paint develops bubbles. Wind causes paint to dry too quickly and can stop some paints from achieving the best bond to the surface being painted.

Comment on Water Heaters Expansion Tanks by Tim Taraska

Bathrooms Plumbing Design text: Tim Carter

Hot Water Heater Expansion Tanks
Virtually, every modern plumbing code requires the installation of an expansion tank on hot water heater installations. The reason is simple. Water expands when heated. This extra volume of water needs to go somewhere. Before the widespread usage of backflow preventers, check valves and pressure reducing valves, this expanded water simply pushed the cold water back into the city water main. If your house has one of the above mentioned devices, you could have problems. These devices prohibit the flow of water from your house back into the public water system.
Without an expansion tank, the expanding water can cause your hot water heater to possibly fail because of the increased pressure. This pressure can cause serious life threatening problems as well, if you heat your water with natural gas or propane. The water heater tank can collapse around the internal flue and cause carbon monoxide to enter your home. It is serious business.
Expansion tanks are really simple devices. They contain compressed air and a special rubber bladder. When your hot water heater turns on, the water within your piping system begins to expand. This expanding water enters the expansion tank. Eventually, hot water is drawn from the system thru a faucet and the expansion tank releases the extra water into the piping system.
Expansion tanks come in various sizes. The size you need depends upon two very important variables. You need to know the capacity in gallons of your hot water heater and the water pressure of your house piping system. The capacity of your hot water heater is stamped on a label or a plate on the side of your hot water heater.
Water pressures within municipal water systems vary widely. Here in Cincinnati, water main pressures vary from 50 pounds per square inch (PSI) to over 200 PSI within a distance of a mile! This same thing may be true in your city. People with cisterns or wells control their own system pressure thru the use of electric pumps.
It is easy to determine your incoming water pressure. Many plumbing supply houses sell a little gauge that attaches to any faucet which has garden hose threads. Or if you like, you can call your local water department. They will possibly send a technician to your house. This person has very accurate gauges which will do the same thing.
Once you have this information, visit a local plumbing supply house that sells these tanks. They will be able to provide you with the proper sized tank to suit your needs.
Be sure to follow the directions that are packaged with the expansion tank. It only takes a few moments to read them. This will insure that your tank will function properly.
If you install a pressure reducing valve to control water hammer, be sure to buy one with a bypass feature. Without this, your water heater will begin to malfunction. You will see water dribble out of the pressure/temperature safety valve without a doubt.
The reason lies in the fact that heated water expands. Without a pressure reducing valve, this expanded water can easily go right back outside to the water main. Low quality or malfunctioning pressure reducing valves block this backwards flow of expanding water.
An inexpensive expansion tank installed on the cold water side of your hot water heater will solve this problem. The tank absorbs the expanding water and then releases it once hot water is drawn from the hot water heater. They are simple yet effective devices.
Installing an Expansion Tank
The first thing you need to do is to size the expansion tank according to the size of your hot water heater. The tank manufacturers make this easy. All you have to do is to determine the capacity of your hot water heater. This is always stamped on the side label of the hot water heater. You may have a 50 gallon or 80 gallon or whatever size hot water heater. Take this information to your plumbing supply house to get the right sized expansion tank.
A Simple Tee Fitting
The expansion tank installation requires you to install a simple tee fitting in your cold water supply line. I like to install these on a horizontal run of pipe, not a vertical piece. A vertical piece of pipe can cause undo stress on the connection point between the tank and the supply piping. I always hang my water-heater expansion tank above the horizontal pipe and recommend NEVER to hang it below. However, ALWAYS read the instructions provided by the manufacturer.
The tanks simply have a threaded connection. You will install the opposite type threaded adapter to your tee fitting. Apply Teflon tape or pipe dope to the male threads and screw the tank onto the fitting. To get a tight fit, you may have to use a pipe wrench or a leather belt around the tank. Most tanks come with a place to attach a tightening wrench. Follow the instructions and this can be done in 1/2 hour or less!

Comment on Porch Decking by Tim Carter

DEAR TIM: I'™m restoring an older home that has a patio porch deck. It'™s covered, so perhaps it'€™s just a deck porch. The wood was painted, but is in bad shape due to neglect. What material would you install if you wanted to maintain the character of the house? I'™ve seen composite porch decking, but Iâ'm worried that I could have problems with it and that it just won'€™t look real. Are there any great trade secrets you can share about decks and porches? Sara G., Mt. Orab, OH
DEAR SARA: Iâ'm really familiar with porch decks, especially ones made from wood. Every house I've owned has had one, and some of the wood is over 100-years old and still in very good condition. There are several reasons why the wood has lasted that long, not the least of which is diligent care on the part of the homeowner.

This is real Douglas Fir porch decking. It'€™s tongue and groove allowing the nails to be hidden. PHOTO CREDIT: Tim Carter

A Wood porch decking is absolutely a classic look. You'€™ll find it on many a covered porch in older homes out in the country as well as houses in the city. I know for a fact that there are thousands of houses in Cincinnati, OH, which is near you, that have original wood porch decks that are still in use. They may be painted, but it'€™s still wood.
If you study your porch, assuming it was installed correctly when your home was built, you'€™ll discover that it probably is not level front to back and that the wood strips are installed opposite of the way you might think they should be.
Carpenters well over 100 years ago discovered that even though porches like yours were covered, wind-driven rain would saturate the wood in fierce storms. The quicker that water got off the wood, the better. Installing the wood so that it has a fall of 1/8 inch per foot allowed for excellent drainage.
To ensure no water got trapped between the individual pieces of wood decking, the carpenters ran each individual strip of wood perpendicular to the front wall of the house. That way the seams between the pieces of wood acted as natural conduits for the water to drain to the end of the porch at the overhang. Installing the wood parallel with the front wall of the house creates a dam between pieces of wood that traps the water.
The wood that I prefer to use for these porch decks is vertical grain Douglas Fir. It can still be found at many traditional lumberyards. The wood that was installed on many of the old porches, and the ones I built, had a tongue and groove profile.
This unique profile is the same used when milling oak for interior hardwood floors. It allows for blind nailing of the strips of wood and adds significantly to the strength of the wood as each strip interlocks with the one on either side of it. This minimizes or eliminates sag or bounce when you walk on the wood in between the floor joists that support the porch decking. It'€™s time-tested technology that works.

I tested a composite porch decking that was made to mimic the wood material. It failed miserably. The instructions said to make sure the decking was covered from the sun. That'€™s pretty impossible to do as the sun can often hit the edges of the decking early and late in the day and as the seasons change with the sun lower in the sky. In my case, even though the decking was installed per the manufacturer'€™s specifications, it developed huge humps from the heat expansion of the plastic in the composite product.
If you want your new wood material to last for generations, you have to treat it with borate chemicals before it'€™s installed. Cut the pieces to the exact length you want and then soak each piece of wood in hot water that contains borate powder. Let each piece soak under water in a trough for about two minutes. Stack the wood in a shaded area making sure to put wood spacers between layers so the wood can dry.
Once it'€™s dried for two weeks, then paint the wood on all edges and surfaces before it'€™s installed. You can use semi-transparent wood preservatives instead of paint if you want the natural look. The key is to coat all the surfaces of the decking so that water will have a very difficult time entering the wood. If you don’t pretreat the wood before it'€™s installed, you€'ll never be able to coat all the surfaces.
Use double-dipped hot galvanized finish nails to install the wood. These will last for generations, especially if the wood is covered with a roof. If you have to cut a piece of wood that’s been treated or painted, be sure to coat the cut end with the borate solution and then the finish sealant or paint.
If you want to minimize any cupping or warping in the wood, consider installing a vapor barrier on the soil under the porch. This will slow water vapor from pouring into the underside of the wood, even though you’ve treated it.
The wood used on many of the old houses had another huge advantage over wood available today. It came from ancient trees whose growth rings were very small. As such there was often as much dense summer wood in the lumber as there was the lighter spring wood. Lumber today seems to have a much higher percentage of light spring wood than the dense dark summer wood. Spring wood, because of its open cellular structure, is much more susceptible to rot than the dense summer wood.

Comment on Water Pressure Loss by Tim Carter

Sometimes, there is nothing more aggravating than low water pressure. In some instances, it can even be dangerous. Low water pressure problems are so commonplace that the national plumbing codes mandated, several years back, the use of pressure balanced shower valves to minimize injury caused by low water pressure problems.
There is a misconception by many homeowners that low water pressure is something they have to live with. Nothing could be further from the truth! Many low water pressure problems are a result of installation inadequacies. The plumber(s) simply put piping in that was either too small (undersized) or reduced the size of the piping, within a structure, too quickly.
Low water pressure problems can also be attributed to scale deposits inside of piping which reduce their diameter, low pump pressure (houses with wells), leaks in underground lines serving a house, and problems with outdated water mains in municipal systems (rare). These problems can usually be identified very quickly. Municipal water works companies have trained personnel that will visit your house and answer questions regarding your water service. Often it takes very little detective work to determine if one, or several, of these possibilities is the source of your low water pressure. Almost always they will help you determine if there is an underground leak, at no charge to you.
They can also attach a pressure reading device which will tell you just what the water pressure is inside your house when all fixtures are turned off.
You can also stop by your local firehouse. Fire engines are equipped with accurate pressure gauges. When a fire engine attaches to a fire hydrant, before they start pumping water from the hydrant they know what the water pressure is in that water main.
By the way, in case you didn't realize it, the fire hydrants on your street are hooked to the same water main you drink from. The only deviation from this is in some large cities. There are individual water mains specifically for fire fighting, but these are almost always located in dense urban/business environments.
The fire departments often have very specific records and they can tell you the specific pressure of the fire hydrant closest to your house. Stop by and chat with them, you may be surprised at what they can tell you about the water mains in your area!
Robert Boyle
Robert Boyle was an English chemist born in 1627. He was a pretty smart guy. Well educated and very methodical, he started experimenting with gases. He developed Boyle's Law which has to do with the relationship between a given volume of gas and its pressure.
He determined that liquids acted somewhat differently. It didn't take too long for him to determine that water couldn't be easily compressed. In fact, it was virtually impossible.
What he found out was that when you applied pressure to water (liquids) in a closed system (no leaks), whatever pressure you applied, the same pressure was exerted everywhere by the liquid against the container it was in.
This is a very significant finding. It tells you that when all of your faucets are closed in your house, the pressure within your plumbing system should be equal everywhere. Not only that, if you happened to visit your local fire department and/or call the water works, you will know what that pressure should be. The only deviation will be the resultant pressure drop due to friction loss as the water travels from the street into your house.
Those people who operate using well water and electric pressure pumps operate under the same "laws". The only difference is pump capacity. Smaller pumps simply cannot meet the demand (flow) you might impose upon them. They may be able to produce an adequate pressure (50 - 70 pounds per square inch PSI), but when asked to deliver lots of water at this pressure, they choke. You may have to jump to a bigger pump.
This is rarely the problem with a municipal system. The typical water main in a residential street can deliver hundreds of gallons per minute and maintain pressure. To put this in perspective with respect to your own water usage, you might use seven gallons per minute if you had four people using two separate bathrooms at the same time. This situation is somewhat realistic as people get up to go to work and school.
Friction Loss
OK, so we know that the pressure in a closed system is constant because of Bob Boyle's findings. What then accounts for water pressure / volume losses?
Well, a number of things can contribute to water pressure loss. Some of the major items are relative elevation differences between your house (fixtures) and the water main, size of water piping and restrictions in a pipe. The two most likely culprits in most cases are the last two, water pipe size and restrictions. These two items have a huge impact on friction loss. Friction loss can dramatically affect water pressure. What happens is simple. When water starts to flow through a pipe, some of it rubs against the side of the pipe. Depending upon how much water is rubbing against the inside walls of the pipe in relation to how much water is in the pipe in any given length, determines how great the pressure loss will be.
The technical term for this situation is called the hydraulic radius. But who cares about that, let me show you a simple example.
Bigger is Better
Let's look at a cross section of a 1/2 inch inner diameter copper pipe. Remember that grade school math homework you didn't do??? Well, it's payback time!
The inner circumference of the 1/2 inch pipe is 1.57 inches. The area of the cross section of this same pipe is 0.19 inches.
Let's look at a 3/4 inch pipe. It's inner circumference is 2.35 inches. It's cross sectional area is 0.44 inches.
Now, these numbers may seem either confusing or insignificant. But, look a little closer. Notice that when we jumped to 3/4 inch pipe, a funny thing happened. The circumference increased by 49.6 percent. But, the cross sectional area increased by 131.5 percent!
This means that as a pipe gets bigger, there is more room to move around. Not as much of the fluid in the pipe has the opportunity to rub against the sides of the pipe.
Restrictions inside pipes can also cause friction loss. Imagine a rough scalely pipe. The water trying to get from one end to the other hits and rubs against lots of "things". It loses energy. What's more, the deposits inside the pipe reduce its inner diameter. As shown above, small inner diameter pipe causes great pressure loss because of friction loss.
So, with respect to pipe size and pressure, bigger is better!

Comment on House Painting Tips by Tim Carter

DEAR TIM: There is still some time left to paint my house before the weather turns. I have the time to do the job right and I would really like the paint job to last. I am interested in knowing any secret tips you have discovered that really make a difference. In other words, are there a few things I can do that will allow me to get the new paint job to last an additional five to seven years? Russell W., Riverside, CA

DEAR RUSSELL: There are several things you can do, all of them quite simple, that will extend the useful life of an exterior house painting job. Some of the tips you have heard before, but some may shock or surprise you. The ultimate exterior paint job, in my opinion, blends the best paint with attention to detail in all preparation steps before you even shake the can of paint and pop open its lid.

Caulk is a powerful weapon to stop water intrusion that can ruin a new house painting job. PHOTO CREDIT: Kathy Carter

How many homeowners do you think read the entire label on a paint can? If past emails I get are an accurate barometer, I would say less than 5 percent of the public truly reads and understands the instructions. Reading the label on the paint can is the first thing you should do. Pay particular attention to the advice given about compatible primers and the amount of time you must wait before you apply a second coat.

When you read the label, my guess is you will see language that tells you to apply the paint to a clean, dry surface. Unfortunately many people do not follow this critical advice. It is important to understand that paint is simply glue with color added to it. If you want glue to stick well to an object, it really helps if the surface is totally clean and is dust-free.

It is very tempting to use a pressure washer to rapidly clean the outside of your home. The trouble is, they don't always remove all of the dirt. You can prove this on your home or on a dirty car. Use a pressure washer and get the tip of it as close to the surface as you feel comfortable so as to avoid surface damage. Let the surface dry. Then come back and hand wash a section with soapy water using a sponge and/or mild scrub brush. I guarantee you will see a difference and the brush and sponge will remove dirt left behind by the pressure washer.

To make matters worse, these tools can inject water behind the exterior skin of your home and cause paint failure problems soon after the job is finished. Water that is driven deep into the structure will eventually make its way back out as a liquid or a gas and can cause bubbles, blisters and peeling in the brand-new paint.

Once all loose paint has been scraped off, look for cracks where water can enter the skin of your home. Caulk these cracks and wipe the water-based caulk with a damp sponge to produce a professional looking joint. Make sure the caulk tube says the caulk is paintable.

Priming new masonry surfaces or bare wood is very important. Even more important is covering the primer as soon as possible with the finish paint. If the primer says it can be top-coated with the finish paint in 24 hours or less, then do so immediately after the time has expired. The finish paint can actually bond both mechanically and chemically to the primer if you do not wait days and days to apply the finish paint. My advice is to only prime as much area as you can finish paint the following day.

If you are working with paint on an older home, be very cautious. Houses built on or before 1978 can be coated with paints that contain lead. It is estimated that there are tens of millions of homes that have lead paint on either their interior or exterior surfaces. Scraping, sanding and removing the paint can create lead dust which is very toxic and poisonous. The Environmental Protection Agency has very helpful tips at their website to help you deal with this hazard.

High-quality paint is easy to find. Look for products that have two important ingredients: urethane and acrylic resins. These two components are the glue part of the paint. Urethane is extremely sticky and once cured and dried, it acts much like epoxy. Paints that contain these resins can be found at national brand paint stores and at large retailers that have hardware and paint departments. Unfortunately I have not been able to locate these paints at home centers.

Avoid painting in direct sunlight and on windy days if possible. Direct sunlight can cause rapid drying which creates a skin over the freshly-applied paint. As the remaining water in the paint dries, the paint develops bubbles. Wind causes paint to dry too quickly and can stop some paints from achieving the best bond to the surface being painted.

Comment on Water Heaters – Expansion Tanks by Tim Taraska

Bathrooms Plumbing Design text: Tim Carter

Hot Water Heater Expansion Tanks
Virtually, every modern plumbing code requires the installation of an expansion tank on hot water heater installations. The reason is simple. Water expands when heated. This extra volume of water needs to go somewhere. Before the widespread usage of backflow preventers, check valves and pressure reducing valves, this expanded water simply pushed the cold water back into the city water main. If your house has one of the above mentioned devices, you could have problems. These devices prohibit the flow of water from your house back into the public water system.
Without an expansion tank, the expanding water can cause your hot water heater to possibly fail because of the increased pressure. This pressure can cause serious life threatening problems as well, if you heat your water with natural gas or propane. The water heater tank can collapse around the internal flue and cause carbon monoxide to enter your home. It is serious business.
Expansion tanks are really simple devices. They contain compressed air and a special rubber bladder. When your hot water heater turns on, the water within your piping system begins to expand. This expanding water enters the expansion tank. Eventually, hot water is drawn from the system thru a faucet and the expansion tank releases the extra water into the piping system.
Expansion tanks come in various sizes. The size you need depends upon two very important variables. You need to know the capacity in gallons of your hot water heater and the water pressure of your house piping system. The capacity of your hot water heater is stamped on a label or a plate on the side of your hot water heater.
Water pressures within municipal water systems vary widely. Here in Cincinnati, water main pressures vary from 50 pounds per square inch (PSI) to over 200 PSI within a distance of a mile! This same thing may be true in your city. People with cisterns or wells control their own system pressure thru the use of electric pumps.
It is easy to determine your incoming water pressure. Many plumbing supply houses sell a little gauge that attaches to any faucet which has garden hose threads.  Or if you like, you can call your local water department. They will possibly send a technician to your house. This person has very accurate gauges which will do the same thing.
Once you have this information, visit a local plumbing supply house that sells these tanks. They will be able to provide you with the proper sized tank to suit your needs.
Be sure to follow the directions that are packaged with the expansion tank. It only takes a few moments to read them. This will insure that your tank will function properly.
If you install a pressure reducing valve to control water hammer, be sure to buy one with a bypass feature. Without this, your water heater will begin to malfunction. You will see water dribble out of the pressure/temperature safety valve without a doubt.
The reason lies in the fact that heated water expands. Without a pressure reducing valve, this expanded water can easily go right back outside to the water main. Low quality or malfunctioning pressure reducing valves block this backwards flow of expanding water.
An inexpensive expansion tank installed on the cold water side of your hot water heater will solve this problem. The tank absorbs the expanding water and then releases it once hot water is drawn from the hot water heater. They are simple yet effective devices.
Installing an Expansion Tank
The first thing you need to do is to size the expansion tank according to the size of your hot water heater. The tank manufacturers make this easy. All you have to do is to determine the capacity of your hot water heater. This is always stamped on the side label of the hot water heater. You may have a 50 gallon or 80 gallon or whatever size hot water heater. Take this information to your plumbing supply house to get the right sized expansion tank.
A Simple Tee Fitting
The expansion tank installation requires you to install a simple tee fitting in your cold water supply line. I like to install these on a horizontal run of pipe, not a vertical piece. A vertical piece of pipe can cause undo stress on the connection point between the tank and the supply piping. I always hang my water-heater expansion tank above the horizontal pipe and recommend NEVER to hang it below. However, ALWAYS read the instructions provided by the manufacturer.
The tanks simply have a threaded connection. You will install the opposite type threaded adapter to your tee fitting. Apply Teflon tape or pipe dope to the male threads and screw the tank onto the fitting. To get a tight fit, you may have to use a pipe wrench or a leather belt around the tank. Most tanks come with a place to attach a tightening wrench. Follow the instructions and this can be done in 1/2 hour or less!

Comment on Porch Decking by Tim Carter

DEAR TIM: I’m restoring an older home that has a patio porch deck. It’s covered, so perhaps it’s just a deck porch. The wood was painted, but is in bad shape due to neglect. What material would you install if you wanted to maintain the character of the house? I’ve seen composite porch decking, but I’m worried that I could have problems with it and that it just won’t look real. Are there any great trade secrets you can share about decks and porches? Sara G., Mt. Orab, OH

DEAR SARA: I’m really familiar with porch decks, especially ones made from wood. Every house I’ve owned has had one, and some of the wood is over 100-years old and still in very good condition. There are several reasons why the wood has lasted that long, not the least of which is diligent care on the part of the homeowner.

This is real Douglas Fir porch decking. It’s tongue and groove allowing the nails to be hidden. PHOTO CREDIT: Tim Carter

 Wood porch decking is absolutely a classic look. You’ll find it on many a covered porch in older homes out in the country as well as houses in the city. I know for a fact that there are thousands of houses in Cincinnati, OH, which is near you, that have original wood porch decks that are still in use. They may be painted, but it’s still wood.

If you study your porch, assuming it was installed correctly when your home was built, you’ll discover that it probably is not level front to back and that the wood strips are installed opposite of the way you might think they should be.

Carpenters well over 100 years ago discovered that even though porches like yours were covered, wind-driven rain would saturate the wood in fierce storms. The quicker that water got off the wood, the better. Installing the wood so that it has a fall of 1/8 inch per foot allowed for excellent drainage.

To ensure no water got trapped between the individual pieces of wood decking, the carpenters ran each individual strip of wood perpendicular to the front wall of the house. That way the seams between the pieces of wood acted as natural conduits for the water to drain to the end of the porch at the overhang. Installing the wood parallel with the front wall of the house creates a dam between pieces of wood that traps the water.

The wood that I prefer to use for these porch decks is vertical grain Douglas Fir. It can still be found at many traditional lumberyards. The wood that was installed on many of the old porches, and the ones I built, had a tongue and groove profile.

This unique profile is the same used when milling oak for interior hardwood floors. It allows for blind nailing of the strips of wood and adds significantly to the strength of the wood as each strip interlocks with the one on either side of it. This minimizes or eliminates sag or bounce when you walk on the wood in between the floor joists that support the porch decking. It’s time-tested technology that works.

I tested a composite porch decking that was made to mimic the wood material. It failed miserably. The instructions said to make sure the decking was covered from the sun. That’s pretty impossible to do as the sun can often hit the edges of the decking early and late in the day and as the seasons change with the sun lower in the sky. In my case, even though the decking was installed per the manufacturer’s specifications, it developed huge humps from the heat expansion of the plastic in the composite product.

If you want your new wood material to last for generations, you have to treat it with borate chemicals before it’s installed. Cut the pieces to the exact length you want and then soak each piece of wood in hot water that contains borate powder. Let each piece soak under water in a trough for about two minutes. Stack the wood in a shaded area making sure to put wood spacers between layers so the wood can dry.

Once it’s dried for two weeks, then paint the wood on all edges and surfaces before it’s installed. You can use semi-transparent wood preservatives instead of paint if you want the natural look. The key is to coat all the surfaces of the decking so that water will have a very difficult time entering the wood. If you don’t pretreat the wood before it’s installed, you’ll never be able to coat all the surfaces.

Use double-dipped hot galvanized finish nails to install the wood. These will last for generations, especially if the wood is covered with a roof. If you have to cut a piece of wood that’s been treated or painted, be sure to coat the cut end with the borate solution and then the finish sealant or paint.

If you want to minimize any cupping or warping in the wood, consider installing a vapor barrier on the soil under the porch. This will slow water vapor from pouring into the underside of the wood, even though you’ve treated it.

The wood used on many of the old houses had another huge advantage over wood available today. It came from ancient trees whose growth rings were very small. As such there was often as much dense summer wood in the lumber as there was the lighter spring wood. Lumber today seems to have a much higher percentage of light spring wood than the dense dark summer wood. Spring wood, because of its open cellular structure, is much more susceptible to rot than the dense summer wood.

Comment on Water Pressure Loss by Tim Carter

Sometimes, there is nothing more aggravating than low water pressure. In some instances, it can even be dangerous. Low water pressure problems are so commonplace that the national plumbing codes mandated, several years back, the use of pressure balanced shower valves to minimize injury caused by low water pressure problems.

There is a misconception by many homeowners that low water pressure is something they have to live with. Nothing could be further from the truth! Many low water pressure problems are a result of installation inadequacies. The plumber(s) simply put piping in that was either too small (undersized) or reduced the size of the piping, within a structure, too quickly.

Low water pressure problems can also be attributed to scale deposits inside of piping which reduce their diameter, low pump pressure (houses with wells), leaks in underground lines serving a house, and problems with outdated water mains in municipal systems (rare). These problems can usually be identified very quickly. Municipal water works companies have trained personnel that will visit your house and answer questions regarding your water service. Often it takes very little detective work to determine if one, or several, of these possibilities is the source of your low water pressure. Almost always they will help you determine if there is an underground leak, at no charge to you.

They can also attach a pressure reading device which will tell you just what the water pressure is inside your house when all fixtures are turned off.

You can also stop by your local firehouse. Fire engines are equipped with accurate pressure gauges. When a fire engine attaches to a fire hydrant, before they start pumping water from the hydrant they know what the water pressure is in that water main.

By the way, in case you didn't realize it, the fire hydrants on your street are hooked to the same water main you drink from. The only deviation from this is in some large cities. There are individual water mains specifically for fire fighting, but these are almost always located in dense urban/business environments.

The fire departments often have very specific records and they can tell you the specific pressure of the fire hydrant closest to your house. Stop by and chat with them, you may be surprised at what they can tell you about the water mains in your area!

Robert Boyle

Robert Boyle was an English chemist born in 1627. He was a pretty smart guy. Well educated and very methodical, he started experimenting with gases. He developed Boyle's Law which has to do with the relationship between a given volume of gas and its pressure.

He determined that liquids acted somewhat differently. It didn't take too long for him to determine that water couldn't be easily compressed. In fact, it was virtually impossible.

What he found out was that when you applied pressure to water (liquids) in a closed system (no leaks), whatever pressure you applied, the same pressure was exerted everywhere by the liquid against the container it was in.

This is a very significant finding. It tells you that when all of your faucets are closed in your house, the pressure within your plumbing system should be equal everywhere. Not only that, if you happened to visit your local fire department and/or call the water works, you will know what that pressure should be. The only deviation will be the resultant pressure drop due to friction loss as the water travels from the street into your house.

Those people who operate using well water and electric pressure pumps operate under the same "laws". The only difference is pump capacity. Smaller pumps simply cannot meet the demand (flow) you might impose upon them. They may be able to produce an adequate pressure (50 - 70 pounds per square inch PSI), but when asked to deliver lots of water at this pressure, they choke. You may have to jump to a bigger pump.

This is rarely the problem with a municipal system. The typical water main in a residential street can deliver hundreds of gallons per minute and maintain pressure. To put this in perspective with respect to your own water usage, you might use seven gallons per minute if you had four people using two separate bathrooms at the same time. This situation is somewhat realistic as people get up to go to work and school.

Friction Loss

OK, so we know that the pressure in a closed system is constant because of Bob Boyle's findings. What then accounts for water pressure / volume losses?

Well, a number of things can contribute to water pressure loss. Some of the major items are relative elevation differences between your house (fixtures) and the water main, size of water piping and restrictions in a pipe. The two most likely culprits in most cases are the last two, water pipe size and restrictions. These two items have a huge impact on friction loss. Friction loss can dramatically affect water pressure. What happens is simple. When water starts to flow through a pipe, some of it rubs against the side of the pipe. Depending upon how much water is rubbing against the inside walls of the pipe in relation to how much water is in the pipe in any given length, determines how great the pressure loss will be.

The technical term for this situation is called the hydraulic radius. But who cares about that, let me show you a simple example.

Bigger is Better

Let's look at a cross section of a 1/2 inch inner diameter copper pipe. Remember that grade school math homework you didn't do??? Well, it's payback time!

The inner circumference of the 1/2 inch pipe is 1.57 inches. The area of the cross section of this same pipe is 0.19 inches.

Let's look at a 3/4 inch pipe. It's inner circumference is 2.35 inches. It's cross sectional area is 0.44 inches.

Now, these numbers may seem either confusing or insignificant. But, look a little closer. Notice that when we jumped to 3/4 inch pipe, a funny thing happened. The circumference increased by 49.6 percent. But, the cross sectional area increased by 131.5 percent!

This means that as a pipe gets bigger, there is more room to move around. Not as much of the fluid in the pipe has the opportunity to rub against the sides of the pipe.

Restrictions inside pipes can also cause friction loss. Imagine a rough scalely pipe. The water trying to get from one end to the other hits and rubs against lots of "things". It loses energy. What's more, the deposits inside the pipe reduce its inner diameter. As shown above, small inner diameter pipe causes great pressure loss because of friction loss.

So, with respect to pipe size and pressure, bigger is better!

Comment on Hygrometers Controlling Indoor Humidity by Tim Carter

Condensation New Construction text: Tim Carter

Condensation - Controlling Indoor Humidity
Several years ago, a friend of mine called me. She was frantic. It was bitterly cold outside. She opened an interior closet door to find one of the walls covered with frost! She thought something was seriously wrong and wanted my advice.
I went to her house and sure enough, the closet was frosty. I went into the attic and located the problem. Someone had cut a hole in the top wall plate of the closet wall. In addition, there was a gap in the insulation which allowed the cold, dense attic air to fall into the wall void. This cold air chilled the wall surface to such a degree that it was below 32 degrees F! The warm, moist inside air readily condensed on this cold surface. It didn't take long for it to then freeze.
Think Soda or Beer....
Condensation happens in warm weather all of the time. Unless you live in the desert or some other very dry location, surely you have seen the outside of a can of soda pop or beer get wet from condensation. The warm, moist outside air readily turns to liquid as it is cooled by the metal surface of the can. The temperature of the cold can is at or below the dew point of the humid air and condensation immediately begins to collect.
The easy way to stop this problem is to stop drinking beer....
Hidden Problems
If you have a condensation problem in your older home, it might not cause too much concern. Why? Old homes were naturally leaky. Many old house had no insulation or lack building materials which readily trapped moisture. As such, humid air could readily mix with colder air outside and dissipate.
However, modern building practices have created tighter and tighter houses. Foil faced sheathing products completely stop moisture transmission. Tight houses tend to have very high levels of indoor humidity as cold, dry air is not allowed to mix. The mixing of cold, dry air with indoor humid air lowers the overall humidity of indoor air. This is another reason you probably did not have a condensation problem in the house you lived in as a child.
Measuring Humidity Levels
Humidity is a relative thing. That is why your TV weather person says "..the relative humidity is now....." As you heat a constant volume of air it can hold more moisture. Eventually it becomes saturated. This is when the relative humidity of that volume at that temperature reaches 100 percent.
Dew point temperatures are also indicators of humidity. The dew point is the temperature when water will condense out of the air for a given humidity. This is why humidity is relative. Confused? It can be tough to understand, so don't worry.
Humidity is measured using devices called hygrometers or sling psychrometers. These devices are calibrated in such a fashion that they can tell you the relative humidity of air within a given temperature range.
The hygrometers can be electronic or ones with a standard dial face with a moving needle. The sling psychrometers are weird devices that incorporate two thermometers. One thermometer is dry while the other one has a wick attached to the bulb end. You get the wick wet and spin the two thermometers around in the air. Depending upon how humid the air is or is not, the water in the wick will evaporate at different rates. The faster the rate of evaporation (drier, less humid air) the lower the wick covered thermometer will read. Remember, evaporation is a cooling process (Why do you think Mother Nature created us so we sweat....?).
Using a chart, you correlate the temperatures of the dry and wet thermometers to determine relative humidity. They are pretty cool devices!
Checking Your House
If you have an indoor humidity or condensation problem, I recommend that you purchase an inexpensive hygrometer. Take readings in the same room(s) at the same spot each day at the same time. Start to chart your readings. Then begin to isolate sources of indoor humidity. Try to control them. See how it affects your readings each day. It may take several days to see a drop in humidity readings.
Take readings at different points within your house. Try to avoid the bathroom and kitchen. You can get widely spaced readings because of ever-present moisture sources.

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Hygrometers - Manufacturers / Features
There are many manufacturers of hygrometers - instruments which measure relative humidity. I have listed just a few here. You can usually find these instruments advertised in the back of Popular Science or Earth magazines. These magazines always seem to have an abundance of ads about companies who sell weather related equipment. Your grade school or high school science teacher will also have science equipment catalogues you can browse through. Want REALLY sophisticated equipment? Call your local TV station's staff meteorologist - they absolutely know who makes top flight hygrometers.

• NovaLynx Corporation ... 800-321-3577
  Humidity Dial Model # 220-730 - Features a brass case and sufficient openings to allow good air flow over the inner humidity element. Certified to +/- 3 percent accuracy. $120.00
• Radio Shack ... 800-THE SHACK
  Wireless Weather Forecaster Model #63-1090 - Handy electronic gizmo that forecasts using temperature, barometric pressure and humidity. Shows date and Atomic time. Requires 2 AAA batteries for sensor; 3 AA for meter. $39.99 Indoor / Outdoor Thermometer with Hygrometer Model #63-1032 - Displays interior temperature, exterior temperature and relative humidity and humidity comfort readings. Electronic. Requires 2 AA batteries. $19.99
  
• Robert E. White Instruments 800-992-3045
  Call for current pricing!
  Model BA777 Compact and accurate. 2 1/2 inch diameter Wall mount $45.00
  Model BA410 4 inch dial, graduated every 1 percent. Accurate to +/- 4 percent, $66.00
  Model CONH6 Outdoor dial hygrometer, 4 1/2 inch diameter, swivel mounting bracket. $39.00
  Model 730 Most accurate (+3 percent), 6 inch diameter, brass case. Wall mount $120.00

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Tips on Controlling Indoor Humidity / Window Condensation
People who live in colder climates can become victims of condensation. Water can collect on both visible and hidden surfaces. My eyeglasses always fog up when I enter my favorite chili parlor on a cold winter night. The thin glasses get cold walking from the car to the restaurant. When I hit that humid environment, BINGO! my glasses steam up.
If you see visible condensation on windows, walls, etc., it is a sure sign that your indoor humidity might be too high. Water can collect in wall cavities and attic spaces if you do not take aggressive action to lower the humidity and/or ventilate the hidden spaces.
Identify the Source of Humidity
All types of things add humidity to indoor air. Aquariums, cooking, washing clothes, bathing activities, house plants, human and animal breathing, slabs, crawl spaces, basement floors & walls lacking vapor barriers, etc.
It can be tough to identify any single source of excess humidity. All the above activities or conditions can collectively add to the problem. What's worse is that as the outside temperature drops, it takes less humidity in the indoor air to cause a problem! That is why indoor humidifiers are supplied with controls that tell you what the setting should be in relation to the outdoor temperature.
Controlling Indoor Humidity
Bathing activities (hot showers and baths) probably cause more indoor humidity problems aside from humidifiers that are set too high. Try to see if you can't take shorter showers and/or ones that use less hot water.
Install and use an excellent bathroom exhaust fan. Turn it on during your shower or bath. Leave it on after your bath for 10 minutes or so. Be sure the exhaust air is piped to the outside of your house. DO NOT dump this air into an attic space. It will rain in your attic!
Do you have a crawl space? Does it lack a high quality vapor barrier? If so, the soil in the crawl space is liberating vast quantities of water vapor into your house. Cover the soil with a vapor barrier and you will drastically lower your indoor humidity. I have written a past column and bulletin on this very topic.
Older homes that have basements are just as bad as houses with crawl spaces. However, it is tough to solve this problem. I am currently doing research on water based sealers that can be sprayed on indoor masonry surfaces which will stop moisture transmission. Stay tuned for that upcoming column!
Cooking liberates lots of water. Boiling water for noodles, vegetables, etc. puts lots of moisture in the air. Try to minimize these activities or install a ducted kitchen exhaust fan.
Window Condensation
I get mail every winter from people who install new windows. They think the windows are bad because water condenses on them. Well, the source of the problem usually lies in the fact that the windows are doing too good of a job! The old windows leaked vast amounts of cold air into the house. This very dry air mixed with the indoor humid air and lowered the overall humidity in the house. The new windows stop the dry air resulting in a higher indoor humidity! This humidity then fogs the cooler glass surface.
To minimize new windows from fogging or condensation, be sure to order ones with soft coat Low-E glass. This type of coating produces a warmer interior glass surface. The warmer the glass surface, the less chance of condensation. Read my past column and Builder Bulletin on Low-E glass.
Look for windows that offer warm edge technology. This refers to special spacers that are used to separate the pieces of insulated glass in your new windows. The spacer strips are made so that the cold outer pane of glass conducts a minimum amount of cold to the inner pane of glass. Ask tough questions to get the right answers when you window shop!