Home DIY

ADT new style alarm box (with blue LEDs) - YouTube

mole grips on blue 'nipple', rotate

these can be silenced by enabling Eng mode = High in the main controller > http://www.tycoemea.com/pdf13/datasht/intruder/psi337a.pdf

Whatever happens the sounder will go off, why not let it drain itself down one Monday morning, stand underneath it with hi vis vest and clip board and tell the pissed off neighbours that it's a statutory 'elf and safety' check - offer to test theirs for £75 a pop!

Thanks RG.

Must spread rep etc.

My house is cold and damp. It's autumn here in New Zealand and down here in the south it's about 10-15 degrees in the day and 2-7 at night. My house is a pretty standard 1950s Kiwi jobbie i.e. a furnished shed by UK standards - semi-detached bungalow, an inch of crumbly rockwool between the ceiling, single glazing, fireplace, and a heat pump (an air conditioner in reverse). It's also rented - I'll be living here for a couple of years but I don't want to put any real money into it.

I only heat the living room, and only in the evenings, but that's okay. I'm more bothered about the humidity... we have water droplets on the bedroom ceiling in the morning! I am concerned that my clothes (especially the very expensive down sleeping bags and alpine jackets) are going to get mouldy...

My thoughts are:

1. Heating. Seal up the living areas - the bedroom is off the living room, so I can put some weatherstrip around the door. I'm also thinking about making DIY double glazing, since the living room and bedroom have fucking massive windows. I have also discovered that open fireplaces are really rubbish at heating the house, so I will get an inflatable chimney damper since there is no point actually burning anything in it.

2. Dehumidifying. This is more complex.
   The obvious solution is to buy a dehumidifier, however a) they are somewhat expensive to run but more importantly, b) they only work well if the air temperature is 20 degrees or so - my house, like most old Kiwi houses, is much colder than that.
   Another solution is to open the doors and windows for 10-15 minutes. But it's pretty rainy and damp here in the autumn so I wonder if it'll actually introduce more moisture.
   I also wonder how to dry clothes. It's often too damp to dry them outside and we don't have a tumble drier. Currently I dry them with a fan heater in the hallway, with a window open, but it's bloody expensive.

What are everyone's thoughts on this?

Been in that situation. Proper ventilation will help prevent damp, so I wouldn't recommend sealing yourself up.

What worked for me? Generating less moisture:

• Open bedroom windows a crack at night.
  
• Window open and kitchen door closed when you cook.
  
• Dry clothes in a room with door closed and dehumidifier running (newer models are much more efficient)
  

1. Dehumidifying. This is more complex.
   The obvious solution is to buy a dehumidifier, however a) they are somewhat expensive to run but more importantly, b) they only work well if the air temperature is 20 degrees or so - my house, like most old Kiwi houses, is much colder than that.
   
   

They are cheap as chips to run. Especially when you factor in how much more efficient your heating becomes. Mine has easily paid for itself. Also, mine will not shut off until well into low single digits.

Yeah we do take all reasonable steps to keep the moisture down. It's extremely windy here so not always possible to crack a window open at night. I've just had a nose around in the attic and there's no insulation up there at all! Which is actually fairly common in NZ and somewhat of a scandal.

I've also noticed that the guttering has broken and the window frame underneath is soaking wet, no doubt contributing.

good to hear about the dehumidifier running costs. I've asked the landlord to install some insulation, fix the gutter and tidy up a few other broken things, and provide us with a dehumidifier. Hopefully he will be receptive...

Pretty sure a landlord wouldn't provide a dehumidifier, good luck though. We got a Suki one from Bunnings, it was about $160 and has survived 2 winters so far, only problem is the fan is noisy, you wouldn't want it beside you, other side of the room is ok. We sometimes use it to dry clothes and put a heater in the room if it's cold. Not ideal but does work.
Dehumidifier says it uses 300 watts, so that's not much.

Treat it as a background heater (that 300W will eventually end up as heat) and arguably gaining around 600J/g from latent heat of condensation at 10 Celsius...

(some dehumidifier discussion middle of p.791 in this thread)

How much do you think I hate painting? Hint: a papercut to the japper is preferable

On the plus side I'm getting some 2m wide shelves cut this weekend to go with these:

The landlord is obliged to keep the property at a liveable standard so we'll go elsewhere if he ignores us (a friend rents out his warm and spacious future retirement home for only $120 more per month but we would both have to drive to work)

Dehumidifier sounds like the way forward. They are reasonably cheap secondhand too.

A couple of mates have some leftover insulation - with a couple of new rolls there'll be enough to do the living room and bedroom. I will mention this to the landlord.

Sometimes I wish I was in my house back in the UK...

Yeah we do take all reasonable steps to keep the moisture down. It's extremely windy here so not always possible to crack a window open at night. I've just had a nose around in the attic and there's no insulation up there at all! Which is actually fairly common in NZ and somewhat of a scandal.

I've also noticed that the guttering has broken and the window frame underneath is soaking wet, no doubt contributing.

good to hear about the dehumidifier running costs. I've asked the landlord to install some insulation, fix the gutter and tidy up a few other broken things, and provide us with a dehumidifier. Hopefully he will be receptive...

NZ housing is something special.
I remember living in a similar sounding style place in National Park, just a box heater to keep it warm- I'm pretty sure ours was actually a shed though. That humid cold is so unbelievable at times.
I miss the mornings there though.

If anyone you live with has a community services card the landlord can get a good discount on having the ceiling and underfloor insulated and the ground covered with pvc through EECA.
Only a complete idiot wouldn't fix that gutter so you're 80% safe there.
The missus recommends layers of newspaper between your blankets for extra insulation in bed, Chch student flats weren't good 20 years ago.

Hinges.
I can't work this out in my head.
I wish to hinge a small removeable cabinet door, and have these nice hinges

The door will be hinged at the bottom, and when closed the hinge will be at 90 degrees. It will open to 180 degrees (or slightly more).
I want the hinge to be (almost) completely concealed when the door is shut, and the inside face of the door to sit in line with the outside face of the frame - in the manner of the panel and plinth on this bath:

Given this diagram showing hinge dimensions

how should I countersink the door and frame, and where should the centre of the pin be in relation to the door and frame?

The landlord is obliged to keep the property at a liveable standard so we'll go elsewhere if he ignores us (a friend rents out his warm and spacious future retirement home for only $120 more per month but we would both have to drive to work)

Dehumidifier sounds like the way forward. They are reasonably cheap secondhand too.

A couple of mates have some leftover insulation - with a couple of new rolls there'll be enough to do the living room and bedroom. I will mention this to the landlord.

Sometimes I wish I was in my house back in the UK...

You have my sympathy - my sister's shed near the Ross Creek Reservoir has wind whistling through it and water dripping down the inside of the windows. They survive by keeping a huge wood-burning stove going in the living room, and the heat pump keeps the rest of the shed above freezing most of the time. Mind you, the landscape goes a long way towards making up for the weather and the poor build-quality of housing.

Hinges.
I can't work this out in my head.
I wish to hinge a small removeable cabinet door, and have these nice hinges

The door will be hinged at the bottom, and when closed the hinge will be at 90 degrees. It will open to 180 degrees (or slightly more).
I want the hinge to be (almost) completely concealed when the door is shut, and the inside face of the door to sit in line with the outside face of the frame - in the manner of the panel and plinth on this bath:

Given this diagram showing hinge dimensions

how should I countersink the door and frame, and where should the centre of the pin be in relation to the door and frame?

wrong hinges, get a set of kitchen door cabinet sprung arch type, with magnet catch at top, or 4 magnet catches and locating dowel pins

Hinges.
I can't work this out in my head.
I wish to hinge a small removeable cabinet door, and have these nice hinges.

The door will be hinged at the bottom, and when closed the hinge will be at 90 degrees. It will open to 180 degrees (or slightly more).
I want the hinge to be (almost) completely concealed when the door is shut, and the inside face of the door to sit in line with the outside face of the frame.

how should I countersink the door and frame, and where should the centre of the pin be in relation to the door and frame?

Not a complete answer, but possibly enough to get your head round the problem...

A: Edge of frame and lower edge of door aligned with hinge axis - gap when closed equal to hinge barrel radius, door opens to horizontal.

B: Door offset upwards - door opens further at the expense of a greater gap at the bottom.

C: Frame aligned with edge of hinge barrel - bottom of closed door at same height as 'top' surface of frame but frame would need to be rebated (recessed) along the hinge line with the sides and top of the frame aligned with the inner surface of the door. (Just realised there is a line missing from 'C' - vertically, 1.5mm from the right hand edge of the hinge barrel)
To meet your requirement that the inner face of the door must align with the outer face of the frame, this rebate would probably need to be 10.5mm - twice the distance from hinge centre to outer face of plate, less the thickness of the plate

In each case, the door is prevented from opening further by the edge of the door being in contact with the frame. Leverage will place great strain on the screws unless some other constraint is in place, e.g.cabinet stays or top of door rests on the floor.

This would be easier if you didn't need to remove the door...

• and ^^ - posted while I was buggering about with Corel Draw.
  

This forum is ace. Thanks MrE.
This would work, right?

Rive Gauche - you're right, those would be ideal, and you can get quick-release types too, but I lack the surface area to mount the long part of the hinge. This is on some boxing-in of pipes, and the plinth I'm mounting the hinge to is vertical - there's a pipe in the way of doing it horizontally.

The boxing in butts up against the bath panel at 90 degrees. The door needs to be removeable to allow the bath panel to be removed (as does the 'lid' which is mounted with magnet catches). At the moment I've used magnet catches at the top and its resting on L shaped brackets at the bottom, but hinges will be better, with some nice push-push concealed catches for the top.

how about a 4 gas strut parallelogram arrangement, complete with goldfinger pussy cat ?!

^^^ Maybe no help but I used two loft latches glued to baton on the back.

This would work, right?

The geometry does, but recessing the hinge into the door reduces the thickness in to which you can drive screws. Much will depend on the various materials and dimensions...

Hit it with a hammer?

The frame is actually vertical, and MDF, so I'll be drilling into the end of the panel and can use nice long screws. (however, I do need to drill new holes in the hinge, closer to the axis)

The magnetic catches are to be replaced by these excellent touch latches from Sugatsune

The door panel is actually an MDF B&Q kitchen drawer front. Good call on the screw length - I don't want to drill through the front of the panel! I may gripfill it as well to give it a bit of extra bond.

I'll take a look at lid stays - I was after one of them but I couldn't think what the bloody things were called.
Something like this would be ideal - I can modify the clasp at the top to make it possible to remove the door.