Home DIY

You're allowed one single or double socket on a spur, total unfused spurs on the circuit should not exceed the number of normal sockets on the main circuit. You are allowed an unlimited amount of fused spurs.

It does say "a non-fused spur should feed only one single or one twin or multiple socket outlet or one item of permanently connected equipment" So you could bang on an outlet with more than 2 sockets provided it's a single unit.

If you need more, just put a fused connection unit on - but obviously you won't be able to draw more than 13a total from the sockets fed by the FCU.

A DIY question from someone not very DIY minded... I need to attach a set of coat hooks to a wall that I can't drill into because there's loads of cables behind it. Any suggestions? Needs to be able to hold dog lead, a towel and a couple of coats I suppose.

A networking guy I had round reckoned shielding really needs to be earthed to do its job properly, probably better than nothing though.

Many Ethernet switches have grounding points and if you use shielded connectors then it all works.

The connectors are shielded, so will replace with likewise and make sure the ground wire is connected properly.

Saw this video so expect something similar... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-bQjrDirT6g&ab_channel=AngieDurbinCreates

Two-sided sticky tape if the things you hang from them aren't too heavy?

Screw the hooks to a board then glue the board to the wall?
It would need to be a board thick enough for the screws to hold, probably more than 15mm, with a large enough area for liquid nail or similar to hold the weight of coats plus the weight of the board itself.
If this
https://www.familyhandyman.com/list/ultimate-construction-adhesive-test
is to be believed, by the time you've got a decent separation between coat hooks it should hold up...

Now the chimney breast in the back is out, I've pulled up the vinyl-on-concrete-on-ply covering the original floorboards in the front. The floor in the front room looks in pretty good shape, but, is about 15mm lower than the back room, with a 140mm band of concrete separating them. This was previously hidden by a ply+concrete+vinyl monstrosity through both parts of the room.

I'm trying to figure out how best to deal with the join. I don't want to pull the lower floor up if I can help it, the higher one is already coming out. Figure my best option would be to take out enough of the concrete to set a plank in there at a slight angle to join the two? I assume planing the joists in the back room, or whittling those boards towards the join is a ridiculous idea...

1 Attachment

As do they go through PCB's too.

If I had to do it to get paid I might try this style. Success relies on any wire you might contact being pushed out of the way. If you have a simple plasterboard wall on wooden stud then you could use a plastic version of these. A complicated plasterboard wall would be one with foil backing on metal studs, the plastic ones don't cope well with that.

https://www.screwfix.com/p/easyfix-self-drill-plasterboard-fixings-metal-32mm-250-pack/7502H?tc=DB3&ds_kid=92700048793290424&ds_rl=1249413&gclid=EAIaIQobChMI-r6SuJO67QIVyrHtCh0EUwLsEAQYASABEgKoOvD_BwE&gclsrc=aw.ds

There are plenty of ways to do what you want to do if you depth stop your drill etc. but that's all more tools and skills than it sounds like you have.

A house I am hoping to buy had a really nice angled transition between the floorboards in the dining room and the new slightly lower tiled kitchen extension floor. No idea how they did it, but it looked good. So good I didn't question why the kitchen floor was slightly lower until right now!

Well, knowing it can be done nicely gives me something to aim for...

Maybe adding another board and a transition moulding would work

Friends don't let friends terminate twisted pair cable into 8P8C plugs. Without lots of practice it is likely to go wrong and end up with a poor connection which somewhere down the line will be intermittent. Decent crimping tools are also quite expensive.

Punch down cables in your walls/floors to sockets which is much easier to do and buy factory terminated patch leads. If you can't screw the box to the wall you can use a surface mount socket as a flying socket, something like https://cpc.farnell.com/pro-signal/psg08000/socket-surface-rj45-cat6-single/dp/CS16167

Noted, thanks. Already ordered a £30 crimping tool so will see how I get on with that.

This is the winner. As someone with few (non bike related) tools and fewer skills, the appeal of just taping the fuckers to the wall is great. I bought some no more nails brand tape that can allegedly support 100kg. I don't think I believe that but I'd be surprised if we ever hang close to 1/4 of that weight from it.

ordered a £30 crimping tool

Get a testing tool as well, and leave enough slack at each end in case you need to have another go or two—you can always stuff extra length somewhere, but you can’t make cut cables longer.

Considered a testing tool, but thought it would be pretty obvious whether it worked or not. I guess it would tell you which connections had failed but I don't see how that helps.

Also considered the length issue. 15m would've done but went for 20 for that exact reason.

I did this in my old place with a ten quid crimping tool and it involved a lot of cursing. I've been dreading doing it in my new place as it's in the cupboard under the stairs and would be as awkward as fuck.

The socket idea seems much simpler, cheers.

Ha. I do see a slight danger of Crumpet potentially tearing it down if the leash were to hang too far down, so that may be worth considering. Tape away. :)

(I'd forgotten that 'no more nails' stuff existed. I've never bought it but remember seeing it.)

If you crimp the cable clamp properly, the copper tape is superfluous. Weird video really, goes into great detail about various bits then just bends the cable clamp with 'finger power'.

Don't forget my favourite: "I Can't Believe It's Not Nails" - a real product that Screwfix used to sell.

I don't think I've seen that before. Also good. Is it just superglue or some special kind of superglue (e.g., for glueing on hooks that need to carry heavy things)?

How we laughed.

You will probably need a testing tool and double the number of connectors you think you'll need based on my own experience.

The problem with the no more nails style glues (or that perennial GripFix) is they fail about 5mm into the plaster wall taking a big chunk of plaster with them. You only need to remove a skirting board stuck on with them to discover that. So the 100kg rating would probably be glued to steel.

Try to get solvent free too, the solvent based stuff is quite unpleasant.