Home Improvement

lurkingdirk

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I just saw this posted somewhere, and I had to share it with you all. What in the actual fuck?!

di-why-5.jpg
 
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Siliconemelons

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Firewall, townhome/villa separation, sound proofing/acoustic room, etc.

Edit: I have also seen this as structural, although usually there is a sign that says so. First time I came across one, I was like “this sign says structural drywall do not cut…that is a thing?” Firewalls usually have signs and duration also, but not always in residential.
 
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Brahma

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Not really home improvement, but a question. Figured you country boyz can help a city slicker out.

I have a hawk and best I can tell a baby in my tree. I can not express how happy I am that this thing came around. EVERY single squirrel, chipmunk, wombat, bat, beaver whatever!...is gone. (My pansies and azaleas thank him daily).

There are ZERO birds that even tweet. I see a humming bird every other day, and that's about it. Birds being gone suck, but fuck them squirrels.

Question. Do hawks take over other birds nests, or squirrel nests? Where this thing lives I KNOW was a squirrel nest already. Is there anything I can do to make sure this thing stays?
 
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Burren

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Not really home improvement, but a question. Figured you country boyz can help a city slicker out.

I have a hawk and best I can tell a baby in my tree. I can not express how happy I am that this thing came around. EVERY single squirrel, chipmunk, wombat, bat, beaver whatever!...is gone. (My pansies and azaleas thank him daily).

There are ZERO birds that even tweet. I see a humming bird every other day, and that's about it. Birds being gone suck, but fuck them squirrels.

Question. Do hawks take over other birds nests, or squirrel nests? Where this thing lives I KNOW was a squirrel nest already. Is there anything I can do to make sure this thing stays?
It will follow the food source. I’m sure your neighborhood is large enough that it will stay fed for a while.
Is it a recent arrival? I suspect other birds will come back in time.
 

Brahma

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It will follow the food source. I’m sure your neighborhood is large enough that it will stay fed for a while.
Is it a recent arrival? I suspect other birds will come back in time.

It's been around for like a month now. Took me that long to notice all the other critters were gone. Nights are eerily quiet. The occasional cicada and crickets is about it.
 

fred sanford

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Thought I'd come and share this insanity with you guys. I need to replace the alcove bathtub in my daughter's bathroom. Me and a friend could do it but I have some extra cash to throw around so I thought I'd hire someone to do it quickly so I wouldn't have to worry about it. This would be to replace an alcove tub (three walls) and redo the tile on the walls. I had three bathroom companies come over and do a quote.

Company 1: Shows me an industry report about how much bathroom remodels cost. The fine print at the top says it's for a full bathroom but he claims it's just for the tub/walls. They won't do any tile work on the wall, just acrylic wall panels. Cost to replace tub and put in the wall panels, $18,000 but will give me a sale price of $14,000.
Company 2: Same as the first company, no tile, just acrylic wall panels. Cost $19,000 but will do it on sale for $14,000.
Company 3: Same as the first company, no tile, just acrylic wall panels. Cost $12,000 but will do it for $10,000 if I pay cash.

W T F

I'll do it myself. I can buy all of the materials and pay my friend for around $3,500 or less
 
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Maximis Velocity

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Thought I'd come and share this insanity with you guys. I need to replace the alcove bathtub in my daughter's bathroom. Me and a friend could do it but I have some extra cash to throw around so I thought I'd hire someone to do it quickly so I wouldn't have to worry about it. This would be to replace an alcove tub (three walls) and redo the tile on the walls. I had three bathroom companies come over and do a quote.

Company 1: Shows me an industry report about how much bathroom remodels cost. The fine print at the top says it's for a full bathroom but he claims it's just for the tub/walls. They won't do any tile work on the wall, just acrylic wall panels. Cost to replace tub and put in the wall panels, $18,000 but will give me a sale price of $14,000.
Company 2: Same as the first company, no tile, just acrylic wall panels. Cost $19,000 but will do it on sale for $14,000.
Company 3: Same as the first company, no tile, just acrylic wall panels. Cost $12,000 but will do it for $10,000 if I pay cash.

W T F

I'll do it myself. I can buy all of the materials and pay my friend for around $3,500 or less
This is exactly how my last home remodel went. It started with a cracked one piece shower floor and ended up gutting 2 bathrooms and redoing the kitchen cabinets and replacing the carpet with hardwood in the whole house myself for under the 15k they wanted to charge me for just the bathtub/shower combo replacement.
 
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Janx

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Not really home improvement, but a question. Figured you country boyz can help a city slicker out.

I have a hawk and best I can tell a baby in my tree. I can not express how happy I am that this thing came around. EVERY single squirrel, chipmunk, wombat, bat, beaver whatever!...is gone. (My pansies and azaleas thank him daily).

There are ZERO birds that even tweet. I see a humming bird every other day, and that's about it. Birds being gone suck, but fuck them squirrels.

Question. Do hawks take over other birds nests, or squirrel nests? Where this thing lives I KNOW was a squirrel nest already. Is there anything I can do to make sure this thing stays?
Invest in kittens and let them out.
 

Captain Suave

Caesar si viveret, ad remum dareris.
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Thought I'd come and share this insanity with you guys. I need to replace the alcove bathtub in my daughter's bathroom. Me and a friend could do it but I have some extra cash to throw around so I thought I'd hire someone to do it quickly so I wouldn't have to worry about it. This would be to replace an alcove tub (three walls) and redo the tile on the walls. I had three bathroom companies come over and do a quote.

Company 1: Shows me an industry report about how much bathroom remodels cost. The fine print at the top says it's for a full bathroom but he claims it's just for the tub/walls. They won't do any tile work on the wall, just acrylic wall panels. Cost to replace tub and put in the wall panels, $18,000 but will give me a sale price of $14,000.
Company 2: Same as the first company, no tile, just acrylic wall panels. Cost $19,000 but will do it on sale for $14,000.
Company 3: Same as the first company, no tile, just acrylic wall panels. Cost $12,000 but will do it for $10,000 if I pay cash.

W T F

I'll do it myself. I can buy all of the materials and pay my friend for around $3,500 or less

This kind of bullshit is why I either do the job myself or go through a handyman who is an old friend. Commercial plumbers wanted 12k just for the rough-in on my bathroom when it was already demoed to studs.
 

lurker

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Thought I'd come and share this insanity with you guys. I need to replace the alcove bathtub in my daughter's bathroom. Me and a friend could do it but I have some extra cash to throw around so I thought I'd hire someone to do it quickly so I wouldn't have to worry about it. This would be to replace an alcove tub (three walls) and redo the tile on the walls. I had three bathroom companies come over and do a quote.

Company 1: Shows me an industry report about how much bathroom remodels cost. The fine print at the top says it's for a full bathroom but he claims it's just for the tub/walls. They won't do any tile work on the wall, just acrylic wall panels. Cost to replace tub and put in the wall panels, $18,000 but will give me a sale price of $14,000.
Company 2: Same as the first company, no tile, just acrylic wall panels. Cost $19,000 but will do it on sale for $14,000.
Company 3: Same as the first company, no tile, just acrylic wall panels. Cost $12,000 but will do it for $10,000 if I pay cash.

W T F

I'll do it myself. I can buy all of the materials and pay my friend for around $3,500 or less
Yup.

Remodeled one bathroom and then the kitchen. I’m getting up there in years so I thought I’d let someone else do the master bathroom. Get a quote for $17k for just the shower. Panels, not tile. No tub, no vanity, no floors, no new fixtures, no paint; just the shower.

So now I’m going to do it myself. I’m gathering parts and I’m into it for about $3k so far but I don’t think I’ll top $6k when I finish.
 
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BrutulTM

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Auto mechanics are getting to get the same way. I am trying to keep an old Subaru going (2010 Forester) and it needs struts, brakes, and front wheel bearings. I got quoted $2500 for the struts, $1400 of that was parts and I can buy name brand struts online for under $500. $500 for each side on the wheel bearings. $400 for parts and again I can get name brand (not genuine Subaru but not random Chinese stuff either) for like $150. I asked them if I bought the parts if they would install them for their shop rate but of course they wouldn't They said it was because they'd had too many people bring them the wrong parts but we all know it's because they want to order the parts themselves and then mark them up by at least 100%. I didn't even price the brake job but I'm sure they would have nailed me for those parts as well as $120 an hour for the labor.

I don't love working on cars, and it will definitely take me longer than it would a pro, but this stuff is all super basic and doesn't require any special tools and I think I can do it all on a Sunday and it will save me like $2500.
 
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Daidraco

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Auto mechanics are getting to get the same way. I am trying to keep an old Subaru going (2010 Forester) and it needs struts, brakes, and front wheel bearings. I got quoted $2500 for the struts, $1400 of that was parts and I can buy name brand struts online for under $500. $500 for each side on the wheel bearings. $400 for parts and again I can get name brand (not genuine Subaru but not random Chinese stuff either) for like $150. I asked them if I bought the parts if they would install them for their shop rate but of course they wouldn't They said it was because they'd had too many people bring them the wrong parts but we all know it's because they want to order the parts themselves and then mark them up by at least 100%. I didn't even price the brake job but I'm sure they would have nailed me for those parts as well as $120 an hour for the labor.

I don't love working on cars, and it will definitely take me longer than it would a pro, but this stuff is all super basic and doesn't require any special tools and I think I can do it all on a Sunday and it will save me like $2500.
Auto Shops have been like that for a while. $120 labor isnt really all that bad comparatively. I had a small dealership in the late 2010's and my service department pulled enough business from my own rehab of cars to sale, the cars I sold, after market service contract work, etc. that we got the full discounts from Advance, Auto Zone, O'Reily's, Napa, etc. But we didnt pass that along to the customer and were anywhere from 115% markup from some sources, to 135% at other sources. Hell, even back then - my labor rate was $150 at my own shop. The radio in my new truck has some kind of issue, and when I was at Chevrolet Thursday, I saw their posted rate at $225. If I take my Harley into the shop, their labor rate is $115 - but thats for bikes.. Just pointing out all of this to show that they sound kind of cheap, honestly.

But by all means, shop around. I hated Subaru's, personally. Because when something needs to be done to them, it was always a pain in the ass. Not always necessarily about price, but sometimes just in how difficult/labor intensive some are to fucking work with. But those older Subaru's like that will run for fucking ever, even when they are beat to piss.
 
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BrutulTM

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Yeah I don't really mind the $120 an hour, but the parts being so expensive chaps my ass. It doesn't make any sense to me why the shop's income should vary based on what the parts cost. Why not just make the shop rate what you need to run the business and give people the parts at cost? Even if it was the same price, it seems more honest. It's an incentive to use the most expensive parts possible as well. I don't doubt that OEM parts are better than Chinesium from Rock Auto, but why put a starter that will last 200k miles on a car that has 150k on it already?
 

Goatface

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$500 for each side on the wheel bearings.

did wheel hub bearings on my parent's impala. the passenger side maybe took 30 mins and bunch of that was just trying to get the wire connector to stay in the bracket. the drivers side was a complete nightmare. beat on it, heated it, used my slide hammer, rented a bigger slide hammer and shit didn't move. on day 2, said fuck it and got out the grinder and cut it down enough to be able to pull it through the knuckle and take it and the cv axle out together.
 

lurker

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And yet we have folks in the “what car do you drive” thread saying $300-$500 for an oil change is OK by them.
 
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BrutulTM

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And yet we have folks in the “what car do you drive” thread saying $300-$500 for an oil change is OK by them.
People will pay a lot to feel special. That's kind of what "luxury" anything is about. Does it really make any difference in your life whether the interior of the car you drive to work is plastic or hand polished walnut? Does it change anything about your life to smoke a cigar that was smuggled in from Cuba? Or to wear shoes that were hand stitched in Italy? Of course not, but people will pay tons of money for things like that because it makes them feel like they are better than other people and that people are impressed with them (even though most of us are just rolling our eyes). Getting a $500 oil change at the Mercedes dealership is just another way of getting that feeling. They want to feel like they are above those of us sitting in a dirty chair reading a year old issue of Motor Trend at the Jiffy Lube or crawling under our own car in the driveway.
 
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