Home Improvement
- Thread starter Picasso3
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I did that to freak out a helper on a wire I knew was dead (wasn't made up on the other side).
My old boss (not making this up) used to put his thumb in the light bulb screw shell instead of walking around with a light bulb to make sure the lights worked 'because it was faster'. That is until he got into it just right and it knocked the total hell out of him.
Definitely different times.
Goatface
Naxxramas 1.0 Raider
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never tried it and might not work around outside wall
Thermal Imaging Leak Detection London - Water Damage
Thermal Imaging Leak Detection London - Water Damage thermal imaging technicians specialise in leak detection in London and surrounding areas.
waterdamage.london
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Okay folks. What is this? It's in the basement of a 1950s home. It could be a valve for heating oil that's under the foundation. That's my initial thought. It does turn, nothing seems to happen. I haven't seen it in person yet, but the first thing I'll do is open the hole at the bottom and sniff to see if there is fuel down there. I think if there is we can just close the hole, remove the valve control rod, and cover it with hydraulic cement.
Other thoughts?
Other thoughts?
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Room/floor looks renovated ( or extremely well kept for being that old) weird that if they renovated they didn't remove wtf ever that is. Let us know when you figure it out I've never seen anything like that in my life.
ToeMissile
Pronouns: zie/zhem/zer
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Seems like the kind of thing that would add awesome character to the space if you could incorporate it into something decorative/functional beyond whatever the original purpose was.
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moonarchia
The Scientific Shitlord
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Goatface
Naxxramas 1.0 Raider
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it could be a sewage back-flow valve.
edit
can not find any pictures of one from that era, but this is grok describing one.
edit
can not find any pictures of one from that era, but this is grok describing one.
| Feature | Description |
|---|---|
| Material | Heavy cast iron (often gray iron), sometimes with a bituminous (black tar-like) coating for corrosion resistance. |
| Size | Usually 4" to 8" diameter (common for residential or small commercial laterals). |
| Shape | - Gate valve: Rectangular body with a round handwheel on top. - Plug valve: Cylindrical body with a lever handle or square wrench nut. - Flap/check valve: Inline cylindrical housing with a hinged flap inside, external cleanout cap or access plate. |
| Handwheel/Lever | - Cast iron handwheel (8–12 spokes, ~10–14" diameter) with a square nut in the center for a wrench. - Or a long T-handle lever (for plug valves). |
| Markings | Embossed foundry marks like: "MUELLER CO. DECATUR ILL.", "CRANE CO.", "LUDLOW", or "AMERICAN DARLING" + year (e.g., "1954"). |
| Bolts | Hex-head bolts (often rusted), sometimes with lead-wiped joints where the valve connects to clay or cast-iron pipe. |
| Finish | Rough, unpainted cast iron or black asphaltum dip; surface often pitted from decades in damp soil. |
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Kharzette
Watcher of Overs
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I live in a shitty rent house, so maybe this isn't the right thread, but here goes anyway.
I tend to stay up most of the night and a couple weeks ago I started hearing alot of scratchy diggy noises outside. I ignored it for a day hoping it would go away, but of course it didn't.
I snuck out there with a little 22 rifle a few times over the next few nights but I could never catch whatever it was, and looking in the daytime, there was a definite hole growing and some of the blocks pushed aside so something could get under the house.
I had an idea to use one of my old oculus rift sensors to catch it on camera and ran a usb line out there but it was too dark to see anything.
I asked my dad about it and he gave me a big ass cage they used to catch an evil cat that had been beating up their cat and eating its food etc. So I put that out there. The first night it ignored it and pushed it out of the way. The next night the bait was gone, the door was closed and the trap was empty.
That same night I thought I heard something so I went out (armed with a better tool for the job my dad lent me, a suppressed 22) and I almost walked right into a giant skunk. I was nowhere near the hole, just sort of on the way to it walking around the house.
I had a decent shot at it, but hesitated and it got away. In my mind I'm thinking "Do I really want to deal with a dead skunk?". And also thinking / hoping maybe this wasn't the creature doing the digging.
A night or two later, I was hearing the usual diggy noises and realized that the sun had partially come up. This was unusual, as the creature usually stopped well before daylight.
I sneakily snuck around the house and I could see that same giant skunk down in the hole it had dug. It was still a bit dim so I couldn't really tell why it didn't just run off, but it seemed frozen staring at me.
I took the shot and nailed it right through the head. I had heard before that if you headshot them they don't spray. This proved to be false.
I observed it for a bit and it never moved. It was obviously quite dead but I gave it 20 min or so to let the light get a bit more and to put on some decent clothes (I was out there in my pajamas).
When I came back out I discovered that my stealth roll was no better than normal. It hadn't run off or vanished because it was stuck. That fatass thing was wedged in there super super tightly. I had to get one of those ratchety winch things (in okieland they are known as a come-along) to get it out.
When it finally came loose I bagged it and hauled it out to some of my dad's land and dumped it. The curse remained behind though, the stink. Alot of it was a "nest" it was making (and the reason it got stuck). It had pulled 100ish feet of old coaxial cable off the outer walls and wadded it up under there and partially buried it with alot of weeds and stuff mixed in.
I managed to pull all that out and it smelled like hell, so I thought maybe that was the worst of it.
We thought it wasn't going to be too bad after, but we were misled by the wind. The hole was on the north side of the house. As soon as the wind shifted out of the north it nuked the house with stink. By this time I had already sealed the hole with that expanding foam stuff.
Luckily it has been really nice days here, mid 80's so we've opened all the doors and such to help it air out. Anyway, that's my story. I stink.
I tend to stay up most of the night and a couple weeks ago I started hearing alot of scratchy diggy noises outside. I ignored it for a day hoping it would go away, but of course it didn't.
I snuck out there with a little 22 rifle a few times over the next few nights but I could never catch whatever it was, and looking in the daytime, there was a definite hole growing and some of the blocks pushed aside so something could get under the house.
I had an idea to use one of my old oculus rift sensors to catch it on camera and ran a usb line out there but it was too dark to see anything.
I asked my dad about it and he gave me a big ass cage they used to catch an evil cat that had been beating up their cat and eating its food etc. So I put that out there. The first night it ignored it and pushed it out of the way. The next night the bait was gone, the door was closed and the trap was empty.
That same night I thought I heard something so I went out (armed with a better tool for the job my dad lent me, a suppressed 22) and I almost walked right into a giant skunk. I was nowhere near the hole, just sort of on the way to it walking around the house.
I had a decent shot at it, but hesitated and it got away. In my mind I'm thinking "Do I really want to deal with a dead skunk?". And also thinking / hoping maybe this wasn't the creature doing the digging.
A night or two later, I was hearing the usual diggy noises and realized that the sun had partially come up. This was unusual, as the creature usually stopped well before daylight.
I sneakily snuck around the house and I could see that same giant skunk down in the hole it had dug. It was still a bit dim so I couldn't really tell why it didn't just run off, but it seemed frozen staring at me.
I took the shot and nailed it right through the head. I had heard before that if you headshot them they don't spray. This proved to be false.
I observed it for a bit and it never moved. It was obviously quite dead but I gave it 20 min or so to let the light get a bit more and to put on some decent clothes (I was out there in my pajamas).
When I came back out I discovered that my stealth roll was no better than normal. It hadn't run off or vanished because it was stuck. That fatass thing was wedged in there super super tightly. I had to get one of those ratchety winch things (in okieland they are known as a come-along) to get it out.
When it finally came loose I bagged it and hauled it out to some of my dad's land and dumped it. The curse remained behind though, the stink. Alot of it was a "nest" it was making (and the reason it got stuck). It had pulled 100ish feet of old coaxial cable off the outer walls and wadded it up under there and partially buried it with alot of weeds and stuff mixed in.
I managed to pull all that out and it smelled like hell, so I thought maybe that was the worst of it.
We thought it wasn't going to be too bad after, but we were misled by the wind. The hole was on the north side of the house. As soon as the wind shifted out of the north it nuked the house with stink. By this time I had already sealed the hole with that expanding foam stuff.
Luckily it has been really nice days here, mid 80's so we've opened all the doors and such to help it air out. Anyway, that's my story. I stink.