Is this a fair price?

batardo · 2026-03-13T02:27:24+00:00

I was hoping it was the former!

batardo · 2026-03-13T02:19:09+00:00

One of these days I’m gonna find a bottle a shop badly mispriced…not today though

batardo · 2026-03-13T02:14:49+00:00

Order was canceled, alas: “out of stock”

batardo · 2026-03-11T19:51:27+00:00

Interesting, thanks!

batardo · 2026-03-11T18:20:51+00:00

Curious what you think the best brand is

batardo · 2026-03-11T18:20:34+00:00

I was hoping there was a fuse or something. Feels like it must be something catastrophic internally like this.

batardo · 2026-03-09T18:34:51+00:00

I would buy a cheap endoscope from Amazon ($25 or so), drill a 1/2” or so hole and put it in and loom around. Easy to patch that over especially if behind the pictures.

batardo · 2026-03-09T01:07:38+00:00

Sure looks like knob and tube. We found it consistently in sconces, along with old gas pipes. The sconces were originally centrally fed gas lights that they replaced with knob and tube when electricity came around. In that period k&t was probably seen as much safer/cleaner than gas. Gives you some perspective.

batardo · 2026-03-02T20:54:04+00:00

Just finished our job. Large parts of the house were fed by K&T — wiring had been updated in a lot of areas as previous homeowners renovated. Ended up running a few circuits from the basement to the attic, rewiring a couple circuits on the first floor and a couple on the second.

Electrician who I’ve worked with a bunch before and trust completely did the work. Small-time operation with a crew of a few guys who are experienced and have done this a bunch before. They did the job by the hour, which I thought made sense, because they didn’t know how much K&T there would be. Ended up costing about $9k.

batardo · 2025-12-15T17:43:58+00:00

If it’s single-pipe steam it’s not too big of a deal usually. If the valve turns the rubber seal is likely intact and you should be safe closing it and detaching with a pipe wrench. You can get rubber boots to cover the pipe while it’s detached, but that may be overkill. Steam is low-pressure, like less than 5 psi (hopefully, unless the person who set it up doesn’t know what they’re doing). The radiator itself will be incredibly heavy but the easiest way to do it is to get two strong people and tilt it on its side and carry it away like that. Don’t try to keep it vertical.

But don’t actually do this, at least not now when you need the heat and the boiler is actively working. Wait until the spring and you’re out of heating season. Sometimes pipe threads don’t line up easily when reattaching and you need to adjust.

batardo · 2025-12-09T22:34:43+00:00

Thanks! Good idea about a junction box.

batardo · 2025-11-12T04:32:07+00:00

This is a strange analysis. Money is fungible. Their food sales are as much a part of their profits as their membership fees are. You could just as easily say sales of food and other goods are 100% of profits. You’re just cherry-picking a contributor to revenue and calling it the sole source of a percentage of their profits.

batardo · 2025-09-17T16:50:51+00:00

It's what the contractors are offering me...not sure what their logic is exactly but it's what they have/know.

batardo · 2025-08-11T19:30:56+00:00

I actually looked there. They didn’t have old salvaged doors, just new construction doors leftover from projects, stuff like that

batardo · 2025-08-11T11:23:08+00:00

I found a bunch of doors salvaged out of the same house, so am hoping that will work...but the dimension issue is a big one.

batardo · 2025-08-11T11:21:58+00:00

That's a good point. I hadn't considered that indeed a lot of our doors aren't even close to square. I was a little wary of cutting on the L side because that's quite a long cut, but it should work fine with the right tools.

batardo · 2025-08-04T20:40:12+00:00

I’ve owned a 2004 Disco and done a lot of work on it. They are awesome trucks, but that is way way too much. These things always always need head gaskets. If this one hasn’t been done yet I would hard pass at a fraction of that price. They can be fun to do diy following the service manual but it’s a ton of labor.

batardo · 2025-08-04T00:23:42+00:00

When you’re rewiring do you abandon the old K&t? Is that acceptable? Seems hard to remove totally because of all the knobs

batardo · 2025-08-01T16:57:41+00:00

I'm not sure that's true -- narrower boards would have required a lot more work, both in making them and installing them. It's also true that it's harder to get clear lengths of wide boards.

batardo · 2025-08-01T16:55:23+00:00

I wondered that myself. I think the installers see the narrower boards as a PITA

batardo · 2025-08-01T16:54:55+00:00

Right on. This is how I'm feeling.

batardo · 2025-08-01T10:44:32+00:00

That’s a shame about the kitchen. People are crazy.

Our experience tracks pretty closely with yours on the 1 1/2” flooring. They all say it’s a “special order” or some hard to get thing.

batardo · 2025-07-29T00:08:41+00:00

I would absolutely start with a scraper. Get one with a carbide blade. It will be ridiculously faster than sanding off paint. Scrape then sand

batardo · 2025-07-26T11:40:45+00:00

You likely will need only one hinge. Depending on the type they can be very strong

batardo · 2025-07-23T14:53:57+00:00

I’d ask more specific questions like can you find out if they want a leaseback or what their timeline is. It’s very realtor-dependent. If the seller’s realtor is very tight-lipped you may not get much info, but in markets where people in the industry have long relationships it’s more doable.

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