Homeowner Forum / General / January 2004

I have a subpanel mounted a few inches from the main panel connected by a
short conduit.  There is no ground bar in the subpanel and all the
connections are via conduit so I assume the ground is conducted through
them.  My question concerns adding circuits to this subpanel using ...

Recently someone posted about a product featured on This Old House that will
insulate the sash pocket of an old window without getting in the way of its
opening & closing.  I searched TOH site but can't find it.
Can someone provide an URL?

I never liked site-built stick framing for houses.
Building on-site is inefficient. Although a house is a physically large
product, it's still easier to move the product through the manufacturing
process than it is to move the manufacturing process to the site.

We just had a Hearthstone direct vent gas fireplace insert installed
by a local dealer. The first installer hooked everything up but every
time he started the fireplace it was reverse venting. Another
installer came out and fixed the problem by unattaching the chimney

I recently purchased a home that is going to take months to renovate, and I
will be contributing a large number of hours to the effort in addition to
hiring several contractors. I was advised that I should keep track of my
hours for tax purposes, but I have trouble imagining that I ...

My wife works nights and needs a dark room to sleep in during the day. I
tried to black out the window by taping a couple different things to the
inside of the window. First try was black construction paper with scotch
tape but the edges curled probably because of condensation. Next ...

Just thought Id pass this along...
I bought a Rubbermaid shed this fall (4x7 with sliding roof).
I was very impressed with the shed at first, it fit the bill
very nicely. One day we had a pretty decent wind storm here

I am a Brit living in Idaho with my wife & kids. I am generally familiar
with UK building regs but wanted to ask a specific question about US regs
and can't seem to find a straight answer.
Here in Idaho, it is my understanding that in order to put a

I have a nice halogen motion-detector light on the back of my house.  At
least it was nice until the gaskets rotted allowing water vapor to touch the
halogen bulbs, and "poof".
Can one make new gaskets out of some material?  Rubber sheeting?  Something

we are redoing our bathroom and i want to make sure the tub is deep enough
for a bath.  THe one upsairs is a standard size I thinkg, about 13.5 deep.
Wife finds this is too shallow for her, the water level is never high
enough, once the water rises to the level of the safety drain, ...

Anyone have a good technique or advice for removing a texture from a
brick?  Our house is 16 years old and our fireplace wall is a
deep/dark red brick with a wavy texture that sticks out as much as
3/8".  The wall is really dated looking.  I want to preserve the look

During our closing, the seller of our house mentioned that he removed
insulation from the attic.  The home inspector also noted that the
insulation that is up there, has the vapor barrier on the wrong side and
that we should "cut slits" into the barrier.  

I am having a house built by a large home builder and have run into a
concern with the I-beam and support posts in the basement.  There are
four steel I-beams that run the length of the house.  At each point
where the ends of the beams meet, there is a post.  One of the posts

Can anyone give me a rough estimate on what it would cost to gut a 3
family house, install new plumbing and electrical? Each floor is
approximately 850 Square Feet.
Thanks in advance.

We are thinking about building a garage with living quarters.  Any web sites
with info?  pitfalls, etc?  The smaller, the better as regards size of
apartment.