DIY thread...

[Mommy]

Also the bit you are talking about Moggy is a Shower hose adaptor, male to male.

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/174452177878?chn=ps&norover=1&mkevt=1&mkrid=710-134428-41853-0&mkcid=2&itemid=174452177878&targetid=1279902197899&device=c&mktype=&googleloc=1007449&poi=&campaignid=14727339348&mkgroupid=127909237815&rlsatarget=pla-1279902197899&abcId=9300672&merchantid=101767039&gclid=EAIaIQobChMI8sSwwuv89gIVYxoGAB2MXgc2EAsYBCABEgK0P_D_BwE

[Moggy]

Also the bit you are talking about Moggy is a Shower hose adaptor, male to male.

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/174452177878?chn=ps&norover=1&mkevt=1&mkrid=710-134428-41853-0&mkcid=2&itemid=174452177878&targetid=1279902197899&device=c&mktype=&googleloc=1007449&poi=&campaignid=14727339348&mkgroupid=127909237815&rlsatarget=pla-1279902197899&abcId=9300672&merchantid=101767039&gclid=EAIaIQobChMI8sSwwuv89gIVYxoGAB2MXgc2EAsYBCABEgK0P_D_BwE

Male to male, outlet nipple.... I never knew plumbing was so damn sexy

Cheers Mommy, I have a few places near me that do plumbing supplies, so will either take the tap parts in or take a punt on some male nipples.

[Mommy]

Also the bit you are talking about Moggy is a Shower hose adaptor, male to male.

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/174452177878?chn=ps&norover=1&mkevt=1&mkrid=710-134428-41853-0&mkcid=2&itemid=174452177878&targetid=1279902197899&device=c&mktype=&googleloc=1007449&poi=&campaignid=14727339348&mkgroupid=127909237815&rlsatarget=pla-1279902197899&abcId=9300672&merchantid=101767039&gclid=EAIaIQobChMI8sSwwuv89gIVYxoGAB2MXgc2EAsYBCABEgK0P_D_BwE

Male to male, outlet nipple.... I never knew plumbing was so damn sexy

Cheers Mommy, I have a few places near me that do plumbing supplies, so will either take the tap parts in or take a punt on some male nipples.

No probs, Why do you think that is the problem? You'd be better off taking the plunger out (you can undo it with a spanner as it has shallow flat edges) and greasing it up a little.
Mine is the same, it's a pain it the arse. With the hose on it causes a vacuum and can be tricky to lift but the grease helps.

[Moggy]

No probs, Why do you think that is the problem? You'd be better off taking the plunger out (you can undo it with a spanner as it has shallow flat edges) and greasing it up a little.
Mine is the same, it's a pain it the arse. With the hose on it causes a vacuum and can be tricky to lift but the grease helps.

The plunger lifts up and down easily without the nut at the bottom. When I put the nut back on, it pushes the plunger back up to where it's stuck. It can't be a vacuum as there's a big hole in the bottom of the nut. I figured the previous owner put the wrong part on and couldn't be arsed repairing it.

But I know nothing about this stuff, so a trip to Screwfix or a plumbers merchant is probably my best bet.

[Mommy]

Are you screwing the short side into the tap? I can see the thread is different so you may not be able to. Worth checking.

[Samuel_1]

One of the troubles I have with DIY is having no bloody idea what things are called. So I'm hoping GRcade can help while forgiving me for having to call stuff "thingys".

In our bathroom, the shower is operated from the main bath taps. Except it doesn't work. The diverter lever thingy just doesn't move and the shower therefore doesn't work.

I figured it was just stuck, so sprayed WD-40 on it. No joy.

So I unscrewed the nut (?) that was underneath the tap, with the intention of cleaning/descaling/whatever it. Except I noticed that when the nut is off, the lever thingy then works. It seems the nut thingy is a perfect fit for the tap and a perfect fit for the shower hose. But completely the wrong fit to allow the lever to go up and down.

Apologies if these photos are huge, but they should show what I mean:

The tap and the lever button thingamajig:

The nut thingy that's on the underside of the tap:

And the tap with the nut thingy attached to the shower hose:

All of this is a longwinded way of asking:

1. What's the nut thingy actually called? It's hard to Google them when I don't know what it is! There's billions of nuts on the internet and that's just on pornhub.

2. Can I buy one with the same dimensions (for the threads) but with more space inside that will allow the diverter button/lever thing to go up and down?

3. Am I going about this the wrong way and there's a different solution to the problem?

Cheers

One tip, never use WD40 on taps, it corrodes rubber seals and can make things much worse, use a silicone or dry ptfe spray.

[No:1 Final Fantasy Fan]

Just had secondary glazing installed to soundproof my flat from the main street outside. I had no idea if it was going to truely work and the advertising was that it could cut upto 90% of noise.
But wow this acoustic glass is amazing. I can literally hear nothing from outside when they are closed. Whereas without them even with my normal double glazing windows closed I can hear tonnes of noise from outside like people shouting, cars, music from the nearby market stalls on the weekend etc all mixed together creating some awful ambient noise.
The difference is day and night. I highly recommend them to anyone who lives facing a noisy street.
It was a gamble but it paid off at 1400pounds to cover two big windows.

My next project is an independent ceiling in my room. I'm gonna lose 6.5inches of ceiling height but I am confident it will work. Getting a 11m2 room done for just under £1600 next month.

[Sandy]

One of the troubles I have with DIY is having no bloody idea what things are called. So I'm hoping GRcade can help while forgiving me for having to call stuff "thingys".

In our bathroom, the shower is operated from the main bath taps. Except it doesn't work. The diverter lever thingy just doesn't move and the shower therefore doesn't work.

I figured it was just stuck, so sprayed WD-40 on it. No joy.

So I unscrewed the nut (?) that was underneath the tap, with the intention of cleaning/descaling/whatever it. Except I noticed that when the nut is off, the lever thingy then works. It seems the nut thingy is a perfect fit for the tap and a perfect fit for the shower hose. But completely the wrong fit to allow the lever to go up and down.

Apologies if these photos are huge, but they should show what I mean:

The tap and the lever button thingamajig:

The nut thingy that's on the underside of the tap:

And the tap with the nut thingy attached to the shower hose:

All of this is a longwinded way of asking:

1. What's the nut thingy actually called? It's hard to Google them when I don't know what it is! There's billions of nuts on the internet and that's just on pornhub.

2. Can I buy one with the same dimensions (for the threads) but with more space inside that will allow the diverter button/lever thing to go up and down?

3. Am I going about this the wrong way and there's a different solution to the problem?

Cheers

The pull up push down part is called a Shower Diverter Valve and for this kind of setup is some kind of tee valve.

The part on the underside is a shower hose adaptor but it looks like it's just to change the fitting from a female fitting to a male one, there's no size change.

At a guess the old shower hose was a male part and it failed so someone went out and bought a new hose but it was female so then they used an adaptor to make it work. Maybe the lever is now fouling against the new adaptor that's been used? But this should be a pull up lever, so I'm not convinced that's the reason.

Has it ever worked / has someone taken this apart recently? There's a possibility they put he adaptor back in the wrong way up and that's what's stopping it from working. It's hard to tell without being there.

If by complete chance you live within a cycling distance of Reigate I will come and check it out for you.

[Moggy]

One of the troubles I have with DIY is having no bloody idea what things are called. So I'm hoping GRcade can help while forgiving me for having to call stuff "thingys".

In our bathroom, the shower is operated from the main bath taps. Except it doesn't work. The diverter lever thingy just doesn't move and the shower therefore doesn't work.

I figured it was just stuck, so sprayed WD-40 on it. No joy.

So I unscrewed the nut (?) that was underneath the tap, with the intention of cleaning/descaling/whatever it. Except I noticed that when the nut is off, the lever thingy then works. It seems the nut thingy is a perfect fit for the tap and a perfect fit for the shower hose. But completely the wrong fit to allow the lever to go up and down.

Apologies if these photos are huge, but they should show what I mean:

The tap and the lever button thingamajig:

The nut thingy that's on the underside of the tap:

And the tap with the nut thingy attached to the shower hose:

All of this is a longwinded way of asking:

1. What's the nut thingy actually called? It's hard to Google them when I don't know what it is! There's billions of nuts on the internet and that's just on pornhub.

2. Can I buy one with the same dimensions (for the threads) but with more space inside that will allow the diverter button/lever thing to go up and down?

3. Am I going about this the wrong way and there's a different solution to the problem?

Cheers

The pull up push down part is called a Shower Diverter Valve and for this kind of setup is some kind of tee valve.

The part on the underside is a shower hose adaptor but it looks like it's just to change the fitting from a female fitting to a male one, there's no size change.

At a guess the old shower hose was a male part and it failed so someone went out and bought a new hose but it was female so then they used an adaptor to make it work. Maybe the lever is now fouling against the new adaptor that's been used? But this should be a pull up lever, so I'm not convinced that's the reason.

Has it ever worked / has someone taken this apart recently? There's a possibility they put he adaptor back in the wrong way up and that's what's stopping it from working. It's hard to tell without being there.

If by complete chance you live within a cycling distance of Reigate I will come and check it out for you.

Thanks. I have no idea if it has ever worked, we moved here about 2 months ago and it's not worked while we've been here.

I'm only about 140 miles from Reigate, I should expect you with 15 minutes? seriously though, thanks for the offer and advice!

[Afrocat]

Found some tiles under the hallway carpet:

1930s house, not sure how old the tiles are.

I've scrubbed the tiles with soapy water and got most of the dirt off. There is some silicon/adhesive that was used for the carpet grippers that I've been scraping off with a paint scraper.

My main issue is the area under the front door. About 2 inches of concrete with flaking paint, which tested positive for lead. I've donned the respirator and wet scraped the flakiest parts off. There's about 1cm gap under the front door that goes back an inch or so, which is full of dirt (dragged in from ants I believe) mixed with paint flakes. I've scooped out what I can of that.

My plan is to hopefully get some PVC trim and silicon it under the door, out to the tiles to hopefully seal off the concrete completely. I've mocked it up with some cardboard in the last picture.

Before I go ahead with this, just wondering if the area under the door is needed for ventilation or something? There are holes on the outside that I'm guessing are how the ants got in before.

Tiles themselves seem in decent condition. I've never done any tiling, should I be re-grouting to best take care of them? I also wondered about sealing them with epoxy maybe?

[Dowbocop]

Looks nice! Why don't you just prep the edge underneath the door and paint it matt black with a decent masonry paint? Alternatively tile with thin black PVC tiles under door frame? No real experience with ventilation but logic would suggest if a tile would ruin air flow the carpet you removed would have done too.

[Afrocat]

If I paint it I'm not sure I'll be able to cover all the lead paint underneath the door frame. Plus I'd probably need to sand away at what's showing there to get a good surface to paint over. Maybe a bit over cautious but I'd prefer to not disturb it as much as I can get away with.

Have you got an example of the kind of tiles you're talking about?

[Green Gecko]

If I paint it I'm not sure I'll be able to cover all the lead paint underneath the door frame. Plus I'd probably need to sand away at what's showing there to get a good surface to paint over. Maybe a bit over cautious but I'd prefer to not disturb it as much as I can get away with.

Have you got an example of the kind of tiles you're talking about?

If that sheet of cardboard is your template for PVC, don't use white - perceptually it'll mess up the framing/border and look weird, which you can see on the underlay. I wouldn't personally cover any of the tiles; presumably you are worried about the lead paint but that is a fairly large overlap.

I wouldn't worry about ventilation when you're just having tiles there now. A draft seal of some description at the bottom of the door would be good anyhow. Generally with these things, a layer of something robust over the top of what you can remove is good enough - an oil based paint or strong emulsion like masonry paint will stick to pretty much any porous surface and seal it in. With barely any exposure lead isn't as horrendous as its made out to be and the body will filter out an infinitesimally small amount of particles; lead fishing weights, lead miniatures, lead solder, even lead toys;- most people has been exposed to it at some stage. It's regular exposure over time you should worry about.

[Dowbocop]

If I paint it I'm not sure I'll be able to cover all the lead paint underneath the door frame. Plus I'd probably need to sand away at what's showing there to get a good surface to paint over. Maybe a bit over cautious but I'd prefer to not disturb it as much as I can get away with.

Have you got an example of the kind of tiles you're talking about?

Forgot I proffered an opinion on this! I meant something like this:

https://www.diy.com/departments/goodhom ... 310_BQ.prd

You could just cut them to size as needed.

[Afrocat]

If that sheet of cardboard is your template for PVC, don't use white - perceptually it'll mess up the framing/border and look weird, which you can see on the underlay. I wouldn't personally cover any of the tiles; presumably you are worried about the lead paint but that is a fairly large overlap.

I wouldn't worry about ventilation when you're just having tiles there now. A draft seal of some description at the bottom of the door would be good anyhow. Generally with these things, a layer of something robust over the top of what you can remove is good enough - an oil based paint or strong emulsion like masonry paint will stick to pretty much any porous surface and seal it in. With barely any exposure lead isn't as horrendous as its made out to be and the body will filter out an infinitesimally small amount of particles; lead fishing weights, lead miniatures, lead solder, even lead toys;- most people has been exposed to it at some stage. It's regular exposure over time you should worry about.

I was planning to have it stick out level with the skirting board so that the small black border is equal along that wall. But yeah, now you've said it, having that large of an area in bright white might look a little off! It doesn't need to come out that far, but the paint is on the grout along that edge of the tiles so maybe have it just overlap enough to cover that.

I figured I'm probably being over cautious. I'm just also aware that the water main is still the original lead one, and the stairs handrail I was planning to strip back to the wood is also lead under the more recent coats of gloss! So just trying to limit what I can.

Forgot I proffered an opinion on this! I meant something like this:

https://www.diy.com/departments/goodhom ... 310_BQ.prd

You could just cut them to size as needed.

I like it, just wonder if I can find any long enough that I could do with a single tile. Think I'm going to need to browse some flooring aisles of the local hardware shops.

Thanks guys, appreciate the suggestions!

[Sandy]

Before I go ahead with this, just wondering if the area under the door is needed for ventilation or something? There are holes on the outside that I'm guessing are how the ants got in before.

Tiles themselves seem in decent condition. I've never done any tiling, should I be re-grouting to best take care of them? I also wondered about sealing them with epoxy maybe?

Only if you've got a suspended timber floor and the holes you're talking about are the air brick. Take a picture if you're not sure.

If the grout is still sound then you can get something called Grout Restorer or Grout Rescue and it'll make the grout look like new again. If the grout is shot to gooseberry fool then it might be worth regrouting.

You can also get specific tile sealers and grout sealers for different types of tiles. I wouldn't use epoxy.

[Afrocat]

Only if you've got a suspended timber floor and the holes you're talking about are the air brick. Take a picture if you're not sure.

Nah, not an air brick. There's two oval holes on the outside in the base of the UPVC door frame that appear to open to this space under the frame (but still above the floor).

I already learned about the air bricks when I discovered that they had all been siliconed up! Looks like it was done by a loose fill cavity insulation company for a previous owner as some of the air bricks lead to the cavity, so I guess they just sealed them all up. I had to cut all the silicone out of the ones for the suspended floor. I've not looked under there but hopefully it's not all rotten.

If the grout is still sound then you can get something called Grout Restorer or Grout Rescue and it'll make the grout look like new again. If the grout is shot to gooseberry fool then it might be worth regrouting.

You can also get specific tile sealers and grout sealers for different types of tiles. I wouldn't use epoxy.

I think it's fine, I might just try something like that thanks!

[Sandy]

The holes are probably just there as a trickle vent for any moisture that might get into the frame.

[Rex Kramer]

Not sure if this is of interest but B&Q have Black and Decker Workmates for £20. There are probably better, more expensive options around but the one issue I always seem to have is not being to grip stuff properly when cutting so £20 for an occasional use seems like a bargain.

https://www.diy.com/departments/black-d ... 170_BQ.prd

I'm guessing stock is dependant on location.

[Dowbocop]

My dad had a pretty bad leak somewhere in his heating/water system which made a part of his front room ceiling collapse. The council have fixed the leak but apparently the hole is his problem! He's waiting for it to finish drying out and then he thinks he'll just whack a bit of board or whatever up there and be done with it (he's not arsed about matching the textured wallpaper from when we moved here in 1988 that I'm not even sure is a thing anymore ). I was wondering if anyone had any insights on how much it would cost to get it fixed by a professional (the hole is 0.5sqm approximately).

If he was to do it himself I'd try and help him if I was about (he lives in London, I'm in Liverpool). My plan would be:
- straighten edges
- measure straight hole
- cut board
- nail into beams
- plaster, sand, paint

Does that sound about right or have I missed something?