The next Stefan Good Day download with Doug and Jay Kirshner is made possible in
part by Keltren, which is the safe way for you to lose weight and
keep it off, and also by previagent keeping your brain healthy. Time for
Tom Kreidler is the co host of the Money Pit home improvement radio program.
Tommy appears with us here as we prepare for weekend things. A lot of
people are preparing for snow, so maybe I'll ask him a few questions about
some of the best shovels and some of the best blowers and that sort of
thing. But first, let's start off with a question from one of our
listeners. Guy's name is Jeff, and he wants to know how to smooth
out a You call him a popcorn ceiling. I would call him just a
rough whatever the what's the other texture? Texture? Yes, the texture.
I think they're kind of ugly to be in with, But don't they use
that stuff to cover up oftentimes messes that are Yeah, you're you're right,
Doug. You know the reason that so many builders use popcorn ceilings, especially
back in the eighties and nineties, was because they're trying to avoid having to
put up drywall ceilings that when people would complain about because if the seam wasn't
perfect and you had lighting, which you often do in a ceiling, it
would show. And so it would take a lot of time, a lot
of callbacks to get it right. And it's like, well, we're just
gonna texture it. Nobody will notice, and that's kind of what happened.
But now you know, we've got so many houses that still have popcorn ceiling
and people really really don't like it for a lot of reasons. I mean,
first of all, it holds dirt, and you know you can paint
popcorn ceiling. There's a special roller for it's very thick and has slits in
it and basically it's designed to go over the popcorn, and so you can
do that. That helps, But frankly, if you really want to steal
it in, you got a prime at first, so it's a lot of
work. Almost as much work has taken it down. But James, if
you want to take it down you can. Generally, the procedure is obviously
cover everything you don't want popcorn droppings on, but you wet the ceiling down
and what I like to use for that is a garden sprayer where I can
pump it up and just cann't control how much moisture I'm putting on it.
We that ceiling down, work a spot at a time, an area of
time, and then you want to use a wide scraper to basically scrape the
popcorn off the ceiling. And once you get it all done, then you
definitely have to prime that ceiling. I would use a solvent based primer and
oil based primer to get it in and sealed in real nice, and then
you could put a flat paint over top of it. You're still going to
see some of the remains of the of the texture of the popcorn, but
it will not look as bad as it did before. So is the assumption
here that this stuff was put up with latex painting so it's easier to scrape
off. Because yeah, I'm listening to the formula that that wouldn't work necessarily
for oil based paint. Yeah, no, I don't. I've never seen
anything that was like a solvent based popcorn material. It's always yeah, it's
always water based. Okay, got it all right. Now. One of
the things, by the way, Tom is brought to you today by the
folks at Progressive Insurance. You can check your home and your auto with a
Progressive save yourself a bundle a dough, get a quote at Progressive dot com
or eight hundred Progressive. So I'm talking about homes and the next episode of
the money Pit podcast is something that is from the dream scope. Yeah,
we call it pipe dreams. Pipe your pipes from freezing? Yeah right,
exactly what It's pretty cold and snowing across much. Have you got snow in
New Jersey? Not yet the second year now? Yeah, really a bran
new snowblower, but bought a BRANDW snowblower last year being the season still brand
new, haven't used yet. So then under the circumstances, what do you
recommend just out of curiosity because there is a snowstorm that shovels. What's the
best shovel? Is it a little? Is it plastic? Is it?
What's the well? The first we'll talk about the pipestug So a couple of
things you can do right away is if your pipes are prone to freezing,
and those homes that that our people know this right, open up your kitchen
cabinets, your bathroom cabinets so more heat gets into those spaces, especially those
areas that are prone to freezing. Insulate areas have exposed pipes that the rubber
insulation has a slit down the side, very easy to put to put those
on. Also, with respect to the freezing pipes, you're gonna run a
little water, very slow drip through the farthest faucet from where the main is
and that will move a little water through the pipes. That makes it less
likely that the pipes can freeze. All those things can help. And finally,
if you do get a frozen pipe, you know this stuff called heat
tape, like an appliance, and you attach it to the pipe and plug
it in. It's okay to use it just a thought of pipe, but
sometimes as a home inspector, I'd find people make it a permanent appliance,
which is a mistake. And I've pulled the stuff off and found burnt wood
underneath it, burnt framing material and things like that. So don't do that.
And you put the heat tape on, don't wrap it over itself,
just land like a strip over top of the pipe, and you tape it
off with electrical tape. The gas company turned off or blew up the pipe
the gas pipe going into one of the barns that I have, and so
we've had to go buy a bunch of electric heaters to keep the pipes in
the barn from freezing. And man, that would you know, we're having
to peel the walls away to make sure that the stuff doesn't freeze. It's
just a it was a yeah, yeah, and that's going to cost you
a bundle in your utility building. Yeah, of course it is. I
would tell you how we used to do it when uh, when I was
a kid. We were worried about the pipes freezing on the edge of the
bar of the barn in the house, so we'd pile manure up against the
wall to keep it. I think most people would prefer a cleaner system.
Yes, Tommy the Cave from the Money Pit. Money Pit Podcast the next
Stefan Good Day download with Doug and Jay Kirshner. Is made possible in part
by Keltron, which is the safe way for you to lose weight and keep
it off, and also by previagent keeping your brain healthy.