Construction Funnies II

Wasps and Caulk

     What could wasps and caulk have in common?  This one job.

     The homeowner was a very nice old man with an oxygen tank and a cigarette in his mouth.  My first thoughts was "Please don't blow us up."  Seems he had been smoking while on oxygen for years.  He said hello every morning and goodbye every evening but stayed out of the way all day.

     We knew there were a few wasps flying around the house and was careful with the repairs.  One guy was on the corner of the house removing a few pieces of rotten siding and I was on a ladder beside him.  When he pulled out on the board, I heard humming of wings and eased down the ladder.  He looked inside and called for me to get down.  Oops.  I was already down and back with the wasp spray.  There were thousands in just this one little spot.

     As the day heated up, they were worse.  The homeowner said they never bother him so he wasn't worried about it.  I guess he moved too slow for them to be alarmed.  We decided to have pest control come and spray while the homeowner was at the doctor.  We did not need him getting sick.  

     Pest control came out and looked.  He even poked his head in the attic.  That was a quick trip.  He came back out saying there was nothing he could do about the attic.  He did not have enough spray for that.  He was trying to leave.  We finally convinced him to spray just the outside of the home where they were going in at.  He stood over fifteen foot away from the house where his spray barely hit the overhangs.  I think he was scared.  As he left, he said, there was no warranty and don't call him for this house again.  It needed condemned.  I have never seen a pest control guy scared of a bug.  He was able to kill over half of them though.  The next morning we came to see a huge black line all around the home filled with wasps and a few stuck hanging onto the overhang, dead. 

     The number one rule with wasps is do not run.  They are not usually threatened by slow movements.  But no matter what, they fly faster when it's hotter.  And it was getting hotter.  

     I was on the inside of the home cutting caulk off the windows and one guy outside on a ladder to catch the window and hand the new one in.  We were all moving slow as not to bother the remaining wasps.  As he lifted the new window, a wasp came and buzzed his right glove.  He balanced the window on the top of the ladder and swatted the wasp away.  He, then, started handing the window in to me.  The same wasp came back and stung him through his work glove on the same hand.  I took the window and he worked his way back to the truck.  I secured the window and went to check on him.  He had no known allergies to wasps.  By the time he walked to the truck and took his glove off, his hand had swollen to twice the size.  We had no luck finding Benadryl in the truck and there were no medical facilities near or open on Saturday.  

     His wrist began to swell, but his breathing was fine.  We found a Fred's open and stocked back up on the Benadryl.  He packed in the Benadryl and we waited to see a reaction.  Thirty minutes went by and the swelling was up to his elbow.  He looked like Popeye the sailor man.  Finally, the swelling had stopped and was beginning to go down.  It seemed to have swollen in just minutes, but was taking forever to shrink.  But the Benadryl was working.  And he was drunk as a skunk.  All the way home, singing to the windshield and the radio was not on.  And everything was beautiful.  He even wanted so bad to go back to the job and kill that wasp.  The wasp that did this to him.  He was going to hunt him down and kill him and maybe all his family too.  No, definitely, all his family deserved to die too.  It was an interesting drive.

     We were almost done with the house and a new guy started.  He was only twenty and was wearing an old style army jacket.  On his first day, he was bragging about being ex-military and how tough he was.  I was thinking he was full of crap, but I wanted to see what work he could do.  His first task was to simply seal a window on the back of the house.  Surely he could do that since he said he worked with painters, caulking for them for ten years.  I gave him a case of caulk and told him to have at it.  Thirty minutes later, I asked a guy to go check on him.  He came back snickering and said I needed to see this for myself.  

     I walk around the corner and he is on a six foot ladder caulking the same window he started on.  I wondered what was taking so long.  He looked to only be half way.  He put a little dot of caulk on the window and then wipe all of it back off.  I looked down at the caulk box.  He was on his third tube.  Do I laugh or scream and pull my hair out.  I calmly walked over and told him to get down.  I went up the ladder and pulled the caulk gun all the way down one side of the window.  Then I took my finger and slid it down the caulk.  There, one good bead.  That was all it needed.  He said his fingers were too gunky to work with this caulk and that was not the way the painters did it.  I explained that all caulk has a time limit on working with it.  I gave him one more chance.  I walked back around the corner for about ten minutes.  I came back and he was still fighting with it.  

     I asked him to clean his fingers off and get a trash bag.  And then the rant began.  "You don't tell a vet to pick up trash.  Are you calling me trash?  I fought for this country and almost died.  I was a sniper in the seals special ops.  You should be paying me just to be here."  Needless to say, I had nothing to say.  I had one of my guys pay him and escort him home.  

     Later, I found out he never served.  Actually, he was denied due to a lack of mental stability.  And the painter job never existed either.  But he did land his self in jail the next day.  Friday came and he was still in jail, but he had his girlfriend call to get his check for the week he worked.  Week?  He didn't even make it a half a day.  The next call was from his grandfather demanding his week's pay or he would sue.  Wow.  Where do these people come from?  I finally told him to just sue me.  Let's see how far this gets.  (He never sued.)  But when the kid got out of jail, he was at the gas station where we all met in the mornings wanting his job back.  Nah, I'm not going down that road again.

     But back to wasps and caulk.  Everyone on the job had a caulk gun to fill holes where wasps were coming out.  With millions of wasps flying around, we were lucky to have only one guy stung.  And after we finished, can you believe the homeowner loved the house, but hated to loose so many of his little flying friends.  The "red devils" he called them.  He thought they were there to protect him.  By this point I could believe it.  They never stung him or even got too close to him.  Us, they hated with a passion.

Construction Funnies I

Construction Funnies I

     After many years of dealing with the public and other contractors, yes I have seen some stuff.

     A repeat customer had another home for us to completely renovate.  On day one, that fell on a Friday, we took out all the wall, ceiling and floor coverings.  She wanted to try and save the cabinets, but they were pieced together and fell apart.  The wiring, plumbing and insulation needed to be brought up to code.  Well, the home needed insulation since there was none.

     In one bathroom, the wall at the end of the tub had what looked like a shower head.  I reached down to grip the old lead pipe and see if it would twist.  Twist, it did and pulled right out.  There was no hookup for the shower head and the head was fake.  The guy who had been renting that half of the house had been doing his own repairs.  But why put in a fake shower head?

     When we moved the stove to remove the flooring, there was a huge hole going straight through the floor and wall.  The stove did not even have a plugin.  What was this guy trying to pull?

     After everything was out, we took the weekend off.  It is never a good idea to leave a job unattended when your customer is known to get into everything.  While we were gone, she decided to have a look.  Then she decided to help with clean up.  We use brooms and shop vacs for a reason.  She only had a leaf blower.  She opened the windows and doors and scooted across the floor joists blowing some of the dust out.  Later, she took her leaf blower into the attic.  Oh, My!  The guy she had helping her said she was nothing but a black soot rag doll when she came back down.  She had to go to her stylist to get the soot out of her blond hair.  

     When we returned Monday, she was coughing and gagging with a sinus infection since she did not even wear a mask.  We all bit our tongues and thanked her for trying to clean up, but it is our job to keep the site clean.

     The electrician showed up to see that the entire home needed rewired.  The other half of the home was rented by a college boy and he was complaining about his power bill being too high.  It seemed to be enough to power the whole house.  At first, we thought it might be how drafty the home was.  Nope.  The electrician found an illegal tap from his meter to the other half of the home.  The guy doing his own repair did not even have a power bill because he was stealing his neighbor's power.  The boy moved before we could tell him.  He said he could no longer afford the power bill.

     She opted to use her own plumber.  She thought he was cheaper and he had a nice truck.  Our plumber gave a flat price that covered the whole job.  I watched her plumber use a level on every pipe and then take it back apart and trim a little and then try to level it (slightly off level) over and over.  And we could not put any of the subfloor down until he had every pipe perfect.  He refused to work under a house.  When the rough in was finally done, she received the first part of the bill.  He billed her sixty five an hour and took over a week.  He worked four hours a day and charged eight.  He used the old water heater and charged for a new one.  Yep, she flipped out.  He was four times what our plumber would have been and he had not even finished the job yet.

     She also brought in her own tile guy.  I usually do not like tile being cut inside the home, but no floor coverings or painting had been done as of yet.  The tile guys took their tools and tile into the bathroom and I did not see them again until they were done.  These guys were determined.  I walked in and saw a pretty neat tile job and no trash  left behind.   I think I like these guys.

     As you may have guessed, she decided to have our plumber finish the house out.  He hooked up all the faucets and drains and everything was looking real good.  The customer was very happy with the colors and fixtures she chose.  The plumber came back the next day to turn the water on and test everything before his inspection.  The tub was filled and tested to any leaks.  The same with all the sinks.  Everything held water well.  Then he went back to the bathroom to let the water out.  When he pressed the plug, the water only drained an inch and stopped.  The sink was the same.  He tried snaking the drains in case the other plumber lost a rag in a pipe.  Whatever was clogging the drain would not move.  OK.  Take the drains back out.  When he did this, he found grout packed into the pipes.  The tile guys had dumped enough excess grout down the pipes, nothing could get through.  Now, I hate her tile guys and so did she.

     She bit the bullet on everything seemingly well and even though her budget for the project was doubled, she still bought another house about three months later for a complete renovation.

Gable Vents. How boring can you get?

Gable Vents. How boring can you get?

Most all homes have no gable vent or a louvered gable vent.  As you drive by the homes on your street, you may notice homes the same color and same style with the same louvered gable vent on the front of the home.  Very boring.

Why doesn’t anyone make a choice or something different?

Well…..

A decorative gable vent cover might spruce things up a bit.

This is a Pinnacle Gable Vent Cover. Only an inch thick, it can attach right outside your existing gable vent.

Or what about a Sunburst decorative vent cover? 

The Sunburst is actually where all our decorative vent covers started.  A customer had a house well over 100 years old being clad in vinyl.  She wanted to preserve her existing gable vents which look like a sunburst.  The first Sunburst Vent was painfully done by wrapping each wooden slat on the original vent.  Soon after, other customers wanted their own Sunburst Gable Vent. This led to the mass production of the vent we offer today.  Each vent is custom sized to fit over your gable vent.

And, yes, some people want it to be completely decorative, not vented. On that one, you can even choose your background color (where the black is).

Now, what about this gem?  This is a Rising Sun vent cover. The granite gray siding being lighter than the granite gray metal roof with white trim, really sets it off.

I have to say, this is one of my favorite pictures.

Maybe you need less ventilation.  This Sunrise vent cover can be used over a louvered vent or by itself.  It is actually vented ½” between each slat.  It can be ideal for areas which need a little venting or if you need to keep squirrels out.

This is a round quasar the customer placed over his round louvered vent to complete his new siding job.  Sometimes, one little detail can make the whole job worthwhile.

Visit us at shop.onyxxteriors.com to see more.

Maybe, you already have our products on your home, if so, send us your pictures and we will proudly post them for you.  contactus@onyxxteriors.com

Trouble with Gable Vent Installs

Does this look familiar?

Have you ever spent hours wrapping each individual slat on a louvered vent?

How about how stiff and sore your feet are after so much time on the ladder?

Or, tell the customer you can paint the gable vent this one time?

It doesn't always go as well as you want. painting or wrapping may sound like the easy, quick way out of the job, but soon the vent will begin to rust again or the wind will find one slat cover to rip off. And then you get to go back and fix that again.

What about vented soffit? Looks pretty good? Right?

Well, you just closed off all your ventilation. Now your attic cannot breath and will begin growing mold and mildew. Also, overheating will cook your shingles from the bottom and cut your roof life in half. The manufacturers of vented soffit will even tell you this is not a use for this product.

Removing the old gable vent and installing a durable aluminum louvered gable vent can solve everything.
It will provide proper ventilation and keep the aesthetics of your home looking good.

Or, maybe, your builder did not give you a gable vent. Why should he care that your home is not properly vented? He doesn't live there.

Cutting out an entire wall area can be a real pain. Remove the siding. Cut out the OSB or plywood. These two are necessary for venting. But cutting out wall studs does not have to be required. Using a 1" or slim line gable vent can mount outside the wall. This cuts install time by 90%.

See more shop.onyxxteriors.com

Aluminum or Metal Half Round Window Trim

Did you recently pay a high price for vinyl siding or vinyl windows?

Once your contractor thinks he is finished, did you look up at your half round window to see it is the only window on the house not trimmed to match the rest of the windows?

Or maybe, you are the contractor. And the customer will not pay until the half round window trim is finished. Wow! That is a dilemma.

This might help. This is an aluminum half round window trim piece manufactured by Onyx Xteriors and easily found at shop.onyxxteriors.com

The half round window trim is made from the same aluminum used with vinyl siding and window installs. You can choose your color to match what you have.

Each trim piece is measured to match your measures to fit your half round window.

This is a simple drawing of the measures we need to ensure a great fit every time. You so not need to add or subtract anything. Just give us your existing window trim measures and we do the rest.

Or do you need something more intricate and special?

This piece was manufactured as one piece. All the installers had to do after delivery, was snap it on and seal it in. How much simpler can that get?

Now, the centerpiece of the home matches the rest of the home.

So, if you are tired of hearing "No, there is no such thing as aluminum half round window trim"?
Just visit shop.onyxxteriors.com to get yours.

Aluminum gable vent vs galvanized gable vent

Both vents are the same age. #1 is aluminum and #2 is galvanized. Which one would you prefer?

Neither gable vent has been painted since they were installed. Sometimes learning from others mistakes can be to your advantage.

Are you really happy painting your gable vents every couple of years? See more at shop.onyxxteriors.com

As time passes, galvanized gable vents seem to wear and rust without a good coat of paint to protect them. Everyone knows, aluminum never rusts. The aluminum used for these gable vents is pre-coated with a durable paint finish. So, when you are ready to install your gable vent, you can just install it. And if you choose to never paint it, that's OK. It never has to be painted. So, this is one hassle removed from your regular home maintenance. Worry free gable vents.

Onyx Xteriors Gable Vents Remember

Onyx Xteriors is ready to help you with your gable vent needs at shop.onyxxteriors.com

Did your husband or cheap contractor bounce on a ladder on your gable vent?  While aluminum gable vents will still dent from a ladder banging on it, we offer many cost effective options to change your gable vent without breaking the bank.

Are you seeing rust spots showing up and tired of painting and touch up every year? We offer all 100% aluminum gable vents to solve this. And the gable vents come in the color you want. So, you don't even have to paint the new gable vent.

What about wood gable vents? Rot? Yeah, I would get tired of that real quick. How would you repair a wood gable vent? It just sounds disastrous. I would just get an aluminum gable vent and avoid the extra work. My dad told me, "Work smarter, not harder." Yeah, I am lazy. But I do not want to continuously be replacing a gable vent. I like the "One time and done".