House & Home

Peeling paint can be an early warning sign, from your house, telling you there’s something wrong — possibly rotting wood trim. When you see paint peeling on the outside of your home, don’t panic; just have a closer look and maybe get professional consultation. It may save you money in the long run.

My company specializes in replacing exterior trim on many homes around the Groton area, which seem to have more rotted trim than I’ve seen in my long career of carpentry. Some of these houses are only 10 or 15 years old. A few reasons I’ve heard are that they grow trees very close together so they have to strive to get sunlight therefore, making them grow taller faster. Does this make the lumber inferior in that it is less dense? Hmmmm. Pre-primed lumber can have recycled primer, which is not high quality. Hmmm. We also witness a lot of unprimed end cuts, when removing rotted wood, which can leave bare wood unsealed, acting more like a sponge, letting in moisture sooner.

No matter what the reason may be, when you first notice paint peeling, it’s time for a closer look. This can help prevent further damage to framing lumber underneath your trim and siding.

If the damage isn’t extensive, it may be possible to do the work yourself if you’re familiar with carpentry and tools. Here are a few things to think about:

• When replacing trim adjacent to wood siding, it’s important to cut along the edges and ends of the trim where it meets the wood siding. If you don’t, the siding could splinter away when the trim boards are pried off the house. Make sure the end and edge cuts, as well as the back of all trim, is primed with a good quality primer before installing. This will help delay rotting.
• The use of boards made of different kinds of plastic, usually PVC, is a common practice nowadays. Although the cost is higher, the product will last much longer and may not need to be painted.
• Be sure to always use a high-quality “paintable” caulking to neatly seal all joints after reinstalling trim. This keeps water from infiltrating and damaging material underneath the trim.

With a final touch up of high quality exterior paint, your home looks like new again and framing lumber underneath the surface of the trim will be saved from rotting, which can cost a lot more to repair than just replacing the surface trim boards. As soon as signs of peeling paint are noticeable investigate the cause and try to get this work done before the damage has a change to spread.

This Earth Day, it’s appropriate that we recognize that water is our most valuable resource for without it we simply cannot live — that is a fact.

We use and abuse water in most every facet of our lives.

We cook with it, wash with it, water lawns, and grow crops with it.

Everything we consume and purchase has along the way had some connection with water either directly or in the manufacturing process. It takes an estimated 18,000 gallons of water to make a single car.

It takes 2.5 gallons of water to refine and produce one gallon of gasoline. Wow! Driving is even more costly than we thought.

Oh yeah — and we drink it too.

We all use it and need it, so let’s not waste it.

There are two simple ways that we can save and conserve our most precious commodity: fix any leaky faucets, and upgrade your toilets to modern water-efficient designs.

Fix any leaky faucets, shower valves or hose bibs. A single dripping faucet can waste over 2000 gallons of water annually (that’s just one faucet). Are there any dripping faucets in your house?

Most faucets today have gone to using cartridges instead of washers and brass seats to regulate flow. Oftentimes this actually can make it easier to fix the drip, assuming you have the proper replacement cartridge. Moisens Hardware carries an impressive selection of cartridges.

Shut off the water to the drippy faucet, remove the handle(s) and there is the cartridge or stem. Remove it (pliers required – lefty loosie), identify it and replace it. If you cannot get the cartridge out with a moderate amount of force leave it and consider a new faucet. Many faucets are worth fixing, however some are not. Have a go at it, or call me.

How about your toilet(s)? Toilets account for 25% of daily indoor water usage in U.S. homes. Does your toilet fill by it self, “run” or periodically flush by itself? If so it is leaking and wasting copious amounts of water. Examine the flapper it is probably rotting out and allowing water to leak by the flush valve. Replace it, or call me to replace it.

If your toilet is 12 years or older don’t replace the flapper, replace the toilet because it is out dated and probably wastes 3 to 5 gallons per flush. It may not flush well enough to clear the bowl due to poor engineering and probably require 2 flushes per use. Half of all toilets in U.S. homes are the less efficient type, wasting in excess of 1.6 billion gallons of water every day. That’s wasteful — perhaps it is time to consider a new toilet. Kohler, and Toto make a well-engineered product. When the federal government required all new toilets sold in the U.S. to be low flow. The first and second generations of these “low flow“ toilets didn’t really do a very good job of clearing the bowl. They should have included a plunger with every toilet. The new low flow toilets do work and work well. Get rid of the old toilet, you’ll be glad you did and you will be helping to save billions of gallons of water on a daily basis. Call me, I would welcome the opportunity to help.

Though you may not be ready to give up on your green lawn, I hope you will consider fixing or replacing those dripping faucets and running toilets. It is oftentimes a simple repair that can literally save thousands of gallons of water per household per year.
Clean water is such a valuable commodity yet undervalued by so many.

Make no mistake about it — we are running out of clean useable water. Less than 1% of all water on earth is drinkable. We need to conserve it. As our population increases (74 million more of us every year) this fact will become more of a prominent concern. Water is life. Let’s work together and be responsible in conserving our most precious resource.