Weekend Update

     This should have been an update on the progress of the solar air heaters. Unfortunately, I still don't have the polycarbonate. even more unfortunate is that I had to spend the majority of Saturday working on projects that had to be done before winter hits.
     Last winter, one of the inside valves to the outside faucets didn't work, so the outside faucet split. In the spring, I replaced the faucet, but apparently, another valve that was attached to it was also damaged, so even though I had turned the water off to the swamp cooler it continued to flow. That wouldn't have been a big deal if the float valve in the swamp cooler had been working properly, which it wasn't. But that wouldn't have been a big deal either if the overflow hose wasn't leaking, which it was. But that wouldn't have been a big deal if it were located to one side of the duct to the swamp cooler. Unfortunately, it isn't, so water pooled up and eventually started leaking through the shingles, into the attic, eventually making it to the hardwood floors on the main floor.
     While searching for the location of the leak in the attic, I also discovered a couple places where the roof isn't sealed and there are a few gaping holes for daylight or weather to come in. Oh yeah, when they re-roofed the house before we bought it, apparently they decided to leave the mess in the attic, that, by the way, isn't properly insulated. When the house was re-roofed, they also neglected to put up any rain gutters. The previous owner ended up in the hospital on account of this oversight. Not wanting to follow suit, I put up rain gutters over the front and back door the month we moved in. Unfortunately, when the house was re-roofed, they didn't do the overhang properly, so moisture flowed between the rain gutters and the house, leaving us with a little more ice on the steps than we wanted. Also, apparently the flowerbed that is part of the house (it's connected the the chimney and made of the same rock) had previously been protected by rain gutters. Since we've lived there, it seems to have started falling apart. I think it's due to the rain and melted snow from the roof dripping into the bed, then freezing and expanding...
     So, Saturday started out with adding flashing between the "drip lip" and the house to channel the water into the rain gutters. After that, I cleaned the roofing debris out of the attic, and also removed a newspaper from Christmas day of 1966, a roll of old carpet, a bunch of pieces of wood that were just compressing the fiberglass insulation, as well as 12 awg romex, coax cable, and miscellaneous garbage. I think that next week I will blow in a some insulation!
     Then I headed to Home Depot and Lowes to get roof sealer, more rain gutters, and a new valve. While I was there, Dean (the man who is planning to do a half ironman the year he turns 50) called to see if I could help him move some equipment from his business to house and storage shed. I only mention this to show the time taken out of the day - it was around 2 hours - and to remind myself about the triathlon that I'm training for. Side note: I swam 32 laps on Thursday! That's a whole mile!!!
     By then it was around 2 p.m. and definitely time for lunch, a little rest and a shower. Next project - the broken and apparently leaky valve. This could have been an easy project if the pipe from outside came straight into the valve inside and if access to the valve was through something larger than a 6"x4" semi-round hole in the ceiling 8 inches above a shelf... Thankfully, I never got into the cussing thing, 'cause if I had, I'd have been swearing up a storm - which wouldn't have been good, since my family was watching Apollo 13 right next to my suffering. Anyway, the pipe comes in, turns 90°, six inches later it turns 90° again and then goes to a leaky valve that doesn't close. I discovered the 'leaky' part when I moved some board games with water damaged boxes out of the way so I could reach up into the 6"x4" hole. More than 2 hours later, I put the finishing touches on what seems to be a simple fix - replacing a 50 year old valve.
     Just now, as I thought about the next project, I wondered if I had dinner on Saturday - then I remembered the delicious french toast that Jeri Dawn made, with the homemade jam, that Jeri Dawn made too, on top. After she left for the Relief Society broadcast, I went upstairs and ate all of the left overs - they were just as good as the first course!
     On to the next project - rain gutters. Rain gutters would be a really easy thing to install if you had scaffolding and if your only source of light weren't an LED head lamp...Oh well, it's done for now.
     I didn't patch holes in the roof, but overall, I'd say that Saturday was one of the more productive days this year. Now, if only I had put in a few miles of training...
     I needed a picture for the post, so I'm adding a picture of something that I found while retrieving the newspaper - a BLACK WIDOW! It's not the picture I took, since it didn't turn out so good, but this is what it looked like.