Day 944: Plants and power tools

For today's post, we're doing something different - we're going to take some proper tools into the garden. Why you ask? Because I find most garden shows to be severely lacking when it comes to the power tool department. I suppose secateurs, seeds and sprayers have a purpose, just not a very fun one. 

 So the task at hand was to plant strawberry plants .. The materials for the day were:

• 2 helpers wearing minimal PPA
• 2 strawberry plants (or there would be fighting between the 2 helpers)
• 6 clay pots - although only 2 were needed for this job
• My trusty FatMax cordless drill
• A 4mm masonry bit

Plants like water. However, I've discovered that most plants don't like to swim. In the summer it's great to leave plants outside as they get lots of rain and sunshine and require minimal maintenance; but to keep their pots from becoming little ponds, some modifications were necessary.

We simply drilled out a few holes at the bottom of each one using a masonry bit and working slowly  to not crack the bottom. 

This photo below was the second try - let's just say the first one wasn't taken at a flattering angle and likely wouldn't be appropriate for general audience website (although maybe that might make my hit count go up). 

With all the pots drilled, in went the plants and we put compost around the edges to hold everything in place.

So there you have it .. 2 happy kids with 2 happy strawberry plants. And proof that power tools make gardening much more fun. 

Day 930: Some serious networking

A well kept secret .. I used to install computer networks professionally. Well not such a well kept secret now that I just told you. So of course now that I have my own house to tinker with, I'd need to install a proper network in it. The only surprise was that it took me so long.

The issue - and there is always one - is that houses, particularly Victorian houses were not built to house computer networks. Unlike commercial properties which have been built (or modified) with fancy things like cable conduits and network closets. Nope, the Victorians we all about normal mail, newspapers and carrier pigeons. Where I'm going with this is that installing a proper network in an old house was going to be a bit of work.

Wireless is great, but range/interference becomes an issue - especially when all your neighbours have wireless networks too. It makes for the annoying pause during the playback of the latest Grand Tour episode (and always at the exciting bits). It makes blogging difficult when the connection goes down and you lose all your work (hoping people will buy this lame excuse). The Victorians didn't have that problem I can assure you. 

The solution was to wire everything up with Ethernet cable and connect it all together into a switch. When doing this, there are a couple of options 1) just run a bunch of patch cables between computers like we did in Uni or 2) terminate everything into wall plates and a patch panel like the pro's do. Any guess what I went for? 

 So first the materials:

• Ethernet patch panel
• Power Over Ethernet Gigabit Switch
• Unshielded solid core Cat 6e cable x 100m - the solid core is needed for the patch panel (vs braided which is better for clips)
• Unshielded RG6 coax cable x 100m
• Flexible plastic conduit

My first activity was to build out the network panel to go under the stairs. It made for a perfect network closet - mostly because it was hidden away and there wasn't any young wizards sleeping there. I used an old piece of 18mm ply to mount everything. I think this was an off-cut from the bathroom floor. Still, it fit everything that I needed it to. In spite of being completely hidden from the view of visitors, I knew it was there and I had a couple of hours to spare. I decided to 1) fill in the notch that was cut out and 2) give it a good splattering of white wood primer. Both of these were of course completely unnecessary - unless you're writing a blog and want to show off 😁
BEFORE 

AFTER

And AFTER with everything mounted. Looks pretty professional I must admit.

And here's what it looks like under the stairs. I ran another outlet as well underneath to provide power to all the equipment. 

With the patch panel ready, it was time to start running cables. With the floor unfinished, this was a whole lot easier to fish everything through. Not knowing how long the cables needed to be, I first ran the coax cable and a string (you'll see why in a minute) along the length that I wanted to go. In this case it was from the network closet to the TV room to a junction box that I made just for this purpose.   

When I ran the cable/string the full length, I tied the string on both ends and pulled the coax cable back out. This gave me an exact'ish measurement on the cable length. I used this to cut the Cat6 cable to size (3 lengths as we're going to have a lot of tech in the TV room) and then I pushed them through the conduit (10m). This was easier than I expected. Just lay the conduit flat and push, push, push ... eventually the wires came out on the other end. It looked like I had a couple of black 10m long snakes wiggling around my garden for a while. 

And now for the purpose of the string. I fastened both sets of conduit/wires to one end of the string with electrical tape and just pulled everything through. And presto, one run of network cables complete. The ends were then pulled though the junction box on one end and run to the patch panel on the other. I haven't bothered to terminate and test them yet as I never seem to have time and have bigger priorities to go after. Anyway, finally I can start putting the finished floors down. Stay tuned.

Day 923: This work sucks

Back from holiday now and doing some long overdue postin'. First a job that really sucked.

When I first installed the bathroom extractor fan (using the term "I" though I actually paid for this one), it was a quick job so I could continue with the bathroom work. The issue that remained was that this loft is an un-insulated cold space (particularly after I boarded it over) so hot steamy air, going upwards from the bathroom through the cold will eventually condense in the hose; and condensation in a hose over a long period in the cold eventually means mould (which rhymes). The flexi-hose that was used also has rings which impact smooth air flow, which leads to more condensation and you guessed it, more mould. Yuck!

The solution was twofold. First I'd replace the flexi-hose with rigid 4" plastic pipe to increase airflow and then wrap the pipe with insulation to protect it from the cold. All this should reduce any condensation in the winter and reduce any green stuff growing. 

The pipe was awful on the inside when I took it down - looking like something out of a low budget 1970's gore movie. So bad my that even my camera didn't want to look at it. 

However, the rest of the job was actually quite easy. Frustrating, but easy. 

Tools required:

• Lots of plastic pipe and some elbows - 45 deg and 90 deg
• Hacksaw
• Plastic pipe sealant - had this leftover from the kitchen
• Measuring tape
• Duct tape for plastic ducts - not normal duct tape which doesn't work on ducting, go figure
• Cable ties
• Condensation collection tray - not used, but could have been
• Draft flap - I ended up buying a second one of these as it only comes with one spring and feels way to flimsy by itself. And yes, I paid £4 for a bloody spring.

The first thing I discovered was that the flex hose wasn't vertical in though the ceiling - grrr. I had to get out the saw and cut both the ceiling and the loft board above to get the pipe vertical. 

Then it was a bit of a Lego operation. I connected the part on the right first as it had little room for maneuver here. 

Next I did the exit pipe on the roof end. The opening on the roof tile was less than 4" so I had to make the pipe "fit". This involved wrapping some tape around the inside, cutting 4 slits on the outside pipe and compressing it with cable ties. Not pretty but it works and this in the loft after all - don't plan on showing this off to too many people (just the internet).

Finally it was about connecting the rest - which was a bit of trial and error. Pipe was easy to cut using a dull saw blade and deburred with the edge of a Stanley knife. Bonding everything involved putting sealant in the inside and taping the outside. I needed to run a small offset using 45 deg bends to line everything up properly. 

BTW .. You can see the water mark from the condensation on the chipboard. I wasn't joking.

The last step was to put on the wrap. This stuff was just bubble wrap stuck to foil - and way overpriced. But it worked OK. It was held on with duct tape and cable ties. Again - this is the loft so who cares really what it looks like.

The result. The sucking sound could be heard instantly. Whoooosh! I'm not sure how much the extraction increased as the mirror still fogs up when we take a hot shower - but I'm convinced that things are less foggy now and it clears faster. As for the green stuff - it's still too warm outside to tell but I'm guessing it won't form this time around. But let's see.

Anyway, I'm glad to finally get this sucky job finished.