HOME MAINTENANCE REQUIRES MORE THAN A STANDARD CHECKLIST

the home three years before, and Dr. Larsen and his wife trusted me. Little did they know, I had no clue how to build the three simple walls needed for the small new bathroom.

By Tim Carter

I’ve seen standardized home checklists over the years, and I sort of chuckle at many of them. I realize the authors have good intentions, but I often wonder if they’ve ever done any hands-on repair work for paying customers. If they had, then they’d probably add a few other items to their lists.

Do you want to build a new wall inside your home?

Perhaps you're trying to create a new small space for a home office or hobby room, or maybe you have a bigger appetite and are transforming a dank basement into a finished living space. But you have no idea where to start. I've been there. I've experienced your anxiety.

Here’s the normal things I see listed: Check the roof for shingle damage. Caulk cracks around windows and doors. Repair chipped paint. Check windows and doors. Check chimneys

I survived with the help of a few phone calls to my boss. It was a humbling experience as I discovered you don't know what

You can't always do this in an existing home, especially if the ceilings in the room are finished with drywall or plaster. As you tilt the wall up, it binds against the ceiling. If you're challenged by a finished ceiling, you'll most likely have to install your top and bottom plates, making sure the plates are pipes. The black rubber boot tends to crack over time where it touches the vent pipe, allowing water to leak into your home. The best plumbing vent flashings I’ve seen are the ones you don't know. Keep in mind this was decades before the Internet and YouTube. You have no idea what an advantage you now have when you have to educate yourself about how to repair and build things around your home. Count your blessings! around windows and doors willy-nilly. Your home may have vinyl siding and the j-channel around doors and windows shouldn’t be caulked. It needs to expand and contract. plumb in the same plane. You'll then cut each wall stud to fit snugly between the plates and toenail them in place. Drill angled pilot holes in the ends of the wall studs for the nails. Use no less than 3-inch-long 16d sinker nails to connect the wall studs to the plates.

Often the lists lack detail as to what to really look for. For that reason, I feel they are of not much value.

Water and ultraviolet (UV) light are the two big things that cause problems to homes, so I suggest we focus on these. I suggest we start at the top and work our way to the bottom.

Every now and then it's interesting to go back in time. I clearly remember having to build my first partition wall inside a house. I was a soaking wet-behind-theears carpenter working for a small remodeling company. One of my college professors, Dr. Larsen, had asked me to install a half bathroom in his home. I had no idea what to do, so I told him that my boss could do the job.

Look at your roofing materials and pay close attention to the flashings. Look for excessive shingle granule loss in small patches, cracks in shingles and any slight curling at the shingle tips.

Once the simple plans were drawn and the contract signed, I was sent to my professor's house to start the job. I had painted the outside of

Chimneys are very important. If you can’t safely get on your roof to inspect it, hire a pro. The most important thing to look at is the chimney crown or cap. It’s the roof of your chimney. Most of the ones I’ve seen have been installed incorrectly and they crack. You don’t want water getting into a crack in the crown. There are special mastics that can coat the crown, and they perform quite well. Check for missing mortar and replace as necessary using hydrated lime and volcanic ash with sand for the strongest and longestlasting mortar.

Look at your roofing materials and pay close attention to the flashings. Look for excessive shingle granule loss in small patches, cracks in shingles and any slight curling at the shingle tips. Replace these damaged shingles as necessary.

Some common trouble spots are the cheap aluminum and rubber flashings around plumbing vent that have a special siliconized-rubber compound that stands up against the harsh UV light from the sun.

Building a new interior wall in an existing house can be much different from doing it on a new home job site. When we carpenters build a wall for a new home, we typically build it flat on the floor. Once all the studs are nailed to the bottom and top plates, we tilt the wall up and secure it so it doesn't fall over.

If your home has gutters and downspouts, be sure they’re clean. Spring is the worst time of year for gutters, as the flowers from deciduous trees and the winter buildup of bark, twigs and other debris can choke gutters with an organic smorgasbord. After the gutters are clean, do a water test with a garden hose. Test to see if there are any leaks in the system. There are special caulks meant to seal the seams in aluminum gutters; they’re available online.

Be sure the water from downspouts is piped to the lowest part of your yard or, in urban areas, connected to approved storm drains. Water dumping out on the ground next to your foundation on splash blocks is a very bad thing, as the water simply enters the soil next to your home. If you have a basement or crawlspace, this water will almost always cause nightmares.

Don’t just go around caulking cracks

Decks are big problem spots. Many people ignore their decks. You need to inspect the railings closely to ensure they’re sturdy and will not fail if lots of outward pressure is applied. Get under the deck and look at all the galvanized metal connectors. Look for corrosion. If the corrosion is severe with lots of rust, you may have to replace a connector.

If there is no ceiling, you can tilt the wall up so long as you orient the wall in the same direction as the floor joists above. You simply make sure the top of the wall rises up in between two parallel floor joists. Once the wall is vertical, you can then slide it into position under

Look at the fasteners used to install the metal connectors. Are they corroded, or have they pulled out? Each time water enters a crack in treated wood, it has the tendency to make the crack bigger because the water gets deeper into the wood, causing it to swell. Important structural nails can pull out. Consider replacing all nails with special exterior screws meant for the newer treated lumber that contain lots of copper.

I’d also take a good look at the soil around your home. Be sure you have excellent, positive drainage. You want the soil to slope away from your foundation. It’s best to have at least 6 inches of foundation exposed above the soil line. Don’t add mulch to garden beds, which creates a moat around your foundation. Don’t allow water to be trapped between the foundation and the mulch.

©2022 Tim Carter. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.