Woodworking/DIY/Home Improvement Mega Thread

[847badgerfan]

I'd go with Moen. We went Delta in the Master but I like the Moan better - and it was 1/5th the price.

[SFBadger96]

So I've been lamenting the fact that my shower head seems to have slowly lost pressure over time. According to my RO water system's pressure gauge, I've got 80 psi. So I should have decent pressure.

I thought it might have been clogged with mineral deposits, so I pulled it off this morning, and connected it to a pump system that I use for brewing. I pumped white vinegar through it for a while, then replaced that solution with a CLR mix and pumped that through for a while as well. It's sparkly clean now!

I hooked it back up... And the flow isn't appreciably better.

Thoughts?

You engineer types are smarter than me, so ignore me if you've already done this, which you probably already have, but...have you checked the hose? I only ask because I was about to replace a bunch of plumbing related to our shower head, but before I did I checked the hose. It was the hose. (After I had spent about 2-1/2 hours trying to diagnose other problems. Sigh.)

[betarhoalphadelta]

You engineer types are smarter than me, so ignore me if you've already done this, which you probably already have, but...have you checked the hose? I only ask because I was about to replace a bunch of plumbing related to our shower head, but before I did I checked the hose. It was the hose. (After I had spent about 2-1/2 hours trying to diagnose other problems. Sigh.)

It's a dual-output type, with one shower head up top that doesn't go through any hose, and one sprayer that is attached by magnet, movable and attached to a hose. Neither gets good flow. 

[SFBadger96]

Bummer. I figured you had already gone through that kind of thing, but figured I would throw it out there just in case.

[betarhoalphadelta]

Nah, it was a good call. I didn't even think of the hose. 

[longhorn320]

Nah, it was a good call. I didn't even think of the hose.

we combined vinegar and baking soda in a solution and soaked the shower head in it over night

this did the trick for us

[betarhoalphadelta]

we combined vinegar and baking soda in a solution and soaked the shower head in it over night

this did the trick for us

Yeah, my assumption would be that the fact I was using an actual pump to circulate the liquid through should be more efficient than mere soaking/contact, and in total I had about 4 hours of time between the vinegar and the CLR. Was thinking if it was mere mineral buildup, that should have taken care of it.

[utee94]

I got tired of fancy shower heads and rain showers and all that.  They all seemed to deteriorate or gunk up and fail too soon.

I finally just bought an old-school super simple shower head, with plenty of pressure.  Going strong for a couple of years now and very inexpensive.  This one:


https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0C7QNQQ7N?ref_=ppx_hzsearch_conn_dt_b_fed_asin_title_1&th=1

[MrNubbz]

So I've been lamenting the fact that my shower head seems to have slowly lost pressure over time. According to my RO water system's pressure gauge, I've got 80 psi. So I should have decent pressure.

Just a shower head I'd pick up one of these 

https://www.conservationmart.com/niagara-1-5-gpm-earth-showerhead-n2915bn-brushed-nickel/?setCurrencyId=1&sku=16623s&msclkid=f608521c7a6c1cf555d33a8617c250bf

Good friend has had used these in his 4 rental units for quite a few yrs.He'll change them out 1-2x a year and soak them in CLR brush them out good as new and rotates & clean them out. He saw these in a hotel he was staying at. I bought one and love it

[betarhoalphadelta]

I got tired of fancy shower heads and rain showers and all that.  They all seemed to deteriorate or gunk up and fail too soon.

I finally just bought an old-school super simple shower head, with plenty of pressure.  Going strong for a couple of years now and very inexpensive.  This one:


https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0C7QNQQ7N?ref_=ppx_hzsearch_conn_dt_b_fed_asin_title_1&th=1

Yeah, I might have to try that one.

One advantage of the external sprayer is that when cleaning the shower, I can get the right amount of water to the right place to rinse what I'm cleaning. But the current one has such abysmal flow that the second sprayer is practically a trickle. 

A downside to the one you sent is that it might make that harder... But it looks to be offer much more directional control than the main portion of my current shower head which is fixed, so maybe I can still get it to shoot some water where I need it, for rinsing. 

[OrangeAfroMan]

Wives tend to favor a sprayer for some reason.

[utee94]

Next up, I've got to finish the built-in wardrobe project in the master bedroom.  I completed the wardrobes and we moved a lot of our clothes/accessories into them around 2 years ago, but I got stumped trying to work out the details of some of the finishing trim work and wasn't sure I could pull it off.  Specifically, mating new crown molding along the wardrobe wall, to the existing crown molding already running along the side walls.  This requires some pretty extensive coping, which is not my strength.

I've built the entire assembly so that it can be fairly easily removed by any future owners, so I didn't want to cut into the existing crown molding.  Rather, since the wardrobes effectively pull the rear wall forward by about 2', I just left the original crown molding back there, sitting just above the height of the wardrobes. The new crown molding at the front of the wardrobes will just intersect the existing side-wall crown molding at a new point.  Visually it will look as if it terminates right there, while only I will know that it actually continues down each side wall all the way to the rear wall, where the backs of the wardrobes are also secured.  The added complication is that there is a tray ceiling and the wardrobes just fit in under the edge of the dropped portion, before it rises another foot from a 9' to a 10' ceiling.

All of that to say, I got scared.  

The base molding was easy, I completed it within a day or two of assembling the wardrobes.  But the crown molding stumped me, I didn't want it to look cheesy, and so I balked.  I actually called out two of my normal carpenter/trim guys who've done work for me before in our rentals, and they're very reasonably priced in general, but they wanted quite a bit for what I know would just be less than an hour's worth of work for them, at their experience level.  I know, I know-- I'd be paying for the experience and the result, not the time.  But dropping that much money when I feel like I should be able to do it myself, is tough.

So anyway, given my fresh experience on the library wall, I think I'm ready to go back and tackle that project again, on my own.    Maybe...

Narrator: He was not ready.

I still haven't tackled the completion of the wardrobe wall.  I'd like to think I might do it this fall but between kids' marching band, football season, the holidays, and everything else, I just don't see it happening.

So, most likely, January.  Winter is good for this kind of stuff, there's usually not much going on.

[FearlessF]

I've found the cheap inexpensive shower heads work as well or better than something that costs more

[utee94]

Yeah, my assumption would be that the fact I was using an actual pump to circulate the liquid through should be more efficient than mere soaking/contact, and in total I had about 4 hours of time between the vinegar and the CLR. Was thinking if it was mere mineral buildup, that should have taken care of it.

So I was thinking about this, and perhaps the solvent capability of the agents you used is more based on time, rather than pressure/friction in the system.  So a 24-hour soak might still be more effective than a 4-hour circulation.

If only we had a chemist around to help us with such matters...