4 Signs of Great Kitchen Cabinets #1219161

TOM: Coast to coast and floorboards to shingles, this is The Money Pit Home Improvement Radio Show. I’m Tom Kraeutler.

LESLIE: And I’m Leslie Segrete.

TOM: Happy Holidays. We hope that you and yours are having a wonderful holiday weekend wherever you are celebrating that with the people you love. And we’re very happy that you have some time to listen in to our show today. We’re going to try to make it special with some holiday tips and tricks to help you get through these next couple of holidays and get your home plans in place for improvements you want to make the coming year.

Coming up on today’s show, if you are taking a trip this holiday season, bed bugs are one souvenir you do not want to take home. So we’re going to tell you what you need to know about these nightmarish, little guys before you head on out to a destination this season.

LESLIE: Bleh. Tom, you’re giving me the willies. I can’t even talk about bed bugs without getting totally grossed out.

So gross, you guys.

TOM: I know, I know. I started with the holiday love and I went right to bed bugs.

LESLIE: You went right there. You just went right to it. Alright. Well, let me sidetrack. Let’s talk about heating.
You know, this is the time of year where people really start to think about upgrading their heating systems because obviously, it’s cold outside. So we’re going to have some tips on how to sort through all of those confusing acronyms, like HVAC, BTUs, SEER – in case you don’t know how that’s spelled, it’s S-E-E-R – and all of the other inhibitors to understanding those words that contractors just love to throw around as if they should mean something to you, so that you can make the most energy-efficient purchase possible.

TOM: And also ahead, if a new kitchen is in your 2017 plans, there are four simple things you should check for to determine if the cabinets are of good quality. We’ll share that tip, just ahead, plus take your calls to 1-888-MONEY-PIT, 888-666-3974.

What are you thinking about today that has to do with your house? Maybe nothing but I’m sure there’s something. And if it’s not today, this weekend you’re going to do a project. Maybe it’s next month or next spring. You’re thinking ahead to the projects you want to get done in the coming months and year. Give us a call right now. We’d love to get you started on the right foot at 888-MONEY-PIT.

LESLIE: Carl in Idaho is on the line with a furnace question. How can we help you?

CARL: I just bought a house in Idaho. I’ve been in it for two days now. The furnace is a gas Lennox furnace. It’s one of those high-efficiency ones where your air inlet and outlet are all PVC pipe. But the home inspector, when he inspected the house, he said, “Yeah, you have a 97-percent efficient furnace but you have 50-percent efficient air ducts.” Because this house was built in 1950, I doubt they’ve done anything with them since. So my question is: what do I do to bring those air ducts up to an efficiency more compatible with the furnace I have?

TOM: Yeah. I mean the solution to leaky ducts is to seal them and it’s very common that HVAC ducts, especially in an older house, are going to be very drafty and very leaky. So it was astute of your home inspector to pick that up. Now, shockingly, duct tape is not designed to do this. Duct tape is not designed for ducts, because it’ll dry out and fall off and not be very effective whatsoever. There is a type of tape called UL 181 tape, which is a tape that is designed for ducts. More expensive, of course, but the adhesive on it is not going to dry and crack.

There is, however, another way to approach this where you seal the ducts from the inside instead of the outside. And there’s benefits to that because you don’t have to worry about getting to every single seam, because it’s going to happen by pressurization. That process is called Aeroseal – A-e-r-o-s-e-a-l. And essentially, the way this works is they apply a material to the inside of the ducts that sticks to the gaps. Wherever there’s leaks, it fills it in.

Have you ever had a leaking radiator on your car?

CARL: Oh, yeah. I had one in my truck. Yes.

TOM: And if you drop a can of Stop Leak in there, what happens is it finds the holes and plugs them. And this works the same way. It finds the holes in the ducts – the air leaks and the holes – and it plugs them.

And it’s a good-quality product. You have to use their dealers. It’s not a – certainly not a DIY. There’s a great video online where the guys at Aeroseal work with our friends at This Old House and did sort of a complete sealing job and did a before-and-after testing to see how well it worked. And it was pretty effective.

So, I would take a look at Aeroseal as one option. And then beyond that, you could think about doing some of this duct-sealing on your own. Just use the right kinds of materials. You can use that UL 181 tape. There’s also a duct mastic, which is kind of like a putty or a paste that you can use to seal ducts. But of course, that’s a lot of work, as well. And remember, you’ve got to get to every single seam.

CARL: Right. And if you can’t find them, you can’t reach them, then you can’t get to them. But this goes on the inside, it will do it automatically. So I don’t have to have my grandson crawl through the duct. He’d like to.

TOM: Crawl through the ducts? No.

CARL: He probably would never come out.

TOM: I’m sure he would but I wouldn’t recommend it.

CARL: No. Alright. Well, you’ve been most helpful. I appreciate it and I’ve got a lot of little things to do in this house but that was one of them I wanted to get knocked off. And I listened – I was hearing you a couple days ago when I was driving across country in the truck I was hauling my stuff. And so I thought to call.

TOM: Alright. And you thought – well, have you – if you’ve got some questions with a new house, you knew who to call. And Carl, I’m so glad you did. Thanks so much for calling us at 888-MONEY-PIT.

LESLIE: Tristan in Iowa is on the line with a flooring question. What can we do for you today?

TRISTAN: It’s going to be laying down a laminate flooring. What is the most easiest way of doing it?

TOM: The easiest way to do this – laminate floor is a good place to start because laminate floor doesn’t – it’s not a floor that needs to be glued together. It usually locks together. The joints on the board usually snap together. So what you want to do – is this is a fairly square room that you’re working in or is it an oddly-shaped room?

TRISTAN: Well, I’ve got it cut and measure but for the most part, it is square.

TOM: So what you want to do is just be conscious of where the seams on the flooring are going to end up. Because if you find the middle of the room, you’ll start from there and you’ll work out. But what you want to avoid is to have the boards that are up against the wall. It’d be really narrow, like 1-inch strips or 2- or 3-inch strips. So you want to decide whether you’re going to start these seams right in the middle of the room or overlap with the first piece so that when you get to the edges of the wall, they’re kind of even.

And then the next thing is since they all kind of lock together, you want to leave a little bit of a gap, like maybe a ¼-inch in between the edge of the laminate floor and the wall or baseboard molding itself. And then you’re going to use a second piece of molding on top of that, like a quarter round or a shoe molding, to cover that seam. This allows the floor to expand and contract.

And depending on the type of floor you purchase, some of them have an underlayment built into the panel itself. And in other cases, you put down an underlayment first, which could be like a very, very thin layer of foam. It helps to give the floor a little bit of give and comfort.

TRISTAN: Well, that’s good to know. Thank you so much.

TOM: Good luck with that project. Thanks so much for calling us at 888-MONEY-PIT.

LESLIE: You are tuned to The Money Pit Home Improvement Radio Show on air and online at MoneyPit.com. You guys, we’re cruising towards a new year, so what can we do to help you get your house in tip-top shape, make all those energy-efficient improvements? Whatever it is, we’re here to help. Let’s make 2017 your home’s best year. Give us a call, 888-MONEY-PIT.

TOM: 888-666-3974.

It’s the travel season. Do you know what the signs are of a bed-bug infestation? We’re going to tell you what to look for before you step foot into your next hotel, after this.

TOM: Up until now, you purchased insulation to insulate, to help keep warm spaces warm and cool spaces cool.

LESLIE: But now, Owens Corning has changed all of that with Pure Safety High Performance Insulation. Pure Safety not only insulates but also actually contributes to a healthier, safer and more comfortable environment for your family.

TOM: That’s right. First, it’s a high-density, all-purpose insulation that efficiently fills cavities in your home with a layer of thermal protection. Next, Pure Safety contributes to healthier indoor air. It stays put in walls and floors and produces 50 percent less dust than some other insulation products. That means healthier air for your family to breathe.

LESLIE: Pure Safety is also fire-resistant. In case of a fire, you’re going to have extra minutes to escape to safety. And those are minutes that can make all the difference.

TOM: And finally, Pure Safety reduces noise up to 50 percent. It helps to keep outside noise out and reduces inside noise from traveling from room to room inside.

Pure Safety High Performance Insulation from Owens Corning, a single product that will enhance your family’s health, safety and comfort. Learn more at PureSafetyInsulation.com. Pure Safety, the greatest home improvement you’ll never see.

(theme song)

ANNOUNCER: Today’s Money Pit is presented by Mr. Beams. Lighting solutions that can be installed in five minutes. No wires, no electrician, no kidding. Find Mr. Beams lights at major retailers and learn more at MrBeams.com.

TOM: Making good homes better, welcome back to The Money Pit Home Improvement Radio Show. I’m Tom Kraeutler.

LESLIE: And I’m Leslie Segrete.

TOM: We hope you’re having a wonderful holiday weekend, enjoying it with family and friends. All that hard (audio gap) you put into decorating your house or your apartment. Let’s try not to think about the fact you’re going to have to take it all apart in probably just a week or so. But enjoy it while you’ve got it and give us a call at 888-MONEY-PIT.

LESLIE: So, you guys, it’s the holidays. I love Christmas trees. Everybody who knows me knows that I love gigantic Christmas trees. I mean the biggest, fattest, tallest for basically as tall as I can get into any living space, that’s how big of a tree I’m going to get.

And I can remember one of our first Christmases when we lived under 38^th Street in the city. There used to be just one tree vendor around us and it was this local, little flower shop. And I remember this guy who worked there. Ed and I walked up and we were like, “Aw, we want a tree I found.” And he’s like, “This is your tree.” And we’re like, “We want to look at other trees.” He’s like, “No. This is your tree.” Picks out our tree for us.

TOM: He told you.

LESLIE: And we walk it back up Lexington Avenue to our apartment, we get it upstairs and we untie it. And this tree is massive. It’s fat and it’s round. It’s the picture-perfect Christmas tree and it was great while it was alive. And then it died. And after the holidays, when I went to take the tree out, literally, I could not fit it through my doorway. And then I kept thinking of how I was going to get it down the flight of stairs, which we were on the third floor of a walk-up. And I’m like, “I’m going to be dragging this thing and I’m going to scrape up all the wallpaper and the paint. It’s going to be a mess.”

Tom, I took a saw and I cut the tree into sections.

TOM: Oh, boy.

LESLIE: I cut it into slices so it got a little pie-shaped one and then a fatter one and then a fatter one until it was this big skirt that I could just turn sideways and carry it out into the street.

TOM: Turned it into firewood. Well, you started your recycling of the tree or something, right?

LESLIE: I helped out the city of New York. But it made such a mess.

TOM: As I say, I can only imagine what a mess that was because as those trees die, all the needles just release and fall off and they get all over the place. You know, that’s the only reason I like those Christmas-tree bags.

LESLIE: Come on, you know you pull the bag up and every branch just pops through it.

TOM: Right. It doesn’t catch them all but I figure it catches about half. And that’s a lot more – a lot less that I have to clean up.

LESLIE: Well, you know what I’ve learned is I keep a canvas paint tarp or an old sheet that we don’t use anymore and I’ll lay that on the floor. And then I pick up the tree and lay that on the sheet and then I wrap it up like a burrito and then I carry it outside that way.

TOM: Oh, that’s a good idea.

LESLIE: So the mess really is contained.

TOM: But you put that – wait a minute, you put that down first before you set the tree up or you just do it at the end?

LESLIE: No, no. I lay it on the floor when I’m taking the tree down.

TOM: Oh, you just lay it down sideways.

LESLIE: Yeah. I just lay it on the floor and then I pick the tree up, I lay it on the sheet and I wrap it up in that. And then I carry it outside and then I sort of flick it off of the sheet and wash the sheet and save it for next year.

TOM: Did you figure that out after you had to disassemble the Christmas tree from your apartment?

LESLIE: Of course. After I cut the tree into sections and carried it out that way. Now, I’m a tree-removing genius. But then? Not so much.

TOM: Now you’ve got a good tip out of it.

LESLIE: Yeah.

TOM: Alright. 888-666-3974. Hey, if you’ve got a tip you want to share about your holiday décor projects, we’d love to hear it. The number is 888-MONEY-PIT.

Leslie, who’s next?

LESLIE: Hey, John in New York, you’ve got The Money Pit. How can we help you today?

JOHN: Last week, I heard something about a guy talking about drainage issues in the basement. And he started talking about certain things to make sure of with the gutters and the footer drains and making sure the soil slopes away from your house.

TOM: Yep.

JOHN: My situation is a little weird. I have a salt-box style house, 1,750 square feet. A very steep hill my house is built into. So, basically, three sides of the – two sides of the basement are partially in the soil.

TOM: OK.

JOHN: One side butts up to the garage, at the ground level, on one side of the house. And one wall of the basement is below the ground completely.

I have very good drainage. I’m on a hill, like I said. However, when it rains heavily, I do get that seep around the foundation. And my thought was, how do you slope soil away in a situation where there’s an overwhelming grade on the property coming right up against the house?

TOM: Yeah, that’s a good point. So, in your situation, the grade is not as important as what you can do to intercept that runoff through your property. So, two things. First of all, the advice that we gave you about gutters, that’s really critical even in your situation. The gutters have got to be clean, free-flowing and those downspouts have got to be discharging away from the house. In your case, you’re going to probably want to go from the uphill side to the downhill side. You might want to run them underground through solid PVC pipe and have them break out to daylight somewhere on the downhill side. So you’re really managing that roof water.

In terms of the runoff, the way you handle that is with something called a “curtain drain.”

JOHN: OK.

TOM: Basically, it’s a trough drain and it gets laid into the soil. And as the water runs down the hill, it falls into this drain and then it gets intercepted and sort of run around the house. Now, instead of going through all the work to construct a French drain where you have to dig trenches and use perforated pipe and stone and filter cloth, there’s another type of a prefabricated French drainpipe that you could pick up at Home Depot. And it’s made by NDS.

It’s an EZ-Drain pipe. And you’ll recognize it when you see it, because it’s a plastic drainage pipe that’s surrounded with – it looks kind of like a packing peanut and then there’s a filter cloth around that. So they’re one piece. They’re modular. And you basically stack these up side by side and then put the soil back on top of them. It’s a very fast, easy way to put that French drain in without going through all of the work that you would have to if you were building it kind of from scratch.

So, in your case, you have to put this drain in to intercept the runoff of the water, run it around the house, again, out to daylight and then I think that your water problems will go away.

Thanks so much for calling us at 888-MONEY-PIT.

LESLIE: Well, if you’re traveling this holiday season, there’s a good chance you’ll be bringing some new things home with you. Let’s make sure that bed bugs aren’t one of them, OK, guys?

TOM: Bed bugs have made a huge comeback in the last few years. They don’t spread diseases but they do bite and they do cause sort of itchy welts. And they’re really hard to evict. So the key is really keeping them out to begin with.

LESLIE: Yeah. Now, bed bugs, they’re most likely to hitch a ride with you when you’re traveling. So if you’re staying at a hotel or another person’s house this holiday, you want to make sure you know what to look for. Bed bugs, guys, they’re flat and they’re tiny and they’re little insects and they’re tan to brown in coloring. That is until after they bite and then they turn a reddish color. And I’m going to tell you, guys, they turn red because they’re filled with your blood. It’s gross.

TOM: Yeah. Thanks for sharing that.

So here’s what you want to do. When you check in, you want to sort of survey your hotel room right away for any sign of an infestation. Keep an eye out for brown or red spots on the sheets or other fabrics and be alert for a musty, sweet odor. It’s not something you want to smell around your bed, because it might mean that bed bugs are present.

LESLIE: No. When you get into your hotel room, take the sheets off the bed. Look at the mattress. This is what I learned from Hotel Impossible. You look at the mattress. You want to look at that little piping edge on the mattress’s seams and you’ll see little brown dots or little, sometimes even bigger bugs in that area. So I always immediately take the sheets off and start to take a look around.

You also want to remember that they really do like to be close to their food source, so you want to make sure that you’re looking around the bedding, looking around the floor, all the upholstered areas. And then don’t put your luggage on the floor. Use one of those little luggage-cart things if they have it. If not, keep it in the bathroom on the tile floor. I know it sounds weird but truly, that’s the best place for your suitcase.

TOM: Yeah. And when you get home, you also want to inspect your luggage for the bugs. If you do see any signs of a bed bug, you want to get the pros involved right away. Treating an infestation is not a do-it-yourself project; it’s something you need professional help for. So get in touch with a pro right away and they will make them disappear.

888-666-3974. Give us a call, right now, with your next home improvement project question.

LESLIE: Marilyn in South Dakota is on the line with a cabinet question. How can we help you today?

MARILYN: A galley kitchen. It’s very small. We just live in a small ranch but I – we put in quarter-sawn, custom-built cabinets with the crown molding to the ceiling – the French cabinets up to the ceiling. And they’re European-style. And so, we’re going to be putting the house on the market. And my husband and I are having a little debate because I want to take them out and bring them with. They’re quarter-sawn solid oak and we put them in years ago where if we had to repeat this again, now it would be three times the cost.

And so I want to take them out and I’m designing a new home. So, I have the galley design sort of drawn in. And so we could put them, basically, in the same configuration with just a little bit more room on both ends for other living space. So I was wanting to get in your opinion on that.

TOM: Sure. I mean why not? You can basically disassemble it the same way that you assembled it. You mentioned that you have crown molding on the cabinets all the way up to the ceiling. That’d be the place to start. And I would take the doors off – take the molding apart, take the doors off next – because you don’t want to have to work on those cabinets with the doors on them.

So I would take the doors off at the hinges, carefully pack them and store them and label them so you know which cabinet they go to. Then just start taking the boxes apart. Start with the wall cabinets and work your way down to the base cabinets. And you know, the difficulty of the project is going to be totally based on how they put it together the first time. But hopefully, you can get everything apart pretty quickly. With just some very gentle prying off of the molding and with the removing of those cabinets the same way they were assembled – they were probably screwed into the wall – you should be good to go.

I would be careful that – the wall cabinets are usually also screwed together. And so you may have to pull out more fasteners than you expect. But I certainly don’t see any reason you can’t disassemble them, especially given the fact that they’re good-quality cabinets and that you feel like there’s a place for them in the new home.

MARILYN: I’ve been wanting to kind of call about this but we weren’t sure until we found out for sure we were going to be moving.

TOM: Alright. Well, it sounds like we’ve got a plan. Thanks so much for calling us at 888-MONEY-PIT.

LESLIE: Hey, if you ever tried to buy a new heating or cooling system, you might find lingo like HVAC, BTU and SEER just completely adding to your confusion. Well, we’re going to sort out all of that confusing alphabet soup that gets in the way of shopping for energy-efficient systems, next.

NORM: Hi. I’m Norm Abram from This Old House and when we’re working on our projects, we listen to The Money Pit.

ANNOUNCER: Did you know that more than 90 percent of U.S. homes are under-insulated, causing increased energy costs and uncomfortable temperatures year-round? An industry leader, Owens Corning, has a new solution to help homeowners and contractors identify air leakage by performing a home energy assessment.

The new Comfort Tracker app by Owens Corning can help you locate problem areas throughout the home. The Comfort Tracker app works with the FLIR ONE Thermal Imaging Camera, which attaches to your iPhone, iPad or Android device. By visiting OCComfortApp.com, you can learn more and download the Owens Corning Comfort Tracker app free for your iOS or Android device. Room by room, you’ll have a prioritized master plan to improve your home’s energy efficiency, ensuring comfortable temperatures all season long.

Visit OCComfortApp.com today and put the power of a professional energy audit right in your hand.

(theme song)

TOM: Making good homes better, welcome back to The Money Pit Home Improvement Radio Show. Happy Holidays, everybody. I’m Tom Kraeutler.

LESLIE: And I’m Leslie Segrete.

Well, are you deep in the midst of holiday baking? Is your oven showing it? Well, here’s a quick recipe for an easy clean. You just want to make a paste of baking soda and water. Now, apply that paste and then scrub with a Scotch pad. If you’ve got some stubborn stains, you can add some salt to the mix.

TOM: Good, natural, oven-cleaning recipe right there. And if your oven is self-cleaning, you won’t need any paste but make sure you run that cycle well before any big dinner parties are planned, to avoid breakdowns. They’re more likely to occur right after the cleaning cycle. So if it does look kind of gross and you’re getting ready to cook that big holiday meal today or tomorrow, I would say wait until the middle of next week, then do it. In case it breaks down, you’ll at least have some time to fix it before the New Year’s celebration starts.

LESLIE: Alright. We’ve got Leda on the line with a question about moisture. What can we do for you today?

LEDA: I have a conventional foundation. The house built in 1970. Solid hardwood floors. And rain was collecting, pooling under the house. I think I’ve got that stopped but I’m wondering – before I got it stopped, there was this powdery-gray – like a mold or mildew. Not very wide, real narrow. And I’m wondering where that – what that is and how to stop that if it comes back.

LESLIE: Well, that’s just a mineral-salt deposit. They call that “efflorescence.” And that’s generally when the water gets into the wall and then dries out, you’re left with just the mineral laying on your wall. And that gives it sort of a cloudy, grayish look to it. And it’s actually easy to get rid of, especially if the water situation has fixed itself. What you would do is you take a little bit of white vinegar and water and you can mix it in a spray bottle. And you put it right on that and it wipes right away.

LEDA: OK.

TOM: Well, good luck with that project. I hope that helps you out. Thanks so much for calling us at 888-MONEY-PIT.

LESLIE: Well, there’s a lot of jargon in the world of HVAC, including those four letters themselves. And all this confusing alphabet soup sometimes gets in the way of shopping for, maintaining or fixing your heating-and-air-conditioning systems.

TOM: Well, here to tell us how to decode the HVAC lingo is Richard Trethewey, the plumbing-and-heating contractor on TV’s TOH, This Old House.

RICHARD: Giving away all the secrets? I can’t do that.

TOM: Hi, Richard.

RICHARD: Hey. How are you?

TOM: So, it’s a question that we hear a lot. What do all of these letters mean in the acronyms that are associated with your heating-and-air-conditioning systems? So let’s start with the basics: HVAC.

RICHARD: It is like alphabet soup, isn’t it?

TOM: It is. It really is.

RICHARD: HVAC. So that’s heating, ventilating, air-conditioning. And so we’ve shortened it to HVAC but it’s sort of the all-encompassing world of I’m going to heat it, I’m going to cool it, I’m going to put some fresh air into it.

TOM: And that’s part of what confuses people because I think that folks don’t recognize the importance of the V part of that, which is ventilating.

RICHARD: Yeah. Ventilating is critically important to get fresh air, particularly as you make these buildings much tighter.

LESLIE: Now, there’s a lot of other acronyms in the HVAC world.

RICHARD: Oh, yeah. There’s a whole book of them. Yeah.

LESLIE: So let’s talk about them. I hear the term MERV a lot.

RICHARD: Yeah. I loved him.

LESLIE: Yeah, Merv Griffin? Great guy.

RICHARD: He was so good.

TOM: He was such a great host, yeah.

RICHARD: He used to have Charo on all the time.

LESLIE: Cuchi cuchi.

RICHARD: So MERV actually stands for minimum efficiency reporting value. And this is an important measurement for how good is a filter. There’s a test standard and so you’ll be looking for some ratings that run from MERV 1 to MERV 16. But most of them are sitting – the decent ones are all sitting at MERV 7, 8 and 9.

Now, when you have a higher resistance, be careful. If I have one that’s got so much resistance that every bit of dirt gets sucked – gets absorbed in it, it might be so hard to push air through that I have to have a bigger blower. It doesn’t work. So you have to – this number – just getting the highest number is not the answer. You’ve got to get the right answer.

TOM: Not always the best.

RICHARD: Right.

TOM: Right. So you have that right combination of efficiency and airflow.

RICHARD: That’s right. Right. Yep.

TOM: Now, what about SEER? That’s another common one – S-E-E-R. That’s an important number that is often used when you’re buying an appliance, because it’s usually stuck on the yellow label in front of it, right?

RICHARD: Yeah. In the efficiency world, there’s all sorts of SEERs, there’s an EER. So, seasonal energy efficiency ratio.

TOM: So that’s SEER – S-E-E-R.

RICHARD: OK, SEER. And then there’s the energy efficiency ratio. And there’s a million of them that all talk about how efficient it is. And so, one is how much of the fuel that I bought and burned became usable heat? But the seasonal energy efficiency ratio is really about how over the course of a season – and hence the word “season” – how efficient it will be. So it takes into account weather occurrences that it was tested under. And so, when you’re talking about air-conditioning, they’re going to measure the air-conditioning condenser outside.

Now, there was a time that we had SEER of 8 and 9. And now, we have minimums of 13 SEER. Now, 13 SEER is what you want as a minimum. It gets up to 18, it gets up to 22. And I’ve got to caution you that as you get higher efficiency, the units get physically bigger, bigger, bigger, bigger, bigger, bigger because they’re trying – the way that they’re doing it is they’re dividing the amount of cooling power divided by the electricity.

LESLIE: Larger.
TOM: Oh, is that right?

RICHARD: So if they can have a much bigger fan that has just a gentle motor in it, then it’s going to have less electricity and more return.

LESLIE: I think I got one of the first SEER 16 condensing units.

RICHARD: Yes. Yep, yep.

LESLIE: This was probably eight years ago?

RICHARD: Yeah. Was it big?

LESLIE: It’s as big as my house.

RICHARD: Yeah, that’s right.

LESLIE: So I have this super-tiny, little Dutch Colonial with this enormous condensing unit outside. I mean it’s kind of comical.

RICHARD: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. As Tommy Silva would say, more is plenty.

LESLIE: Now, speaking of more, let’s talk about A/C tons. I think people think that there’s the weight of the physical container itself.

RICHARD: Oh yeah. Yeah. Yeah, they don’t think we should be able to carry the equipment in because it weighs 2 tons.

TOM: Two tons, yeah.

RICHARD: It weighs 2 tons. And that actually goes back to the old days when the ice man was in play. And there was a – it was a measurement when they have an ice house, how many tons – how much heat would it take to melt a ton of ice?

TOM: Oh, is that right?

RICHARD: Absolutely. It goes right back to that (inaudible at 0:27:57).

TOM: Wow.

RICHARD: And so, I will tell you that it’s a measurement of a ton. It’s the cooling power that you have available to you. I will tell you that in New England, anyways, you need a ton of cooling for every 600 to 700 square feet of space. It’s a typical thing. With these modern houses, they’re getting super tight. We could go up to 800 or 1,000 but the typical house built here. And so it’s got nothing to do with the weight of the equipment; it’s a question of the size.

And I want to caution you. On this issue of tonnage, you want to get the right amount of cooling power. More is not better. More is not better. Everybody says, “Oh, how much for a 2-ton system? OK, how much for a 3-ton system?” And then when you tell them a 3 ton, they say, “We’ll take that,” as if they’re getting a deal.

TOM: Right.

RICHARD: And if – but if the load – if what the building needs is 2 tons, if you put in one that’s 30 percent too big, it’s the worst thing you could ever do.

LESLIE: Because it never turns off.

RICHARD: It’s on and off.

TOM: It cycles.

RICHARD: No. It’s on and it’s off, it’s on and it’s off. And it never stays on long enough to actually pull out the humidity. So now you’ve got cold but no humidity removal. And half the battle to be comfortable is to get that humidity level to a reasonable place.

TOM: You get that cold, clammy feeling all the time. Yeah. That’s a great point.

RICHARD: That’s right, that’s right. Those are tons, yep.

TOM: Now, let’s talk about some newer systems that are out there. Not so much newer to the world because these have been used in Europe for decades at this point. But we’re starting to see them more widely distributed in the States. And that’s the system called the “ductless mini-split unit.”

RICHARD: Right, right. So, the acronym that some people call it is DFS – duct-free split. And ductless mini-splits. And you’ve seen them. They read like the who’s who of Asian manufacturing. They’ll have a cassette up on the high side wall or they can be ducted. And unlike the other typical domestic systems we already had, which was a furnace with a series of ductwork going through to every room and returns from each room.

TOM: Right.

RICHARD: And you try to balance it and it would never have the exact temperature you want it to.

Duct-free splits are light – have either a single box outside connected to a single box inside and all you have to run between them is two relatively small refrigerant lines and electricity. Or you can have a single box outside and up to 4 or 5 – or in the commercial world, you could have 100 different inside boxes connected to 1. And now, you can get localized zoning, quiet, really efficient both heating and cooling.

TOM: So lots of things to know when you are purchasing a new HVAC system.

RICHARD: Yeah.

TOM: Fortunately, we’ve got Richard Trethewey from TV’s This Old House to help us sort out all of this alphabet soup.

Richard, thank you so much for stopping by The Money Pit.

RICHARD: Yeah, yeah.

TOM: Great advice.

RICHARD: Yeah. Just always say the name Merv and (inaudible at 0:30:40).

TOM: Merv, right?

RICHARD: Merv.

TOM: Got it.

LESLIE: Alright. Catch the current season of This Old House and Ask This Old House on PBS. For local listings and step-by-step videos of many common home improvement projects, visit ThisOldHouse.com.

TOM: And This Old House and Ask This Old House are brought to you on PBS by GMC. GMC, we are professional grade.

Just ahead, are you planning to give yourself the gift of a new kitchen this coming year? There are four things you should know to look for that can spell the difference between cabinets that are well-made and those that are just not. We’ll share those secrets, after this.

The new Comfort Tracker app by Owens Corning can help you locate problem areas throughout the home. The Comfort Tracker app works with the FLIR ONE Thermal Imaging Camera, available on HomeDepot.com, which attaches to your iPhone, iPad or Android device. By visiting OCComfortApp.com, you can learn more and download the Owens Corning Comfort Tracker app free for your iOS or Android device. It will walk you through the entire insulation-assessment process and will help you identify the products to use for your project. Room by room, you’ll have a prioritized master plan to improve your home’s energy efficiency, ensuring comfortable temperatures all season long.

Visit OCComfortApp.com today and put the power of a professional energy audit right in your hand.

(theme song)

TOM: Making good homes better, welcome back to The Money Pit Home Improvement Radio Show. I’m Tom Kraeutler.

LESLIE: And I’m Leslie Segrete.

TOM: Happy Holidays. Give us a call, right now, with your home improvement question. We’re here to help at 1-888-MONEY-PIT.

Well, is a new kitchen in your plan for 2017? It’s a big project that can be made a lot easier if you know what to look for when you’re shopping for those kitchen cabinets. CliqStudios.com, great company. They manufacture and sell well-made, durable cabinets that are going to last. And I think the features of the CliqStudios.com cabinets provide a good example of what makes a good-quality cabinet.

LESLIE: Yeah. You know, first, you want to look at the drawers. Now, well-made drawers are going to use dovetail joints. This really is an age-old cabinet builder’s technique that literally locks the sides of the drawers together so that they can stand up to the test of the ages.

TOM: Those dovetail joints, when they’re done right, you almost don’t even need any glue. The box is just so strong as a result of the joinery itself.
Now, speaking of strong boxes, you want to look at that cabinet box next. It ought to be made out of plywood, not particle board. Plywood cabinets are really strong, really hold up to wear and tear and they last in the long run. And over the years, I’ve had to rip out many a kitchen. And I can tell you, from firsthand experience, the ones that had plywood are just as sturdy as the day they went in. If it’s particle board, they fall apart. You can’t get them off the wall but the plywood ones, rock solid. In fact, I even hate to throw them away. I usually find a place to donate them to.

LESLIE: Yeah. That’s a really smart idea, Tom, because they do last so long. You want to give them a second life.

Next, check out the hinges and the drawer glides. These should be soft-close. Now, what that means is that the doors and the drawers can’t be slammed shut. They sort of close to a point and then softly close the rest of the way. And that’s going to save on wear and tear.

TOM: Now, lastly, you want to look for these certifications – KCMA – that’s the Kitchen Cabinet Manufacturers Association – and CARB2. CliqStudios.com cabinets carry both and I think that speaks to their commitment to the quality of the cabinet construction and their adherence to strict environmental responsibility.

For example, the standards that the KCMA puts out for drawers – I think this is indicative of why this is so important – they have to stand up to being loaded to 15 pounds per square foot and then opened and closed 25,000 times. Twenty-five thousand times. I think that’s more than even my kids used to open and close the drawers in a day.

LESLIE: Guys, the other thing that I love about CliqStudios is that they have professional designers who work with every customer and they do a free cabinet design. And as a special offer to Money Pit listeners, you can download a free design guide put together by our friends from This Old House by visiting CliqStudios.com/Free today.

TOM: That’s right. Just go to CliqStudios.com/Free to get the free This Old House guide and start planning your new designer kitchen. That’s C-l-i-q-Studios.com/Free.

LESLIE: Doug in Rhode Island is on the line with a flooring question. Tell us about your project.

DOUG: Yeah. I’m considering pulling out some carpeting and putting in a floating floor. But I’m looking for good quality, something that would be – have a decent thickness and also the possibility to be refinished, need be, in 10 years or whatever. Is there something like that?

LESLIE: Well, with a floating floor, I mean I think if you’re looking for something that has the potential to be refinished, you’re going to want to look at an engineered hardwood. Because that’s going to assemble the same way that a laminate would. And it’s also going to be structurally stable if you’re looking for flooring to go on a space maybe below grade or in a room that might have a higher moisture content.

But the difference between a laminate, which you cannot refinish, and an engineered hardwood is an engineered hardwood is going to be a base of a plywood. So you’re going to have the opposing layers of the grains so that it’ll be structurally stable. And then the topmost layer is the actual hardwood. And so you’re able to re-sand it, depending on the manufacturer, a couple of times, up to five times. It really depends on which one and the thickness of that top layer. And that will give you the opportunity to do so when and if you need it down the line.

DOUG: Is there a particular name that you’d recommend or …?

TOM: Yeah. Take a look at the products that are available at Lumber Liquidators. They have a very good selection in all lines of durability, as well.

DOUG: OK. Great. Listen, I appreciate that. Thank you for your time.

LESLIE: Well, the holiday lights are up but they’re going to be coming down and getting packed away very soon. We’re going to share some tips on how to store your decorations safely so that they’ll work next year, after this.

(theme song)

ANNOUNCER: The Money Pit is presented by CliqStudios.com, the smarter way to get a designer kitchen. Visit CliqStudios.com/Free and get a free copy of their Kitchen Cabinets Buyer’s Guide, produced in partnership with This Old House. That’s C-l-i-q-Studios.com/Free.

TOM: Making good homes better, welcome back to The Money Pit Home Improvement Radio Show. I’m Tom Kraeutler.

LESLIE: And I’m Leslie Segrete.

TOM: And it is officially the ho-ho-home improvement time of the year. It’s the time when you’re doing a lot of ho-ho but you’re not maybe doing as much home improvement. But we know that you’re thinking about it for the year ahead. So give us a call, shoot us an e-mail at 888-MONEY-PIT.

LESLIE: Please, you’ve probably got a stack of gift cards to all those fun décor places and you’re ready to get to work. So let us know what you’re working on and let us know how we can give you a hand.

Alright. We’ve got a post here from Claire who writes: “Every year, when I hang my holiday lights, it always seems that one or two strands don’t work. Is there anything I should be doing to protect the lights when I put them away in a couple of weeks so that they last until next season?”

TOM: I think it’s always amazing, first of all, that when you – the lights worked when you took them off the tree or off the wall or the house. But then somehow, mysteriously, over the next 12 months, they stop working. And when you try to plug them back in, you know, you get a situation where a string is out or certainly bulbs are out.

And I think the key is that when you take them off of the house or off the tree, you need to really pack them carefully. And what I found is the best way to do that – you can get some of these hangers when you can wrap the string around it. It’s kind of like an H-shaped piece of plastic that they sell for holiday lights, where you can rewrap the lights in that sort of circle around the hanger. Or you can just do it with a piece of cardboard so that the string is fairly secure and tight but not too tight.

And then you want to place those in your boxes to be put away for the season. Don’t put the lights in too loose because sometimes, just dropping them in the box and taking them out is enough to knock one bulb loose. And with the way most of these lights are wired, if one bulb is loose, the whole string is dead.

Now, I always love the fact that when you buy these lights, it says, “If one light goes out, the whole string is not affected.” Well, that’s true if it burns out but they almost never burn out. What happens is they get loose in the socket. And when that happens, the whole string stops working. So, I think if you use one of these hangers, one of these cord wraps to put the cord around and make it nice and tight, when you put it away, you’re going to have a much more – better chance of them working well next year.

LESLIE: Alright. Next up, we’ve got a post here from Mike in New York who writes: “I keep seeing backsplashes made of small, ½-inch glass tile. Would it be cost effective to cut those tiles myself rather than buying them in sheets?”

Oh, geez, Louise, I’m going to say no. If you start cutting all these tiles yourself, first of all, you’re not going to guarantee that they’re going to be properly shaped. Second of all, you’re probably going to end up with so much waste just from trying to get them to be a ½-inch square. And then maybe or maybe not you’ll end up with the same amount of fingers you started with. I’m just saying.

I think, really, the best thing is to buy those sheets. They come in 12-inch-square or 18-inch-square sheets that are already on the mesh backing. They’re already laid out for you. And then you just go ahead and put your adhesive on and put the tiling sheet onto that, let that set and then you can go ahead and grout it.

If you want something more customizable, there is a designer that I’ve worked with for a gajillion years. Her name is Susan Jablon and she’s got an online website. And you can custom-pick all of those little, ½-inch-square tiles and create your own color palette. Totally up to you.

TOM: This is The Money Pit Home Improvement Radio Show on air and online at MoneyPit.com. Hey, we hope that you are having a magnificent holiday today, this weekend and for all the days beyond as we celebrate this wonderful season together with your family and your friends. We are your friends and we are going to be here, 24/7, to help you today, tomorrow and hopefully for a very long time at 888-MONEY-PIT.

So, remember, as you are thinking about next year and what you want to do in your home, if the idea comes to mind, the question comes to mind, you need some advice, give us a call right then and there at 888-MONEY-PIT. If we’re not in the studio, our gift to you is that we’ll call you back the next time we are.

That’s all the time we have this hour. The show does continue online. I’m Tom Kraeutler.

LESLIE: And I’m Leslie Segrete.

TOM: Remember, you can do it yourself …

LESLIE: But you don’t have to do it alone.