Eric Goranson and Caroline Blazovsky dive into projects and some of the hard things they learned on them. They discuss storm door installation issues and fence staining to may other projects around the house!

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Mentioned in this episode:

Baldwin Hardware

Baldwin Hardware

A new kind of decking and siding from Millboard

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[00:00:04] Caroline Blazovsky: and I did go old Anderson to newer Anderson. So I was consistent with that. Okay. The other thing was I had to order, um, you know, you, pre-order the side where your lock is gonna go. So in your handle, right? So I went with the left. What was interesting. Now I've never had this happen before the lock of my door was sticking out too far.

[00:00:33] Eric Goranson: you my trick on that little piece of felt, what I've done yeah. Is I've gone through I've uninstalled the storm door and I've gone in and made the brick mold around the outside a little bit thicker by adding some wood to it.

[00:00:49] Intro: is a lot to know the, we got you covered. This is around the house.

[00:01:08] Caroline Blazovsky: Hello everybody. Hey, how's

[00:01:30] Caroline Blazovsky: Home in our studio and I've been working like a dog and he's been on vacation. No, he had to put on vacation. He's working and doing a little bit of vacationing. Yeah. I'm just working

[00:01:54] Eric Goranson: I tell you what they're. I've been to probably 20 or 30 different times where, you [00:02:00] know, manufacturers have flown me out or I've done some consulting work. They're they're, that is the top shelf. As far as them taking care of you and getting to learn some new stuff. It was really fun to see a lot of the stuff out there had a great time and

[00:02:17] Caroline Blazovsky: So tell us, what did you see out there and what did you.

[00:02:35] Eric Goranson: And of course I'll tell some of my Folies on the way out there. I got stuck at O'Hare airport for six and a half hours because of a huge scheduling slash mechanical issue with a. On, uh, it's always that

[00:02:51] Caroline Blazovsky: now everybody gets stuck. I mean, I don't, I don't know anybody who hasn't been on a flight.

[00:02:57] Eric Goranson: This is my first time. And so it was kind of funny. So we're sitting [00:03:00] there, we land and we could see that there was a, a delay. So the plane shows up, you know, hours later. And then when it shows up, this is where I got frustrated as I showed up. And I'm like, really? They're like, oh, sorry, the pilot's out of hours.

[00:03:31] Eric Goranson: And so we finally got in. And, uh, that was cool. And, uh, had a great time that night we, uh, walked in and they had us up at this, uh, hotel car, Michael, which is a really, really nice hotel. And they had a piano bar, uh, down in the basement and we were down there. They were, everybody was having dinner in karaoke.

[00:04:10] Eric Goranson: It's cool. Nice. Lots of stone work. It was awesome. But uh, spent a great amount of time there and, uh, really got to figure out kind of what those guys are doing. Julie gave me a hard time cause I actually got up and sing karaoke, which I never. I think she's ever seen me sing karaoke before, so I actually got up and did it, but good times.

[00:04:43] Eric Goranson: Well, it's funny, you know, you look back at the, the origination of Delta and they're the ones that actually started Masco, the big Masco corporation that owns, you know, lots of different companies out there in the home improvement space.

[00:05:27] Eric Goranson: Now that is really cool from the home improvement or construction side of things. You know, when you put in a shower valve, for instance, You know, you're gonna maybe have a shower or a tub shower that valve you put in there they've simplified it. So you can put the rough in, in, and then you can figure out what type of cartridge you want in there.

[00:06:05] Caroline Blazovsky: Do they have a giant showroom?

[00:06:09] Eric Goranson: It is massive. And, uh, they are just bringing on a steam shower line. So they were doing some remodeling to, to include that in there. And if you saw on, uh, the, around the house Facebook page, I did a little quick little video of the, uh, Frank Lloyd Wright FAU.

[00:06:28] Caroline Blazovsky: And they had like, they had a demonstration where they were running the faucet and there's real water going through it. It's not like you're going to a kitchen. Bathy and you just look at a model. They actually had a working faucet. It was cool.

[00:06:41] Eric Goranson: So you could actually turn it on. They had the shower system you could turn on and you know, people go, oh, okay. It runs water. It's pretty. It's cool. But when it comes down to it, and this is where it makes a difference, we've all had shower heads. You go, oh, that's pretty. Like in a hotel, for instance, how many times Caroline, you've been in a hotel room.

[00:07:20] Eric Goranson: Liquid knife. Cutting you. You know what I mean? You're like, it's

[00:07:25] Eric Goranson: yeah. Hey, this isn't good. So they have done a great job of going through with their H two O connect technology to use less water, but give you the feeling of having more water.

[00:07:59] Caroline Blazovsky: yeah.

[00:08:00] Eric Goranson: that's missing. Yeah. It's missing, but it's cold, right? It still feels cold. Some of those shower heads, the warm water comes out and like the droplets are so small. When they come out and missed like two inches out, they're already cold, so you're wet, but you're getting cold.

[00:08:16] Caroline Blazovsky: Like a lot of the shower heads. I always complain that they're not giving me full coverage. Like it's just getting my hair in my head and my body standing there getting cold. And that's the key, like to getting your whole body feeling like it's getting showered at once? I think, yeah, that's a

[00:08:29] Eric Goranson: shower to me.

[00:08:51] Eric Goranson: So it's giving you the feeling of a lot of water, huh? But your body can't, it just feels like you're getting twice the water than what you. [00:09:00] So that's kind of the key right there. So that was really making us out, faking us out. But, uh, and you know, something, our hotel had that shower head in it, it was, it was a gorgeous hotel.

[00:09:28] Eric Goranson: Other thing I learned about faucets and stuff and, and a great story too, how they've dealt with kind of a situation that went sideways while we were there. And I was just really impressed. So I have to give 'em some props, Caroline, we come back. We'll do that. And then I wanna hear about your, uh, Storm door story.

[00:09:50] Intro: so hot.

[00:09:59] Intro: Hey,

[00:10:04] Intro: home. I hid your line. You got me thinking about the day we move along. You have me singing in your

[00:10:21] Eric Goranson: You've been

[00:10:26] Eric Goranson: Yeah. Wow. They took care of us. And I, I wanted to give a shout out here. You know, we spent a lot of time at, at, uh, at Delta breeze over three days and they did a great job taking care of us and got to play with the research and development people.

[00:11:05] Eric Goranson: And they have a whole team of people in a certified lab in their own building. The tests. Incredible. Yeah. And as long as it map passes, the half a million uses mark.

[00:11:20] Caroline Blazovsky: fascinating to our audience. Look at that. Look at the care that people think about that goes into your kitchen or your bathroom.

[00:11:27] Eric Goranson: incredible designed to be solid. And I can promise you that stuff that you buy online, that's the no name brand or the, the stuff you get on Amazon or whatever that you've never heard of it. Ain't got that. And it, I can tell you that right now, I can tell you that right now. So we had a great time with that, you know, and then they had like big 3d printers that they use for, um, for testing and design.

[00:12:14] Eric Goranson: So it looks like a Chrome or a brass or whatever, and they can make a plastic replica of it at a 3d printing and see if it works. And tweak it before they even use a piece of metal shrimpy. It's kind of cool, you know, kind of cool that they can do that. So that makes it really, really easy from that. But here's one thing that went sideways on this trip and, you know, that's where you really see when companies can react or not.

[00:13:01] Eric Goranson: Something's sums up. Well, unfortunately one of the people, and I don't know who it was on. The team of 30 had caught COVID and tested positive that morning. And I, I have to shout out to Delta Brizo as a company in Masco, because I've never seen how a company has dealt with this. So lovingly and graciously.

[00:13:49] Eric Goranson: You can go. If you're worried about you, like you might have symptoms and you want to sit here in this gorgeous hotel and sit here for five days and make sure that [00:14:00] you quarantine for five days, we'll pick up the cost and your airfare on the way back. Nice. Very nice. Or if you want to continue on, you know, let's put masks on, let's wash our hands.

[00:14:30] Caroline Blazovsky: yeah, exactly. Everybody's got different situations.

[00:14:35] Eric Goranson: family. Yeah. So it was, it was absolutely awesome. And hats off to them, you know, it's, it's one thing to throw a really cool event and, you know, ask us questions and give input and all that stuff. But when something goes sideways like that, that's out of everyone's control.

[00:15:16] Eric Goranson: That's very important that I wanted to bring up here in the show real quick, DeWalt recalls nearly 1.4 million Mir saws due to injury and laceration hazard. Mm, go over to the consumer product safety commission. If you've got one of those chop saws, the Dewal ones, um, there's about 1.4 million of them out there where the guard guard can come apart.

[00:16:00] Eric Goranson: Yeah. Mm-hmm they said, uh, make sure you stop using the saw contact Dewal for details and they will get you a free repair kit, or you can take the saw to DeWalt service center for a free repair. And, uh, if you registered it, they are contacting all the purchasers to make sure that's it. So there's your tip right there.

[00:16:41] Eric Goranson: This is great. You were, you were doing the storm door battle. I did.

[00:17:00] Caroline Blazovsky: Push to open or push to hold button that, you know, everybody sees it takes up space. Right. So if you're trying to move in a, an item into the house, maybe you're moving a, a sofa, you've got these things, you gotta take the door off, it's a pain. So they've got this awesome technology now, which I really like.

[00:17:28] Intro: Yeah.

[00:17:30] Eric Goranson: If you wanna hold it open, you have to slide that little piece of metal out and that kind of jams it open. You gotta chain sitting there that you're in case of wind gets it. You know,

[00:17:41] Caroline Blazovsky: clean, clean, gone, nice door jam. Like, I mean, I'm telling you, I, I'm going to say. Because we're honest on the show.

[00:18:09] Caroline Blazovsky: Put it in. It's gonna help you tremendously. However, there's some caveats that we gotta

[00:18:24] Eric Goranson: We'll do that just as soon as around the house returns.

[00:18:56] Eric Goranson: you're listening to around the house with Eric G and Caroline B [00:19:00] Zeke sky. And I'm gonna show you how to shred it out while you're

[00:19:20] Eric Goranson: Welcome back to around the house show. This is where Caroline and I talk about to help you be better caretakers of that house you're living in are gonna be living in. And well, Caroline and I, when we were just going out to break here, we were talking about your storm door install. Yeah. And, uh, sounds like you had a couple hiccups along the way, or at least challenges.

[00:19:41] Caroline Blazovsky: preface this, this door is well worth it. Like I was out there in 98 degree. Sweating. My took us off doing this and it's, and I'm still telling you, I have like this pride feeling when I look at this door. It's awesome. However, there's some things that you need to be prepared if you're gonna do this install because it took me all day [00:20:00] yeah.

[00:20:19] Caroline Blazovsky: Um, okay. So I'm using the screen insert instead, but it did not fit and it looked like the caulking within the window. Piece was sort of over cocked and, and ah, messed up. So maybe that it, so that was noticeable. It, it was banged up on the outside the scratches. I wasn't so happy with that. They're supposed to be in the directions.

[00:20:58] Caroline Blazovsky: The trim pieces that go around you're [00:21:00] framing have to be, as Eric said, minored. Yep. Is the word or cut? Yep. Where in the directions, it tells you that they want you to do it, let it just, you know, come down onto your threshold. So imagine the pieces will kind of hang over your threshold and that doesn't look good to me.

[00:21:34] Eric Goranson: is awesome.

[00:21:52] Eric Goranson: Credit, they're trying to build a storm door. That's gonna fit every store out there. Right. Mm-hmm and so they have to kind of make it a universal fit. It's not like they [00:22:00] go, oh, you've got an Anderson door. You've got a Simpson door. You've got, you know, any, one of the different brands out there. They just go out.

[00:22:11] Caroline Blazovsky: universal. And I did go old Anderson to newer Anderson. So I was consistent with that. Okay. The other thing was I had to order, um, you know, you, pre-order the side where your lock is gonna go. So in your handle, right? So I went with the left, but was interesting.

[00:22:41] Caroline Blazovsky: Cause I can do it, but I've got a piece of, uh, little, can I tell you

[00:23:02] Eric Goranson: So it brings the door out that ha you know, three quarters of an inch. So the lock handle and stuff don't hit. Mmm. So like you've got an old house, right. That's made out of a two by four construction. Yeah. Yeah. You know, most new houses due to energy code are made two by six or even two by eight, depending on where you're at.

[00:23:43] Caroline Blazovsky: Well, you'll be happy about what I did. So instead I went with the electronic door door. You go, went for the lock. The, I went with the Yale. I haven't installed it so we can talk about that next week, but that's coming up.

[00:24:06] Eric Goranson: Yeah, that's what it was. And it's, it's solid, but yeah, it's almost probably flush with my door. So I know that if I put a storm door in the front, I'm gonna have a C. No

[00:24:24] Caroline Blazovsky: So I don't mess up my door handles if they accidentally bump into each other. But yeah, smart. I'm going to uh, yeah, so that's getting changed out and I'm gonna go with the new interior door as well. So I think the whole thing I'm going with

[00:24:37] Caroline Blazovsky: then, uh, oh my God, we have projects coming out the

[00:24:41] Eric Goranson: Yeah, exactly. And then, uh, you're diving into, uh, getting ready to do some, uh, door removal. Aren't you, you putting a new door in and stuff like that?

[00:25:00] Caroline Blazovsky: So the kitchen's gonna go out to a nice deck. Nice. Make

[00:25:07] Intro: oh, it's

[00:25:08] Intro: up my flashing

[00:25:26] Eric Goranson: One of the things I like to do when I'm reframing is put a couple degrees of pitch to the outside on that bottom sill. So the top of the framing of the window. Yeah. That way, if any water does get around it and intrude, you know, like when you get your hurricanes rolling in or anything else, it still helps to kinda kick that out to the outside.

[00:25:47] Intro: Eye. I.

[00:26:10] Eric Goranson: So next time it's gonna be even crazier, cuz we'll have more stories and stuff. But, uh, it was fun getting to know some of these people that, uh, you know, we've, we've seen in, you know, we've all seen people in zoom meetings, right? We all have that. Or we have the, this kind of stuff. It was really cool to be face to face with him and, and having fun and actually get to know him a little bit better.

[00:26:42] Intro: I think

[00:26:44] Caroline Blazovsky: Okay. Exterior. Siding's gonna have to get fixed. Cause you gotta do all these things before the deck goes on. Cause once the deck's on,

[00:27:05] Eric Goranson: Oh, good point. You see what I mean? So what I would want to do is probably have the citing guys. I say guys that could easily be girls, have them come in after the deck. Yeah. Girls, you

[00:27:24] Caroline Blazovsky: Okay. So they just have to go up the

[00:27:31] Caroline Blazovsky: Yep. I forgot. So this is just we're extending. So we have one. Slider mm-hmm and then this is the second one going in, so it'll stay extended out.

[00:27:54] Caroline Blazovsky: And, um, I found someone who actually, he started the national deck association. Oh, cool. So we'll talk a [00:28:00] little bit more about them once I get to meet with them out of the house, but they, uh, Very neat stuff. All outdoor.

[00:28:08] Intro: hardscape.

[00:28:16] Eric Goranson: I've got some projects I'm gonna talk about here and, uh, that I've got coming up as well. And we'll kind of wrap up and talk about your deck stuff here as well. We'll do that just as soon, this around the returns.[00:29:00]

[00:29:07] Eric Goranson: I'm a man from Apolis band and you are listening to around the house with Eric G and the

[00:29:21] Eric Goranson: Welcome back to the, around the house show. This is where Caroline and I sit here and help you. Be that great caretaker to that house, or soon to be house or even your apartment. If you wanna be a homeowner, we've got all that information for you. Now, Caroline and I were talking about some of these projects we've been working on and, uh, I've got one coming up that I gotta do.

[00:30:01] Eric Goranson: I'll never be able to change it cuz it's this color's going in. What,

[00:30:09] Eric Goranson: I'm using oil based. Uh, I'm using oil based seeing kids it's outside. Yeah, it works well for me, it's, you know, it's works well and, uh, just going around and getting it.

[00:30:35] Eric Goranson: Applying it a little bit differently. I'm gonna try spraying it on there. And if that's not it I'm just gonna roll it on. I call it a dime. Yeah. But it's going pretty quick, but I just don't like wasting stain or getting it on, you know, on the, uh, on the tarps and stuff. I put down on the ground to keep me from getting stain all over the landscaping.

[00:30:52] Caroline Blazovsky: a, what color is it? Are you, what color? Stain are you just doing a clear coat? Oh no, I'm going

[00:30:58] Intro: Oh, to match your

[00:31:10] Eric Goranson: Mm it's gonna be a Cedar top cap. That'll look cool that

[00:31:13] Caroline Blazovsky: See out, buy you. Like I was kind of interested cuz out by Eric there's so much fencing like people use, it's just part of the, everybody's got fencing out

[00:31:23] Eric Goranson: Yeah. Yeah. And it's depending where you're at. I mean, it's, you know, in Portland, you're trying to keep people from like camping on your yard.

[00:31:46] Eric Goranson: So, um, I'm gonna actually build. A four foot high, or I guess three foot high fence out there I'm gonna do just to, uh, you know, kind of a little bit of a sand wall sound wall with landscaping and stuff. And then, uh, I'm gonna do [00:32:00] a hedge behind it. So that way we've just got some privacy. You have to tell

[00:32:04] Caroline Blazovsky: So I need around I'm putting in a spa. So I wanna be able to do some type of privacy fencing, but I don't think I wanna do like a wood. So I kind of wanna do something with, you know, Some kind of agriculture, I don't know trees, but you know,

[00:32:22] Eric Goranson: And it maybe won't fit with your house and your climate as well, but I've gotten some of the big, like metal feed troughs. Okay. You know what I mean? Like you, yeah. I know them feed Catalan, filled those up with great soil and then do a bamboo hedge in that. And there's enough weight there that it won't really blow over.

[00:33:07] Eric Goranson: That way, and then make sure you kind of wherever you drill those holes through that, make sure that you spray some of the, of the, um, they make a kind of a, a spray, zinc stuff that you could put on there. So you don't rust it through right there, but you want to. You cuz it's meant to hold water. You need to have that drain.

[00:33:34] Caroline Blazovsky: need to do it just for drainage for the plant. You know, like anytime I do, like, you know, I plant something, right?

[00:33:49] Eric Goranson: you're laying that in the ground with bamboo though, here's one little secret.

[00:34:11] Eric Goranson: So, Caroline, I know you're getting drywall and you're on a drywall hunt right now. Are you? Yeah,

[00:34:31] Caroline Blazovsky: So, um, I like gold bond, which is, you know, drywall

[00:34:38] Intro: that powder ah, izer

[00:34:50] Intro: No

[00:34:54] Caroline Blazovsky: Um, you have USG, what do you usually do you use certainty? What do you have a brand that you usually like for Gypson? [00:35:00]

[00:35:04] Caroline Blazovsky: And they're not all the same guys, just so you know, they, they do have different products. And so when you research, 'em like I do.

[00:35:21] Intro: board.

[00:35:31] Eric Goranson: Oh, sorry.

[00:35:38] Intro: on me. Yep. I

[00:35:51] Caroline Blazovsky: I have my reasons for wanting to do that, but, um, yep. I just couldn't find it. So I'm going out to Allentown, PA friends in

[00:36:00] Caroline Blazovsky: Eh, it's about an hour. Give or take. Okay. So, I mean, it's not too far, but you know, it's an hour out. Yeah.

[00:36:09] Eric Goranson: so that's a lot of trial. Yeah. That's a project. If you're getting 20 sheets, that's like solid, you're ripping stuff. Apart when you're getting 20 sheets of dry off, I'm doing an Eric G . You are, you are. That's awesome. Yeah. I'm gonna work on that. And you know, we've got some decent weather here this last few weeks.

[00:36:48] Eric Goranson: TV show next year. So I'm trying not to like dive into my big ones right now, so I can save those for

[00:36:56] Eric Goranson: around the house show, coming to television next year. But [00:37:00] I kind of wanna use those projects there, right? Yeah. I mean, it's, you know, it's, I don't want to. Use up content that we can do. So it's gonna be a lot of fun and then we gotta figure out, uh, maybe we'll figure out how to come out and work on your shower.

[00:37:22] Eric Goranson: awesome. Oh yeah. Get him, get him out there. There you go. Mm-hmm that would be good. Or tile check, but tiles or, or tile check tile checks. Good too.

[00:37:31] Caroline Blazovsky: her on she's you gotta fly her in cuz she's in Texas.

[00:37:47] Eric Goranson: We've talked about both of those things. You've

[00:37:51] Eric Goranson: Walkout and Hey, that's one thing too. Just, uh, talking projects out and you know, I love to plan projects out, start to finish. I would get your [00:38:00] electrician out there to run the power for your spa. Before you do siding work.

[00:38:17] Caroline Blazovsky: that's a good point.

[00:38:25] Eric Goranson: I checked it out, but yeah, but if you're getting that swim spa, sometimes those need like a 30 amp circuit or 40 amp circuit. So you might need, that's not a regular outlet.

[00:38:37] Intro: It's a serious

[00:38:56] Eric Goranson: You gotta plan for

[00:39:15] Caroline Blazovsky: So they're all booked

[00:39:17] Intro: right. I'm Eric G and I'm Caroline B. You've been

[00:39:22] Intro: the house.