November 23, 2025 • 45 mins
**Unveiling the Concrete Secrets: Transforming Your Home's Hardscapes**
Is your concrete driveway showing signs of wear? Are oil stains and cracks making your garage floor an eyesore? Host Gary Sullivan dives deep into concrete restoration, offering practical solutions for homeowners looking to tackle these common problems before winter arrives. From liquid crack sealers to specialized oil stain removers, this episode reveals professional-grade techniques that can transform your concrete surfaces without breaking the bank.
The conversation doesn't stop at concrete repair. Gary explores how to reclaim and organize your garage space, turning what's often the most neglected area of the home into a functional, attractive entry point. With special guest Paul Abrams from Roto-Rooter, the episode also covers essential fall plumbing maintenance to prevent costly winter disasters.
**Timestamps:**
04:15 - Concrete surface repair options for cracks and spalling
10:30 - Oil stain removal techniques for garage floors
18:45 - Garage floor coating options and organization solutions
27:20 - Fall plumbing maintenance with Paul Abrams
32:40 - Preventing frozen pipes and identifying vulnerable areas
38:15 - DIY drain maintenance tips
41:30 - Preparing plumbing for holiday gatherings
Whether you're looking to tackle that eyesore of a driveway or protect your plumbing from freezing temperatures, this episode delivers actionable advice from trusted experts. Don't let another weekend pass without addressing these essential home maintenance tasks that could save you thousands in repairs later!
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:32):
Well, it's a weekend.
Speaker 2 (00:33):
Welcome, you're at home with Gary Salvan. This out brought
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Sherman Williams and Dumontglobal dot Com. All right, another weekend,
getting a few things done around the home, and feel
free to join us. Our phone number is eight hundred
(01:06):
and eight two three eight two five five. Will be
taking your call and chatting about your home projects. And
one thing I'd like to focus. I know where I
am right now. You know it's almost fifteen, the sun's out.
I talked to my daughter down in Charlotte yesterday seventy
seven degrees and beautiful. They were talking about some of
the things they got done around their home, and of
(01:27):
course winters also in the foreseeable future, and we can
talk about some getting your home ready for colder temperatures
and all that ugly stuff, or we can put some
warmer weather projects that you may have been putting off
around the home and get that done. And one of
the things we chatted about yesterday which I'd kind of
(01:51):
like to go through again because it's really very timely
if you got some decent weather above freezing, is the
concrete surfaces. You know as well as I do. We
take a lot of questions regarding concrete surfaces on this show. Cracks, spawling,
where the surface is popped off, needing ceiling. Having done
(02:13):
that for a while, we have oil stains, so we can,
you know, chat a little bit about that because we
can get those done. And remember, for cracks that really
are under a quarter of an inch, using a liquid
cracked sealer a quick creep makes one simply called crack seal.
It's an acrylic It is simply poured into the crack,
(02:37):
it levels out, and it does quite a job of
sealing that crack up. And then if you want to
follow back up with the seiler, of course, that's going
to protect that concrete driveway from maybe some snow and
ice damage, maybe some rock salt damage that you would
be drinking dragging in Again, that's for colder climates, but
(03:00):
they are very very corrosive and very aggressive too concrete
if laid to sit on a concrete surface, So we
can get those patched up. Also, we can do it
with a cementatious product or just an acrylic product with
no cementatious base at all, which means it's a little
(03:20):
more resistant to those particular types of problems. So we
can take care of some of those problems. And whoa,
how about that garage used for years? How people enter
our homes, our guests through the garage in a lot
of cases just depending on how your house is laid out.
(03:41):
But let's get that cleaned up. Let's get that driveway
floor sealed, Let's get it patched up. Let's it doesn't
have to look like a foyer, but it also doesn't
have to look like a dingy you know, dingy garage either.
So let me give you the phone number and then
we'll come back with take some of your calls. It
(04:01):
is eight hundred eight two three eight two five five.
You can go ahead and grab a line Danny's We're
ready to take your call. And I will say in
a garage when we're talking about seilers. There are different
types of sealers for your concrete, whether it's a driveway
or sidewalk, whether it's a stamp concrete or an exposed aggregate,
(04:23):
whether it's a garage floor. Some of those need to
be penetrating, they need to be breathable, and yet others
are more solid and on the surface and glossy. So
we got to find the right sealer for your particular project,
and we've got to pay attention to any types of
(04:43):
limitations that we may have for temperature. So go ahead,
grab a line and we'll take a break. We'll come
back and talk a little further on concrete and about
your project. You're at home with Gary Sullivan.
Speaker 3 (04:58):
TA see right with a call to gart at one
eight hundred eight two three talk. This is at home
with Gary Sullivan.
Speaker 1 (05:21):
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(05:43):
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order now. Well. It's fall and that means smart homeowners
are preparing their homes for winter, especially they're plumbing. Hi
(06:29):
this scary solvent for roto router plumbing and water cleanup.
I want you to go outside, unscrew your garden hose
and check those outdoor faucets for drips. Listen if they're
leaking now. They could freeze and burst this winter, causing
expensive water damage and plumbing repairs. The time to fix
dripping hose bibs is right now. Call Rotor Router at
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(06:53):
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(07:38):
Sullivan talking about your concrete around your house. It's not
too late to get that taken care of before winter,
and so very important. We'd address the spawling a little bit,
we address the small cracks, but let's start Kenda from
the garage floor out. First of all, I said, WHOA,
(08:00):
what about that garage floor. Even if you're just going
to organize it. Uh, maybe you're gonna win a rise
your lawnmower. Maybe you're going to clean your garden tools,
sharpen the spates and just kind of get everything off
the floor and give it a good cleaning. That would
be great. The one thing you're going to encounter, h
(08:23):
for sure, in most cases, you're going to encounter some
oil stains and oil stains. There's all kinds of things.
And when we open that up sometimes people call in
their home tips and everything, everything from don liquid soap
to spring WD forty on the oil stain and us
an old soil access. But I'll tell you, really, there's
(08:46):
two that I really recommend that I think do that
are pretty effective no matter how much oil there is,
no matter how long it's been there. One of them
is called the brand name is Crudcutter, and they have
a crugcutter that's with a K and they have that
for old or fresh oil stains. It is nothing that
(09:11):
has to really be scrubbed. It's nothing that has to
be hosed off, which is good. That keeps that residue
out of our waterways and different things. But the crud
cutter is a liquid that is poured on, almost like
a can pancake batter would be. You would pour it
onto the oil stain. You would let it sit. So
(09:33):
you're not gonna, you know, clean that whole garage that day.
You're just gonna start treating the oil stains and it'll
take a couple of two or three days and literally
it'll turn to a powder and you can just sweep
it away and no scrubbing. It pulls that oil right
out of there. If perchance, you know, because there are
(09:55):
different types of oils and different types of problems and
different porosity. Is a concrete but if perchance that wouldn't work,
that's kind of my number one go to product, that
crud cutter, driveway, an oil stain remover. There's one called
act Act. It comes. You got to buy like ten
(10:16):
pounds of it. It's a powder. It's a microbe that
actually eats the oil and similar to the crug cutter,
but different. So this is sprinkled on. It is a
powder and it just it literally eats the oil, I
mean eats the oil. It doesn't dry it out, It
(10:38):
eats the oil. And when it's removed it and there
is no more oil. That powder will disappear. I know
it sounds weird, and that oil stain will be gone.
It does a great job. So if you get the
oil stains out and then you can work on cleaning
the surface again. In oxygenated bleach will do a really
(11:02):
good job of cleaning concrete. Think about it. Before you
get the pressure washer out, and I know you all
want to get that pressure washer in there, but use
an oxygenate bleach. A good concrete cleaner which is an
oxygenate bleach of the powder, mix it with water, get
it on the surface of that garage floor. Let it
(11:22):
begin to lift the grime, the dirt, the oil stains
already gone. Then get your pressure washer out and just
give it a good blasting and get that garage floor
cleaned up, and then you can do whatever you want
with I mean, you can stop the process there and
then go organize the garage. Or or you could take
(11:44):
a look at some coatings. I talk a lot about
dice coatings. The roller rock a great protectant that can
bite onto that concrete very nicely and it's slip resistant.
Or if you just want to use a sealer that
would be slip resistant on the concrete. They got one
(12:06):
called track Safe And by the way, I just throw
this in as a caveat. It was not what I
was going to talk about. But they do have a
Black Friday special again I'm looking for. It's twenty five
percent off any dish product from the twenty seventh of
November to December first. If you're entertaining using any of
(12:29):
their products, take advantage of that. That's quite a deal.
And it's dai Chcoatings dot Com and that's from the
twenty seventh to the first at twenty five percent off.
So the roller Rock you could do two coats of
that and then put a track safe clear ceiling over there.
You should be able. Unlike the epoxy kits that you
(12:53):
see in the stores and things. I would say at
roller Rock you'll get somewhere around fifteen years protection out
of that. It's do it your self product. It can
be rolled on, but man, what a way to dress
up that garage floor. Don't just use a paint. You're
gonna be very disappointed. The epoxy kits, I think you'll
(13:13):
get maybe four or five years out of Other people
have had better success. That's been my experience. Clear ceiling,
that's fine. A clear ceiling like a track safe will
get you anywhere from four to five years. Then you reapply.
But what I'm just trying, and there's other things too.
(13:34):
You can get a tile that snaps together to go
over a garage floor and you know, you cover up
all past sins. It is a hard plastic, so you
have literally a new surface. You can do a two
car garage for under a thousand bucks. It's got a
(13:56):
little diamond pattern like you'd see, you know, maybe in
a car shop. But that's another really nice way to
kind of dress it up. And then if you want
to go further with getting organized, you know, there's all
kinds of things from peg board to slat board, slapboard.
You can put a little heavier duty hooks in there
(14:17):
for the shovels and the blowers and the spades and
the you know, rakes snowshovels, so you can get that
stuff off the floor and out of the corners of
the garage. You can get hooks that hang or screw
into the joyst through the ceiling of the garage away
(14:40):
from you gotta be mindful where that garage door comes back,
so you'd be at the back back edge of the garage,
but you can hang the bikes upside down from the
ceiling get them off the floor. So try to try
to look at the cube that you have in the garage.
(15:02):
In store going up, you can put in shelves. There's
all kinds. There's a wonderful shelves that I put in
probably gosh, fifteen years ago. I can't even remember the
brand name of them, but it has the standards and
(15:23):
there's just a screw at the top so they're kind
of free hanging and then the shelves kind of pull
it together. Then when you get the shelves on there,
you put screw down the base so you're all squared up.
You can change the different heights of the shelves. There's
a cost of that. You can also build wood shelves
(15:45):
if you want. I'm just again getting that product off
the floor and up onto the walls. In a cube,
you can be way way ahead of the game. So
if you get that floor decorated out, and maybe before
you do the shelves and the storage, maybe you paint
the walls. And I get asked that question a lot,
(16:09):
is what kind of paint do I use in a
garage just regular interior paint. I mean, you could probably
use exterior paint. Exterior paint's got probably a little bit
more in there than you want, like mill sides and
UV resistance. But I just use regular indoor wall paint.
(16:29):
If you want to do it satin, fine, If you
want to do it just flat, that's fine. If you
want to use really good just flat paint, that's great
because that's scrubs. So as you can see, we can
not only get our garage organized. You know, the old
pile is you know, we don't you know, if you're
(16:50):
going to keep it, let's store in the cube, going
vertically rather than sitting it on the ground. You know,
leave the ground for things like your snowblower or your lawnmower.
And this can apply also though it doesn't have to
be as ornate as a garage, but a storage shed.
(17:11):
Getting that organized always chuckle when I see some people's sheds,
it's like a dumpster with doors. They just throw everything
in there and then when you want it, you got
to take half the stuff out. But if we can
just take a time to get it a little bit organized,
and especially in the garage because like I said, that's
a passageway into your home. In a lot of cases,
(17:32):
especially bad weather, if you're in driveways right next to
the garage doors, you know, maybe you have to turn,
you know, go in the driveway and then take a
hard right to get inside the garage. But people, you know,
visitors will sometimes park there and you'll have the door open,
they can walk right in, you know, have it welcoming.
(17:54):
So something to just kind of take a look at
and decide. But I feel that one of the largest
wasted areas of our homes that are very abused and
keeping it clean. You know, we all have issues. You know,
leaves this time of year kind of blow in, but
you know, just to let the oil stains continue to
(18:16):
mount and the dirty concrete. I know there's other things
you're working on, but you can clean up a garage
fairly inexpensively. And if you do have it where people
enter your home on occasion, it would really behoove you
to kind of dress that up a little bit and
(18:38):
get it looking pretty good. Well, you know, this is
the time of year, we're busy. I've got some tips
on decorating on the outside of the house. I want
to pass on to you and also cleaning, cleaning before
the guests come, cleaning after the guests come, and we'll
talk about some of the Jaws products. And then the
(18:59):
other thing, of course, is as the cold weather approaches,
it can be kind of a real drag on your
entire plumbing systems. So we have Paul Abrams, he's with
Roto Ruter and he's going to be our guest. We'll
chat about some of those fall projects and even winter
projects in perporation for the upcoming winter weather will continue.
(19:23):
You're at home with Gary Sullivan.
Speaker 3 (19:35):
Start a project and don't know how to finish it
and call Gary at one eight hundred eighty two three talk.
You're at home with Gary solivaner.
Speaker 1 (19:59):
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(20:19):
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(22:12):
It is that time taking a look outside where I am,
the sun's out. If I looked at the last three days,
it was kind of cold and gloomy and very very gloomy,
and that reminds me all about plumbing. When it gets
cold and gloomy, that's when we need our help from
our friends at Rota Ruter And that's exactly who I have.
(22:33):
Paul Abrams, Paul Welcome again at home with Gary Sullivan.
Speaker 4 (22:38):
Good to see you.
Speaker 1 (22:38):
Gary, Yes, sir, how you doing all right?
Speaker 4 (22:42):
You know you were talking about that gloominess and yeah,
I'm out of hibernation. I'm waiting for the sun to
come out and I'm going to finish all my winter
rising today.
Speaker 1 (22:51):
Well, let's talk a little bit about that, because Rota Ruter.
What a legacy name. I know you guys are throughout
the United States and you know that name. Just when
we start talking about plumbing and pipes, that name just
pops in many of our heads. And on your website,
I've said this main time, paulse you got really informative
(23:11):
website that talks about what to do in the fall
and what to do in the winter. And let's just
go through some of those fall maintenance tips if you
don't mind.
Speaker 4 (23:21):
Yeah, sure, well you said it. I mean we've got
so much information at rotoroter dot com. If you miss
something that Gary and I talk about today, go there
search winter Rising and you'll find all kinds of blogs
and videos and things like that. But yeah, if I
had to say, you know, the number one thing that
(23:41):
causes problems is is frozen pipes, and it's usually that
outdoor faucet. So everybody listening, go out there after this.
Disconnect your outdoor hoses for sure, before you cover them
up with a foam insulation kit. Watch them for a
few minutes and make sure they aren't dripping, because if
they are, you might have a leak there, and it's
(24:02):
best to fix that before winter arrives.
Speaker 1 (24:05):
For sure. For sure. Yeah, I've been preaching that since
probably about mid September. You know, it's so important. I mean,
you know, there's two different types of faucets, and some
people think that frostproof faucet prevents everything. But if that
garden hose is attached to it and there's water in it,
it's just back flowing back into that pipe, and you're
(24:26):
going to have a problem for sure.
Speaker 4 (24:28):
Oh yeah, you know, I've got those frostproof hose bebs
in my home and I don't have the disconnects down
in the basement that I have to drain out. But
I know a lot of people do, right, People forget
to do that. And if you've got those, you know,
go shut that valve off, go outside and drain it out,
Let all the water get out of the system, and
(24:50):
then cover it with a with a foam insulation kit
and you know, rest easy this winter without that extra
worry of sure of a and pipe bursting.
Speaker 1 (25:01):
You know, heaven doing you know, doing this show for
like thirty nine years, Paul I always equate winter time
with water heater questions. Now, the water heater for the
most parts insideer home. What what what do we have
to do if anything? Or is that just I know,
when it gets cold outside, it's tough on plumbing.
Speaker 4 (25:23):
It is, you know, it's the it's that elephant in
the room that we all want to ignore. We know
it does its job, makes a little rumble here and there,
but for the most part, it's awfully dependable on your
water heater. So you know, let's give it a little love.
This is a good time of year to go check
it out. Uh, you know, feel around the pipes going
in the inlet, the outlet, make sure there's no leaks
(25:45):
up there. Look around the base of it if you uh,
if you see any water around the floor that could
have been coming out of that Uh. That tube that
runs down the side of your water heater is connected
to your temperature and pressure relief. And if that thing's
burping and shooting water out. That means your heater is
(26:05):
either getting too hot or it's developing too much pressure
in the tank, and you want to deal with that
before winter too. But you know, it's a great time
fall to drain down, flush out the sediment that accumulates
in the bottom of your water heater, so that you'll
find instructions at rotorator dot com on how to do that.
There are great YouTube videos showing you how to do that.
(26:26):
But you'll save yourself a lot of trouble and extend
the life of that water heater by draining that sediment
out of the bottom of it.
Speaker 1 (26:34):
Every year, you know, we talk about that, and sometimes
you can just drain off like two or three gallons
and remember that water's hot, and you know it'll be
kind of uh, you know, rusty colored or something along
those lines. That'll be clear and you're probably good to go.
One caution I've used in the past. I don't know
how you feel about this. If you're somebody that's listening
(26:56):
right now and that hot water heater is for the
water heater is twelve years old and you've never drained it,
sometimes that sentiment's kind of holding the water heater together.
Speaker 4 (27:08):
Yeah, you know, you're right. They say eleven years is
the life expectancy of a typical conventional water heater. Yeah,
if you've never done it before, you're right, Garret, you
might be inviting some problems starting that ten or twelve
years into the life of your water heat.
Speaker 5 (27:24):
Oh.
Speaker 4 (27:24):
Boy, if it broke, don't fix it at that point.
Speaker 1 (27:27):
Yeah, it's great to start out doing that and keep
doing it, but boy, if you haven't done anything, it
might be a little more cautious. How about the some pump.
We've had some decent rains at least where we're at
testing them. If you haven't had a lot of rain,
probably a real good idea.
Speaker 4 (27:47):
Yeah, and you know that's some pump. You know, if
you're getting heavy rain in the fall, you can get
down and watch it. If there's water coming into the pit,
you want to see if that pumps turning itself on,
most of the water out of the pit and then
turning itself off again without any trouble. And if you
don't have water in the pit right now, you can
(28:07):
run a garden host through the basement window works, get
a five gallon bucket and pour it in that pit
and make sure the pump's doing its thing, and if
it isn't, or if it's hot, nothing in something's off
running too long. I've had one to do that before.
It's a good time to get it, Get it taken
(28:28):
care of before winter, because before you know it, we're
going to have the spring falls and there's going to
be a lot of groundwater seeping in the basement walls
and floors.
Speaker 1 (28:36):
Oh yeah, and you.
Speaker 4 (28:37):
Want that some pump to be working when it's time
for it to.
Speaker 1 (28:40):
Be working, No doubt about that, No doubt about that.
And before long it's also going to be hard freeze times.
And I know you started out talking about frozen pipes,
and gosh, I can just imagine just how busy you
get on a day where it's ten below zero and
pipes are freezing. Give me some areas, or give my
(29:04):
listeners some areas where to inspect looking for pipes that
are exposed. If you've lived in a house for thirty years,
you probably know where it's vulnerable. But where should we
be looking for pipes that could freeze?
Speaker 4 (29:19):
Yeah? You know any any pipes that are exposed to
the elements are a little colder with those outside walls.
We talked about the hose bichs, the ones that are
connected to hose bitch once you've taken care of those,
if you've got a crawl space, or if you've got
pipes running through your garage or your attic like that
in Florida, you'll want to take a look at those
(29:43):
and know the difference between a water supply pipe, which
is usually copper, it might be pecks and could even
be cast iron, and a drain pipe, which is usually
PVC or they're usually a larger diameter pipe. That's easy
way to know the difference, right. You know, if we've
seen people gary that they think they've they've insulated their
(30:07):
pipes and looking at that cross base or looking under
a pier and beam home and find out they put
pipe insulation around a drain line, but they've neglected their
water supply pipes. And if drain lines are pitched properly,
you usually don't have to worry about those freezing. Other
are always exceptions, but it's the water supply pipes that
those copper lines especially that will and see PVC and
(30:31):
those things you want to make sure you've got good
insulation on them. If you've got a pipe that is
especially vulnerable. You can run thermostat, controlled heat tape or
heat cable that will keep that pipe from freezing. I've
got one right now running on my backflowsalves outside connected
(30:51):
to my sprinkler system, because they're not going to be
able to get to me until for another week or so,
and we're already getting it dipping into freezing temperatures and
that's all it takes to do damage.
Speaker 1 (31:02):
Yeah, that's a good point. And you know, I guess
those vulnerabilities are different in different areas too. You're talking
about Florida, and I'm not in Florida, so I forget
about that. They get freezing cold temperatures sometimes too, and
the protection on those pipes isn't quite as great in
the Midwest, where I am a little different ball game.
(31:22):
But you get some older housing, no insulation in walls,
and you know, block construction, and that copper pipes running
right along that block underneath the kitchen sink. That that's
vulnerability as height.
Speaker 4 (31:38):
Oh gosh.
Speaker 1 (31:39):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (31:39):
And what you have to think about is when it
when a pipe freezes, you know, it creates pressure. There's
an ice block in there, and it creates pressure, and
that pressure's got to give somewhere, and that's why they
tell you, you know, you can leave your leave your
at least some thinks trickling during extreme cold periods, it
leaves the pressure. So if you get something freezing, that
(32:00):
pressure is going to go somewhere, and often it's out
the side of the pipe wall, right, yeah, first fight.
Speaker 1 (32:06):
Yeah, Yeah. I was just gonna say, even if you
have one of those situations that I just described, you know,
leaving the cabinet doors opened, and uh, you know, if
you don't have any foam sleeves around that copper, that's
something you can do today because we always love to
put that off.
Speaker 4 (32:25):
Them at the box doores and uh, you know, keep
some of that stuff aranging. Never know when you're gonna
need it.
Speaker 1 (32:32):
I know folks call rotor ruter when they have plumbing
problems and also drain problems. Is there any drain maintenance
a homeowner can do anytime of the year. Yeah, things
are just running the littlest slow.
Speaker 4 (32:46):
Sure, when things are slow, Uh, you know, you think
about your house, which drains typically run slow. The shower
drain in my house run same here slow from time
to time. And me and my wife has longer hair
and boy but it's like, you know, every six months
or so, I got to slow drain in there so
you can get one of those little you know, the
(33:06):
little plastic drain widgets that you put down in there
and even put a hook in a metal coat hanger.
Push it down in that pipe, twist it around a
few times, go fishing. I said, right, pull back and
you'll be surprised what you catch down there. Do that
two or three times until nothing else is coming up.
That takes care of it. And then after you've cleaned it.
(33:28):
There's a lot of these bioins. I'm drain care products
aren't caustic and and you know with the fumes and everything,
they're natural products, right, and those that you introduce good
bacteria down into the pipes and it eats away A
lot of that gunk doesn't work instantly, but you leave
it sitting there overnight, it works miracles sure.
Speaker 1 (33:51):
And we put so much of that gunk in there ourselves.
I mean, our toothpaste has gelling it, our shaving cream
is jelling it, our hairspray has gelling it. Everything we
use in a bathroom has gel in it. That makes
the inside of those pipes nice and tacky and it
kind of collects things. And you're right, those enzyme products
do a pretty good, pretty good job. I've used one
(34:12):
called Drainbow. Just put the plug in the vanity bowl
and put some warm water in there and pour some
of the drain Bow in there. Let's sit about ten minutes.
It activates it, and pull the plug and let's sit over.
Speaker 4 (34:26):
Yes, they're great products. And you know this week of
always you mentioned at the top, we're coming into Thanksgiving
and plumbers called brown Friday. It's the busiest day of
the year for Roto Router and most plumbing companies in
most markets because drains just get overloaded. You get a
house full of guests and they're taking extra showers, they're
(34:49):
they're flushing the toilet more often, running the disposal, and
making a big meal in the kitchen. All those things
come together. It's a perfect storm for your drain system.
And that's why so many dreams back up on Thanksgiving
and the Friday after.
Speaker 1 (35:05):
So if I have twenty potatoes to appeel on Thursday,
I don't take all the scraps and shot them down
the disposal.
Speaker 4 (35:13):
It happens every year and every time.
Speaker 1 (35:17):
All right, Well, we've been preaching a little bit of
that too. One thing I will say, and I think
it was in I don't know, one of our conversations,
or it was in one year commercials or something, but
I've really latched onto this, and that is, if you
are not comfortable doing plumbing, and we all got to
(35:39):
know where our strengths, or you don't have the time
to do it, to create kind of an ongoing list,
almost like a shopping list. You know, vanity sink, slow drip,
toilet flushes itself. In other words, when you call rotor router.
If you have multiple small jobs, very very efficient at
(36:02):
getting that taken care of and save yourself a little
money at the same time.
Speaker 4 (36:08):
Yeah, create a punch list because you get second job discount,
third job discount, fourth job discount. So you know, rather
than pay you know, oh, let's just have him deal
with this one issue. It actually saves you money. Sure
will the plumber's in your house to have him knock
got any of the problems that you're that you're worried about,
(36:28):
that you're dealing with it, it's a lot less expensive
in the long run.
Speaker 1 (36:33):
Very good, Paul, Thanks for joining us today. A happy Thanksgiving.
I hope you're not too busy Friday. And again, folks,
that website is rotoreruter dot com. You can get a
lot of good information. Schedule a visit with Rotor Ruter
to your home if you'd like. And Paul, thanks again.
Speaker 4 (36:51):
My pleasure, Gary, Happy Thanksgiving everyone.
Speaker 1 (36:53):
Thank you, take care all right, very good, Thank you
very much, Paul. I enjoy the conversation we have throughout
the years, and they do a great, great job for you.
Get a lot of compliments about the folks at Rotor Router.
All right, your call's next, so grab a line. They're
wide open right now. It's eight hundred eight two three
eight two five y five. You're at Home with Gary Sullivan.
Speaker 3 (37:18):
Help for your home is just a click away at
Garysullivan online dot com. This is at Home with Gary Sullivan.
Speaker 1 (37:41):
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(40:05):
beck at it we go at home with Gary Salvin.
Thanks for joining me. Thanks to our friend Paul Abrams
from rotor Ruter giving us some tips on well, just
kind of what happens in the next week or two
sometimes do our plumbing system. So take what he said
as gospel and take care of some of those issues
you may be having. All right, Our phone number has
(40:28):
stated eight hundred eight two three eight two five five
lines open and Frank welcome. Thanks for holding.
Speaker 5 (40:34):
Frank, Good morning, Gary morning. I have a little wood
project I'm doing refinishing a bench, and I haven't used
asked home to get off the finish that was on there. Okay,
and I'm standing a lot of spots, and I had
a prime suggestion when I get done after blowing all
(40:55):
the dust off, to use a cloth with some teen
natured alcohol to clean the surface off. Is that a
good idea using the dnatured alcohol. I haven't used that before.
Speaker 1 (41:07):
Yeah, yeah, D natured alcohol. Well, you know, D eight
natured alcohol is used a lot in woodworking, even from
mixing it with shelac and creating even prossy of the
wood before staining and different things. But as a cleanerture
denatured alcohol, it'll remove any dirt and there's probably not
much dirt left, but any oils, fingerprints, sanding dust. Even
(41:36):
though you got a lot of it off, there's probably
a lot you don't see too. And it really will
help with the stain and it'll finish better. The best
part is it evaporates very quickly after you use it.
I mean give it five minutes and you're ready to go.
Speaker 5 (41:51):
Okay. One other quick question using the acid tone and
the dnation alcohol i'd like to use some gloves. I
didn't know if latex or rubber or nitral would be
the best glove to use with those products.
Speaker 1 (42:07):
I don't know the makeup of the glove, but I
know in the department where you're looking at the acetones
and stuff and some strippers, they'll have a glove there
for you in the part where they have the strippers.
Outside of that, you'd have to read the label. I
don't know the actual makeup of the glove itself.
Speaker 5 (42:29):
I got you, all right, Gery. I appreciate your help.
Speaker 1 (42:31):
You're quite welcome. Thanks again for hold on. I appreciate
it all right. Yeah, that dnage ilcohol is a good cleaner.
When I was talking about and this is we haven't
talked about this for a while. But if you are
stripping an old I don't know, whatever desk, buffet, kitchen
(42:51):
table or whatever, or maybe an inexpensive piece of wood
a little hope chest or end table and that's made
of pine, maybe you picked it up at an unfinished
furniture shop or something along those lines, and you're going
to stain it and you're going to finish it and
put it in a bedroom or give it to somebody
as a gift. A couple things to think about. It
(43:14):
really depends on the wood. And I keep that threatening
a couple of my friends. One is a wood turner
and the other one is a wood worker, and what
a great hobby. I don't do that, but I'm going
to have them on and talk about their hobby and
(43:34):
one of the things, you know, and they really get
into finishes too. And one of the things you can
do to minimize the varying porosity of wood is to
take denatured alcohol fifty percent denatured alcohol fifty percent SLAC,
mix it together and put a code of that onto
pine and you won't have those real random ups and
(43:59):
down of dark in light of the same stain. So
it kind of evens that out. You can kind of
make pine be a little more even almost, uh you know,
maybe like a maple, not exactly, but it will certainly
even it out. So that's a little tip for you. Also,
all right again, our phone number is eight hundred eight
two three eight two five five. You can grab a
(44:21):
line happy to talk about your home project. And you're
at home with Gary Sullivan
Speaker 3 (44:39):
Weekends, I mean, a never writing list of things to
do around your home, Get help at one eight hundred
and eighty two three Talk You're at home with Gary Sullivan,
(45:01):
Nie
Well, it's a weekend.
Speaker 2 (00:33):
Welcome, you're at home with Gary Salvan. This out brought
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getting a few things done around the home, and feel
free to join us. Our phone number is eight hundred
(01:06):
and eight two three eight two five five. Will be
taking your call and chatting about your home projects. And
one thing I'd like to focus. I know where I
am right now. You know it's almost fifteen, the sun's out.
I talked to my daughter down in Charlotte yesterday seventy
seven degrees and beautiful. They were talking about some of
the things they got done around their home, and of
(01:27):
course winters also in the foreseeable future, and we can
talk about some getting your home ready for colder temperatures
and all that ugly stuff, or we can put some
warmer weather projects that you may have been putting off
around the home and get that done. And one of
the things we chatted about yesterday which I'd kind of
(01:51):
like to go through again because it's really very timely
if you got some decent weather above freezing, is the
concrete surfaces. You know as well as I do. We
take a lot of questions regarding concrete surfaces on this show. Cracks, spawling,
where the surface is popped off, needing ceiling. Having done
(02:13):
that for a while, we have oil stains, so we can,
you know, chat a little bit about that because we
can get those done. And remember, for cracks that really
are under a quarter of an inch, using a liquid
cracked sealer a quick creep makes one simply called crack seal.
It's an acrylic It is simply poured into the crack,
(02:37):
it levels out, and it does quite a job of
sealing that crack up. And then if you want to
follow back up with the seiler, of course, that's going
to protect that concrete driveway from maybe some snow and
ice damage, maybe some rock salt damage that you would
be drinking dragging in Again, that's for colder climates, but
(03:00):
they are very very corrosive and very aggressive too concrete
if laid to sit on a concrete surface, So we
can get those patched up. Also, we can do it
with a cementatious product or just an acrylic product with
no cementatious base at all, which means it's a little
(03:20):
more resistant to those particular types of problems. So we
can take care of some of those problems. And whoa,
how about that garage used for years? How people enter
our homes, our guests through the garage in a lot
of cases just depending on how your house is laid out.
(03:41):
But let's get that cleaned up. Let's get that driveway
floor sealed, Let's get it patched up. Let's it doesn't
have to look like a foyer, but it also doesn't
have to look like a dingy you know, dingy garage either.
So let me give you the phone number and then
we'll come back with take some of your calls. It
(04:01):
is eight hundred eight two three eight two five five.
You can go ahead and grab a line Danny's We're
ready to take your call. And I will say in
a garage when we're talking about seilers. There are different
types of sealers for your concrete, whether it's a driveway
or sidewalk, whether it's a stamp concrete or an exposed aggregate,
(04:23):
whether it's a garage floor. Some of those need to
be penetrating, they need to be breathable, and yet others
are more solid and on the surface and glossy. So
we got to find the right sealer for your particular project,
and we've got to pay attention to any types of
(04:43):
limitations that we may have for temperature. So go ahead,
grab a line and we'll take a break. We'll come
back and talk a little further on concrete and about
your project. You're at home with Gary Sullivan.
Speaker 3 (04:58):
TA see right with a call to gart at one
eight hundred eight two three talk. This is at home
with Gary Sullivan.
Speaker 1 (05:21):
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(07:38):
Sullivan talking about your concrete around your house. It's not
too late to get that taken care of before winter,
and so very important. We'd address the spawling a little bit,
we address the small cracks, but let's start Kenda from
the garage floor out. First of all, I said, WHOA,
(08:00):
what about that garage floor. Even if you're just going
to organize it. Uh, maybe you're gonna win a rise
your lawnmower. Maybe you're going to clean your garden tools,
sharpen the spates and just kind of get everything off
the floor and give it a good cleaning. That would
be great. The one thing you're going to encounter, h
(08:23):
for sure, in most cases, you're going to encounter some
oil stains and oil stains. There's all kinds of things.
And when we open that up sometimes people call in
their home tips and everything, everything from don liquid soap
to spring WD forty on the oil stain and us
an old soil access. But I'll tell you, really, there's
(08:46):
two that I really recommend that I think do that
are pretty effective no matter how much oil there is,
no matter how long it's been there. One of them
is called the brand name is Crudcutter, and they have
a crugcutter that's with a K and they have that
for old or fresh oil stains. It is nothing that
(09:11):
has to really be scrubbed. It's nothing that has to
be hosed off, which is good. That keeps that residue
out of our waterways and different things. But the crud
cutter is a liquid that is poured on, almost like
a can pancake batter would be. You would pour it
onto the oil stain. You would let it sit. So
(09:33):
you're not gonna, you know, clean that whole garage that day.
You're just gonna start treating the oil stains and it'll
take a couple of two or three days and literally
it'll turn to a powder and you can just sweep
it away and no scrubbing. It pulls that oil right
out of there. If perchance, you know, because there are
(09:55):
different types of oils and different types of problems and
different porosity. Is a concrete but if perchance that wouldn't work,
that's kind of my number one go to product, that
crud cutter, driveway, an oil stain remover. There's one called
act Act. It comes. You got to buy like ten
(10:16):
pounds of it. It's a powder. It's a microbe that
actually eats the oil and similar to the crug cutter,
but different. So this is sprinkled on. It is a
powder and it just it literally eats the oil, I
mean eats the oil. It doesn't dry it out, It
(10:38):
eats the oil. And when it's removed it and there
is no more oil. That powder will disappear. I know
it sounds weird, and that oil stain will be gone.
It does a great job. So if you get the
oil stains out and then you can work on cleaning
the surface again. In oxygenated bleach will do a really
(11:02):
good job of cleaning concrete. Think about it. Before you
get the pressure washer out, and I know you all
want to get that pressure washer in there, but use
an oxygenate bleach. A good concrete cleaner which is an
oxygenate bleach of the powder, mix it with water, get
it on the surface of that garage floor. Let it
(11:22):
begin to lift the grime, the dirt, the oil stains
already gone. Then get your pressure washer out and just
give it a good blasting and get that garage floor
cleaned up, and then you can do whatever you want
with I mean, you can stop the process there and
then go organize the garage. Or or you could take
(11:44):
a look at some coatings. I talk a lot about
dice coatings. The roller rock a great protectant that can
bite onto that concrete very nicely and it's slip resistant.
Or if you just want to use a sealer that
would be slip resistant on the concrete. They got one
(12:06):
called track Safe And by the way, I just throw
this in as a caveat. It was not what I
was going to talk about. But they do have a
Black Friday special again I'm looking for. It's twenty five
percent off any dish product from the twenty seventh of
November to December first. If you're entertaining using any of
(12:29):
their products, take advantage of that. That's quite a deal.
And it's dai Chcoatings dot Com and that's from the
twenty seventh to the first at twenty five percent off.
So the roller Rock you could do two coats of
that and then put a track safe clear ceiling over there.
You should be able. Unlike the epoxy kits that you
(12:53):
see in the stores and things. I would say at
roller Rock you'll get somewhere around fifteen years protection out
of that. It's do it your self product. It can
be rolled on, but man, what a way to dress
up that garage floor. Don't just use a paint. You're
gonna be very disappointed. The epoxy kits, I think you'll
(13:13):
get maybe four or five years out of Other people
have had better success. That's been my experience. Clear ceiling,
that's fine. A clear ceiling like a track safe will
get you anywhere from four to five years. Then you reapply.
But what I'm just trying, and there's other things too.
(13:34):
You can get a tile that snaps together to go
over a garage floor and you know, you cover up
all past sins. It is a hard plastic, so you
have literally a new surface. You can do a two
car garage for under a thousand bucks. It's got a
(13:56):
little diamond pattern like you'd see, you know, maybe in
a car shop. But that's another really nice way to
kind of dress it up. And then if you want
to go further with getting organized, you know, there's all
kinds of things from peg board to slat board, slapboard.
You can put a little heavier duty hooks in there
(14:17):
for the shovels and the blowers and the spades and
the you know, rakes snowshovels, so you can get that
stuff off the floor and out of the corners of
the garage. You can get hooks that hang or screw
into the joyst through the ceiling of the garage away
(14:40):
from you gotta be mindful where that garage door comes back,
so you'd be at the back back edge of the garage,
but you can hang the bikes upside down from the
ceiling get them off the floor. So try to try
to look at the cube that you have in the garage.
(15:02):
In store going up, you can put in shelves. There's
all kinds. There's a wonderful shelves that I put in
probably gosh, fifteen years ago. I can't even remember the
brand name of them, but it has the standards and
(15:23):
there's just a screw at the top so they're kind
of free hanging and then the shelves kind of pull
it together. Then when you get the shelves on there,
you put screw down the base so you're all squared up.
You can change the different heights of the shelves. There's
a cost of that. You can also build wood shelves
(15:45):
if you want. I'm just again getting that product off
the floor and up onto the walls. In a cube,
you can be way way ahead of the game. So
if you get that floor decorated out, and maybe before
you do the shelves and the storage, maybe you paint
the walls. And I get asked that question a lot,
(16:09):
is what kind of paint do I use in a
garage just regular interior paint. I mean, you could probably
use exterior paint. Exterior paint's got probably a little bit
more in there than you want, like mill sides and
UV resistance. But I just use regular indoor wall paint.
(16:29):
If you want to do it satin, fine, If you
want to do it just flat, that's fine. If you
want to use really good just flat paint, that's great
because that's scrubs. So as you can see, we can
not only get our garage organized. You know, the old
pile is you know, we don't you know, if you're
(16:50):
going to keep it, let's store in the cube, going
vertically rather than sitting it on the ground. You know,
leave the ground for things like your snowblower or your lawnmower.
And this can apply also though it doesn't have to
be as ornate as a garage, but a storage shed.
(17:11):
Getting that organized always chuckle when I see some people's sheds,
it's like a dumpster with doors. They just throw everything
in there and then when you want it, you got
to take half the stuff out. But if we can
just take a time to get it a little bit organized,
and especially in the garage because like I said, that's
a passageway into your home. In a lot of cases,
(17:32):
especially bad weather, if you're in driveways right next to
the garage doors, you know, maybe you have to turn,
you know, go in the driveway and then take a
hard right to get inside the garage. But people, you know,
visitors will sometimes park there and you'll have the door open,
they can walk right in, you know, have it welcoming.
(17:54):
So something to just kind of take a look at
and decide. But I feel that one of the largest
wasted areas of our homes that are very abused and
keeping it clean. You know, we all have issues. You know,
leaves this time of year kind of blow in, but
you know, just to let the oil stains continue to
(18:16):
mount and the dirty concrete. I know there's other things
you're working on, but you can clean up a garage
fairly inexpensively. And if you do have it where people
enter your home on occasion, it would really behoove you
to kind of dress that up a little bit and
(18:38):
get it looking pretty good. Well, you know, this is
the time of year, we're busy. I've got some tips
on decorating on the outside of the house. I want
to pass on to you and also cleaning, cleaning before
the guests come, cleaning after the guests come, and we'll
talk about some of the Jaws products. And then the
(18:59):
other thing, of course, is as the cold weather approaches,
it can be kind of a real drag on your
entire plumbing systems. So we have Paul Abrams, he's with
Roto Ruter and he's going to be our guest. We'll
chat about some of those fall projects and even winter
projects in perporation for the upcoming winter weather will continue.
(19:23):
You're at home with Gary Sullivan.
Speaker 3 (19:35):
Start a project and don't know how to finish it
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November twenty seventh to December first and save big. All Right,
(22:12):
It is that time taking a look outside where I am,
the sun's out. If I looked at the last three days,
it was kind of cold and gloomy and very very gloomy,
and that reminds me all about plumbing. When it gets
cold and gloomy, that's when we need our help from
our friends at Rota Ruter And that's exactly who I have.
(22:33):
Paul Abrams, Paul Welcome again at home with Gary Sullivan.
Speaker 4 (22:38):
Good to see you.
Speaker 1 (22:38):
Gary, Yes, sir, how you doing all right?
Speaker 4 (22:42):
You know you were talking about that gloominess and yeah,
I'm out of hibernation. I'm waiting for the sun to
come out and I'm going to finish all my winter
rising today.
Speaker 1 (22:51):
Well, let's talk a little bit about that, because Rota Ruter.
What a legacy name. I know you guys are throughout
the United States and you know that name. Just when
we start talking about plumbing and pipes, that name just
pops in many of our heads. And on your website,
I've said this main time, paulse you got really informative
(23:11):
website that talks about what to do in the fall
and what to do in the winter. And let's just
go through some of those fall maintenance tips if you
don't mind.
Speaker 4 (23:21):
Yeah, sure, well you said it. I mean we've got
so much information at rotoroter dot com. If you miss
something that Gary and I talk about today, go there
search winter Rising and you'll find all kinds of blogs
and videos and things like that. But yeah, if I
had to say, you know, the number one thing that
(23:41):
causes problems is is frozen pipes, and it's usually that
outdoor faucet. So everybody listening, go out there after this.
Disconnect your outdoor hoses for sure, before you cover them
up with a foam insulation kit. Watch them for a
few minutes and make sure they aren't dripping, because if
they are, you might have a leak there, and it's
(24:02):
best to fix that before winter arrives.
Speaker 1 (24:05):
For sure. For sure. Yeah, I've been preaching that since
probably about mid September. You know, it's so important. I mean,
you know, there's two different types of faucets, and some
people think that frostproof faucet prevents everything. But if that
garden hose is attached to it and there's water in it,
it's just back flowing back into that pipe, and you're
(24:26):
going to have a problem for sure.
Speaker 4 (24:28):
Oh yeah, you know, I've got those frostproof hose bebs
in my home and I don't have the disconnects down
in the basement that I have to drain out. But
I know a lot of people do, right, People forget
to do that. And if you've got those, you know,
go shut that valve off, go outside and drain it out,
Let all the water get out of the system, and
(24:50):
then cover it with a with a foam insulation kit
and you know, rest easy this winter without that extra
worry of sure of a and pipe bursting.
Speaker 1 (25:01):
You know, heaven doing you know, doing this show for
like thirty nine years, Paul I always equate winter time
with water heater questions. Now, the water heater for the
most parts insideer home. What what what do we have
to do if anything? Or is that just I know,
when it gets cold outside, it's tough on plumbing.
Speaker 4 (25:23):
It is, you know, it's the it's that elephant in
the room that we all want to ignore. We know
it does its job, makes a little rumble here and there,
but for the most part, it's awfully dependable on your
water heater. So you know, let's give it a little love.
This is a good time of year to go check
it out. Uh, you know, feel around the pipes going
in the inlet, the outlet, make sure there's no leaks
(25:45):
up there. Look around the base of it if you uh,
if you see any water around the floor that could
have been coming out of that Uh. That tube that
runs down the side of your water heater is connected
to your temperature and pressure relief. And if that thing's
burping and shooting water out. That means your heater is
(26:05):
either getting too hot or it's developing too much pressure
in the tank, and you want to deal with that
before winter too. But you know, it's a great time
fall to drain down, flush out the sediment that accumulates
in the bottom of your water heater, so that you'll
find instructions at rotorator dot com on how to do that.
There are great YouTube videos showing you how to do that.
(26:26):
But you'll save yourself a lot of trouble and extend
the life of that water heater by draining that sediment
out of the bottom of it.
Speaker 1 (26:34):
Every year, you know, we talk about that, and sometimes
you can just drain off like two or three gallons
and remember that water's hot, and you know it'll be
kind of uh, you know, rusty colored or something along
those lines. That'll be clear and you're probably good to go.
One caution I've used in the past. I don't know
how you feel about this. If you're somebody that's listening
(26:56):
right now and that hot water heater is for the
water heater is twelve years old and you've never drained it,
sometimes that sentiment's kind of holding the water heater together.
Speaker 4 (27:08):
Yeah, you know, you're right. They say eleven years is
the life expectancy of a typical conventional water heater. Yeah,
if you've never done it before, you're right, Garret, you
might be inviting some problems starting that ten or twelve
years into the life of your water heat.
Speaker 5 (27:24):
Oh.
Speaker 4 (27:24):
Boy, if it broke, don't fix it at that point.
Speaker 1 (27:27):
Yeah, it's great to start out doing that and keep
doing it, but boy, if you haven't done anything, it
might be a little more cautious. How about the some pump.
We've had some decent rains at least where we're at
testing them. If you haven't had a lot of rain,
probably a real good idea.
Speaker 4 (27:47):
Yeah, and you know that's some pump. You know, if
you're getting heavy rain in the fall, you can get
down and watch it. If there's water coming into the pit,
you want to see if that pumps turning itself on,
most of the water out of the pit and then
turning itself off again without any trouble. And if you
don't have water in the pit right now, you can
(28:07):
run a garden host through the basement window works, get
a five gallon bucket and pour it in that pit
and make sure the pump's doing its thing, and if
it isn't, or if it's hot, nothing in something's off
running too long. I've had one to do that before.
It's a good time to get it, Get it taken
(28:28):
care of before winter, because before you know it, we're
going to have the spring falls and there's going to
be a lot of groundwater seeping in the basement walls
and floors.
Speaker 1 (28:36):
Oh yeah, and you.
Speaker 4 (28:37):
Want that some pump to be working when it's time
for it to.
Speaker 1 (28:40):
Be working, No doubt about that, No doubt about that.
And before long it's also going to be hard freeze times.
And I know you started out talking about frozen pipes,
and gosh, I can just imagine just how busy you
get on a day where it's ten below zero and
pipes are freezing. Give me some areas, or give my
(29:04):
listeners some areas where to inspect looking for pipes that
are exposed. If you've lived in a house for thirty years,
you probably know where it's vulnerable. But where should we
be looking for pipes that could freeze?
Speaker 4 (29:19):
Yeah? You know any any pipes that are exposed to
the elements are a little colder with those outside walls.
We talked about the hose bichs, the ones that are
connected to hose bitch once you've taken care of those,
if you've got a crawl space, or if you've got
pipes running through your garage or your attic like that
in Florida, you'll want to take a look at those
(29:43):
and know the difference between a water supply pipe, which
is usually copper, it might be pecks and could even
be cast iron, and a drain pipe, which is usually
PVC or they're usually a larger diameter pipe. That's easy
way to know the difference, right. You know, if we've
seen people gary that they think they've they've insulated their
(30:07):
pipes and looking at that cross base or looking under
a pier and beam home and find out they put
pipe insulation around a drain line, but they've neglected their
water supply pipes. And if drain lines are pitched properly,
you usually don't have to worry about those freezing. Other
are always exceptions, but it's the water supply pipes that
those copper lines especially that will and see PVC and
(30:31):
those things you want to make sure you've got good
insulation on them. If you've got a pipe that is
especially vulnerable. You can run thermostat, controlled heat tape or
heat cable that will keep that pipe from freezing. I've
got one right now running on my backflowsalves outside connected
(30:51):
to my sprinkler system, because they're not going to be
able to get to me until for another week or so,
and we're already getting it dipping into freezing temperatures and
that's all it takes to do damage.
Speaker 1 (31:02):
Yeah, that's a good point. And you know, I guess
those vulnerabilities are different in different areas too. You're talking
about Florida, and I'm not in Florida, so I forget
about that. They get freezing cold temperatures sometimes too, and
the protection on those pipes isn't quite as great in
the Midwest, where I am a little different ball game.
(31:22):
But you get some older housing, no insulation in walls,
and you know, block construction, and that copper pipes running
right along that block underneath the kitchen sink. That that's
vulnerability as height.
Speaker 4 (31:38):
Oh gosh.
Speaker 1 (31:39):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (31:39):
And what you have to think about is when it
when a pipe freezes, you know, it creates pressure. There's
an ice block in there, and it creates pressure, and
that pressure's got to give somewhere, and that's why they
tell you, you know, you can leave your leave your
at least some thinks trickling during extreme cold periods, it
leaves the pressure. So if you get something freezing, that
(32:00):
pressure is going to go somewhere, and often it's out
the side of the pipe wall, right, yeah, first fight.
Speaker 1 (32:06):
Yeah, Yeah. I was just gonna say, even if you
have one of those situations that I just described, you know,
leaving the cabinet doors opened, and uh, you know, if
you don't have any foam sleeves around that copper, that's
something you can do today because we always love to
put that off.
Speaker 4 (32:25):
Them at the box doores and uh, you know, keep
some of that stuff aranging. Never know when you're gonna
need it.
Speaker 1 (32:32):
I know folks call rotor ruter when they have plumbing
problems and also drain problems. Is there any drain maintenance
a homeowner can do anytime of the year. Yeah, things
are just running the littlest slow.
Speaker 4 (32:46):
Sure, when things are slow, Uh, you know, you think
about your house, which drains typically run slow. The shower
drain in my house run same here slow from time
to time. And me and my wife has longer hair
and boy but it's like, you know, every six months
or so, I got to slow drain in there so
you can get one of those little you know, the
(33:06):
little plastic drain widgets that you put down in there
and even put a hook in a metal coat hanger.
Push it down in that pipe, twist it around a
few times, go fishing. I said, right, pull back and
you'll be surprised what you catch down there. Do that
two or three times until nothing else is coming up.
That takes care of it. And then after you've cleaned it.
(33:28):
There's a lot of these bioins. I'm drain care products
aren't caustic and and you know with the fumes and everything,
they're natural products, right, and those that you introduce good
bacteria down into the pipes and it eats away A
lot of that gunk doesn't work instantly, but you leave
it sitting there overnight, it works miracles sure.
Speaker 1 (33:51):
And we put so much of that gunk in there ourselves.
I mean, our toothpaste has gelling it, our shaving cream
is jelling it, our hairspray has gelling it. Everything we
use in a bathroom has gel in it. That makes
the inside of those pipes nice and tacky and it
kind of collects things. And you're right, those enzyme products
do a pretty good, pretty good job. I've used one
(34:12):
called Drainbow. Just put the plug in the vanity bowl
and put some warm water in there and pour some
of the drain Bow in there. Let's sit about ten minutes.
It activates it, and pull the plug and let's sit over.
Speaker 4 (34:26):
Yes, they're great products. And you know this week of
always you mentioned at the top, we're coming into Thanksgiving
and plumbers called brown Friday. It's the busiest day of
the year for Roto Router and most plumbing companies in
most markets because drains just get overloaded. You get a
house full of guests and they're taking extra showers, they're
(34:49):
they're flushing the toilet more often, running the disposal, and
making a big meal in the kitchen. All those things
come together. It's a perfect storm for your drain system.
And that's why so many dreams back up on Thanksgiving
and the Friday after.
Speaker 1 (35:05):
So if I have twenty potatoes to appeel on Thursday,
I don't take all the scraps and shot them down
the disposal.
Speaker 4 (35:13):
It happens every year and every time.
Speaker 1 (35:17):
All right, Well, we've been preaching a little bit of
that too. One thing I will say, and I think
it was in I don't know, one of our conversations,
or it was in one year commercials or something, but
I've really latched onto this, and that is, if you
are not comfortable doing plumbing, and we all got to
(35:39):
know where our strengths, or you don't have the time
to do it, to create kind of an ongoing list,
almost like a shopping list. You know, vanity sink, slow drip,
toilet flushes itself. In other words, when you call rotor router.
If you have multiple small jobs, very very efficient at
(36:02):
getting that taken care of and save yourself a little
money at the same time.
Speaker 4 (36:08):
Yeah, create a punch list because you get second job discount,
third job discount, fourth job discount. So you know, rather
than pay you know, oh, let's just have him deal
with this one issue. It actually saves you money. Sure
will the plumber's in your house to have him knock
got any of the problems that you're that you're worried about,
(36:28):
that you're dealing with it, it's a lot less expensive
in the long run.
Speaker 1 (36:33):
Very good, Paul, Thanks for joining us today. A happy Thanksgiving.
I hope you're not too busy Friday. And again, folks,
that website is rotoreruter dot com. You can get a
lot of good information. Schedule a visit with Rotor Ruter
to your home if you'd like. And Paul, thanks again.
Speaker 4 (36:51):
My pleasure, Gary, Happy Thanksgiving everyone.
Speaker 1 (36:53):
Thank you, take care all right, very good, Thank you
very much, Paul. I enjoy the conversation we have throughout
the years, and they do a great, great job for you.
Get a lot of compliments about the folks at Rotor Router.
All right, your call's next, so grab a line. They're
wide open right now. It's eight hundred eight two three
eight two five y five. You're at Home with Gary Sullivan.
Speaker 3 (37:18):
Help for your home is just a click away at
Garysullivan online dot com. This is at Home with Gary Sullivan.
Speaker 1 (37:41):
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Garysalvent for Rotorrouter Plumbing and water Cleanup, a company that
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has been trusted and recommended for generations. Coast to coast.
Rotor Router fixes clogged drains, leaky faucets, and running toilets.
They repair and replace water heaters, garbage disposals, some pumps,
water softener, and every other residential commercial plumbing fixture I
use rotor Aruter at my house, and you should leave
plumbing to the pros too. Call one eight hundred, get
(39:09):
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(39:30):
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dot com. You'll see and smell the difference. All right,
(40:05):
beck at it we go at home with Gary Salvin.
Thanks for joining me. Thanks to our friend Paul Abrams
from rotor Ruter giving us some tips on well, just
kind of what happens in the next week or two
sometimes do our plumbing system. So take what he said
as gospel and take care of some of those issues
you may be having. All right, Our phone number has
(40:28):
stated eight hundred eight two three eight two five five
lines open and Frank welcome. Thanks for holding.
Speaker 5 (40:34):
Frank, Good morning, Gary morning. I have a little wood
project I'm doing refinishing a bench, and I haven't used
asked home to get off the finish that was on there. Okay,
and I'm standing a lot of spots, and I had
a prime suggestion when I get done after blowing all
(40:55):
the dust off, to use a cloth with some teen
natured alcohol to clean the surface off. Is that a
good idea using the dnatured alcohol. I haven't used that before.
Speaker 1 (41:07):
Yeah, yeah, D natured alcohol. Well, you know, D eight
natured alcohol is used a lot in woodworking, even from
mixing it with shelac and creating even prossy of the
wood before staining and different things. But as a cleanerture
denatured alcohol, it'll remove any dirt and there's probably not
much dirt left, but any oils, fingerprints, sanding dust. Even
(41:36):
though you got a lot of it off, there's probably
a lot you don't see too. And it really will
help with the stain and it'll finish better. The best
part is it evaporates very quickly after you use it.
I mean give it five minutes and you're ready to go.
Speaker 5 (41:51):
Okay. One other quick question using the acid tone and
the dnation alcohol i'd like to use some gloves. I
didn't know if latex or rubber or nitral would be
the best glove to use with those products.
Speaker 1 (42:07):
I don't know the makeup of the glove, but I
know in the department where you're looking at the acetones
and stuff and some strippers, they'll have a glove there
for you in the part where they have the strippers.
Outside of that, you'd have to read the label. I
don't know the actual makeup of the glove itself.
Speaker 5 (42:29):
I got you, all right, Gery. I appreciate your help.
Speaker 1 (42:31):
You're quite welcome. Thanks again for hold on. I appreciate
it all right. Yeah, that dnage ilcohol is a good cleaner.
When I was talking about and this is we haven't
talked about this for a while. But if you are
stripping an old I don't know, whatever desk, buffet, kitchen
(42:51):
table or whatever, or maybe an inexpensive piece of wood
a little hope chest or end table and that's made
of pine, maybe you picked it up at an unfinished
furniture shop or something along those lines, and you're going
to stain it and you're going to finish it and
put it in a bedroom or give it to somebody
as a gift. A couple things to think about. It
(43:14):
really depends on the wood. And I keep that threatening
a couple of my friends. One is a wood turner
and the other one is a wood worker, and what
a great hobby. I don't do that, but I'm going
to have them on and talk about their hobby and
(43:34):
one of the things, you know, and they really get
into finishes too. And one of the things you can
do to minimize the varying porosity of wood is to
take denatured alcohol fifty percent denatured alcohol fifty percent SLAC,
mix it together and put a code of that onto
pine and you won't have those real random ups and
(43:59):
down of dark in light of the same stain. So
it kind of evens that out. You can kind of
make pine be a little more even almost, uh you know,
maybe like a maple, not exactly, but it will certainly
even it out. So that's a little tip for you. Also,
all right again, our phone number is eight hundred eight
two three eight two five five. You can grab a
(44:21):
line happy to talk about your home project. And you're
at home with Gary Sullivan
Speaker 3 (44:39):
Weekends, I mean, a never writing list of things to
do around your home, Get help at one eight hundred
and eighty two three Talk You're at home with Gary Sullivan,
(45:01):
Nie
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