May 11, 2024 • 27 mins
It’ an all-calls day as Dean talks everything surrounding your home! Dean shares on what to do when dealing with a sinkhole in a backyard and water heater issues – causing water from shower to gradually turn cold quickly. Dean continues to talk about dealing with a sinkhole in backyards. Dean advises about pergolas in a backyard & what to do to prevent it from falling in the case of an earthquake.
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Episode Transcript
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(00:00):
KFI AM six forty. You're listeningto Dean Sharp, the House Whisperer on
demand on the iHeart Radio appf IAM six forty and live streaming in HD
everywhere on the iHeart Radio app.Hey, welcome to home where. Every
(00:20):
week we help you better understand thatplace where you live. I am Dean
Sharp, the House Whisperer, customhome builder, custom home designer, and
most importantly, today, your guideto turning your ordinary house into something truly
extraordinary. It is I'm just lettingyou know right now so you can get
to work. It is an allcalls Saturday morning. We do this every
(00:45):
few weeks. We just kind ofclear the decks of any agenda that I've
got and we're just gonna take callstoday. We will take as many calls
as we possibly can. The phonelines are open and here is the number
eight three three two Ask Dean Athree three. The numeral two ask Dean
(01:08):
A three three to ask Dean.Phone lines are open now. Producers Richie
and Kean are staying by ready totake your calls. And as soon as
we get some calls up on theboard, we will go to it.
Saturday Morning's always a you know,low traffic time, right, so everybody's
asleep, well not everybody, You'renot asleep. And that's the point.
(01:32):
If you've tried or wanted to orthought about calling in, Saturday mornings are
always an optimal time to hop onthe old radio traffic freeway because you know,
it's pretty clear out there right now. All right, Uh, I'm
(01:52):
just deciding where I'm you know,I'm off. I'm thrown off a little
bit because there's somebody missing from thestudio. But that's all right, that's
all right. If she's tarty,then she will have a check mark against
her name later today. But theteam is all here for you. I'll
tell you who's not tardy. Samis on the board and ready to rock
and roll. Good morning, Sam, Good morning Dean. It's really good
(02:17):
talking to you, buddy. There'sour studio audience, our live studio audience,
who sounds exactly the same every Saturdaymorning. They are consistent. I'll
tell you that, they're just consistent. Producers Richie and Keana standing by working
it to take your calls again.The number eight three three two ass Dean.
(02:39):
Heather Brooker at the news desk.Good morning, Heather, Good morning,
happy Saturday. Yeah, I'm good. Hey, listen if if you
have time later, I have questionsand I will always take advantage of getting
advice from Dean. Oh heck,yeah, oh, we'll do it.
We'll do it for sure. We'lldo it no matter what day plans this
(03:00):
weekend? What's the what's the scoop? Well, I am pardon me,
still waking up, apparently. No, we're going to brunch and we're going
to take my mom, who justmoved out here from Oklahoma, to brunch
and we're gonna have like a nicelittle seaside. We may go out to
the Malibu area one of the restaurantsout there, and yeah, just enjoy
(03:21):
the day. And then I'm gonnacome home and get ready for work because
I'll be here and there you go, and no rest for the weary exactly.
All right, what are you doingfor Mother's Day? Okay? So
Tina has set up a way tohonor her mom specifically and a couple of
(03:42):
the other moms and our family.She has put together a tea a tea
we are doing. We're not doinga brunch, We're doing a high tea
here at the house. How lovely. That's because her mom loves that kind
of thing. And so, youknow, the full on British high tea
with all the grandcumber sandwiches. Yeah. I don't even know what all those
(04:04):
things are made out of, butyeah, stacks of sandwiches and scones and
biscuits and tea and what times shouldwe be there? What time should well,
you're you're actually going to be outin the area, so you know,
we'll have you swing by. Howdo you swing by? That sounds
great? I myself, if I'mactually going to get full on a tea,
(04:28):
will require about eighty seven of thosetiny little triangles sand fill up on
the scones. The scones are veryfilling. Yeah, I heard. The
secret is scones and no water,and they just go in your stomach and
they they become a rock, andthen you're going to get a feeling of
fullness and also get a little drymouth. Yeah, a little dry mouth
too, Yeah, exactly, allright, perfect, Heather's got questions.
(04:53):
We're gonna we'll we'll get to Heather'squestion in a little bit, all right.
She just slid in under the wirehere. I mean I had to
kind of vamp it for a bit. Yeah, I was ready to give
you a check mark on tardi.Technically you were tardy. I was the
only person sitting across it. Theonly person sitting across the table from me
(05:14):
is a beagle who is asleep.Tina is here, my better half,
my design partner, the best momI know, and my best friend in
all the world. Hey, what'sgoing on? Yeah? All right,
all right? I just you hadme a little nervous that you weren't going
(05:34):
to make it in. That's allI'm saying. You have a house full
of beagles. You're like an astudent who's always late to class. What
do you do with that kind ofa person? Your best? Just praise
them? All right? I seehow this is going. All right,
y'all listen, Uh it is anall call Saturday morning. I'm looking at
(05:58):
the board and guess what we got? So we will get to it.
Kaf I, Jean Sharp. Thehouse was for at your service. Good
Saturday morning to you. It isand all calls Saturday here on the program.
We set aside all other agendas andwe let you, you, my
(06:20):
friend, get to set the agenda. Anything you want to talk about regarding
your home, any kind of question, that you've got, whether it is
DIY construction design, inside, outside, upside, I don't know, downside,
I don't know. Just anything.Anything you want to talk about your
home. So let's not waste anymore time, and let's get to the
(06:44):
phones. I want to talk toJanet. Hey, Janet, welcome home.
I listened to you, and Ireally like it. I have been
living in my house for forty fiveyears and we never had this problem.
Maybe the rain caused it or something. We have a large backyard and it's
(07:09):
it's concrete, and then we havea section that is a grass growing and
there's a walkway to go to oneof those little houses that we put our
shovels and you know, garden stuff. And one day I noticed that under
the walkway there is a hole,and so I called my son and he
(07:34):
put a couple of blocks in there. And the next day I noticed that
the block went down, so Icalled my handyman and he checked and under
the concrete, the site is likeempty and is probably like four five yards
(07:58):
in under the concrete, and there'sa hole that is in the grass that
goes under the concrete. And hesaid he never seen this before, and
this is like forty five years welive in here, never this happened.
So he's trying to find what tofill this with and maybe it's gonna sink
(08:26):
more, and what should we do. And my other question is that I
have a water heater, and whenI'm taking a shower, and this has
happened many times with other water heaters, I'm taking a shower probably takes maybe
forty twenty five minutes or maybe thirtyminutes. Once a week, I wash
(08:50):
my hair and all of that,and the water gets the water at the
beginning, and then I have circulatingwater that goes all over the house.
The water is hot, and sothe water is hot and I'm washing,
and then the water gets cold,so I add more hot water, and
again a few minutes later it getscold. So I returned couple of water
(09:18):
heaters because of that, and thenstill I have the same problem. Actually,
one of the companies send their ownengineer to come and check, and
he didn't understand it and says,oh, this is too hot for summer
in California. You shouldn't put itthis high. Yeah yeah, okay,
(09:41):
okay, I gotcha, I gotcha. I love it when people give weird
expalt. You know when professionals quoteunquote give weird exploit You're like, so,
you know what, you shouldn't bedoing this. That's the problem.
You shouldn't be doing this, allright, Janet. So let's address the
sinkhole first. Okay, and okay, Leon know what, We kind of
(10:03):
had a long explanation there. We'resort of up against the clock and I
don't want Sam to yell at mefor going late. Oh because he will,
Oh he will. So here's thething I'm gonna I'm gonna pop you
back on hold. Everybody, hangtight. We're gonna find out what's going
on with the sinkhole in Janet's backyard. You're listening to Home with Dean Sharp
(10:28):
on demand from KFI AM six fortyKFI AM six forty live streaming in HD
everywhere on the iHeart Radio app.You are Home with Dean Sharp. The
house whisper. We are having anall calls Saturday morning. That means we've
(10:48):
set aside any other agenda but totake your call. The number to reach
me eight three three two. AskDean eight three three the numeral two Ask
Dan. All right, I've gotJanet on the line. Janet has been
in her home for many, manyyears. She now has a sinkhole in
her backyard. She wants to knowwhat in the world is going on and
(11:11):
what can she do with that.I'm not sure I've had a sinkhole question
before or man, maybe not ina while. I don't remember the last
sinkhole question I have. Also,she's got some issues with her water heater,
so let's dive into it, Janet. How close is this sinkhole to
your foundation? Is to my foundation? Probably like ten yard? Okay?
(11:39):
All right? So no, maybemaybe it is, so it's not right
under the house. No, it'snot close to the house, okay.
And how wide is it? Anddeep is it? Right now? The
depth is probably maybe a yard andthe length and the is it the place
that is under the concrete is probablythree yards? Okay, So there's an
(12:03):
area that's getting underneath the concrete patio. Okay. All right. So here's
the thing. Sinkholes are nothing tomess around with, and we don't just
fill them in, Okay, We'vegot to find out what the cause is
so that we know how to doit right. Most sinkholes, I'll let
(12:24):
you know right now, most needto be excavated a little bit even further
beyond the evidence. They are asymptom. They are not the thing.
They are a symptom of something that'sgoing on underneath the ground there. So
it could be a number of differentthings, and I can't tell you what
it is because it could be anumber of different things. Sometimes there is
(12:50):
a batch of organic material that's beenhanging out underneath our property for a long
period of time, and that organicmaterial, for one reason or another,
has finally gotten enough moisture into itthat it has begun to collapse, and
therefore the soil sitting on top ofit has collapsed. That's that would be
(13:11):
the good news sinkhole, meaning that, Okay, yeah, we just found
a bunch of old tree stumps andthis or that something that was dumped here
in years past, decades past,and because the things have been dry here
in California for so long, butwe just went through two incredibly wet winters,
all that stuff got wet. Itnow is decomposing and composting down,
(13:35):
and therefore the space that it usedto take up it's not taking up anymore,
and everything above it is sinking down. That is quite a possibility if
that's the case. That's good news. But still that means excavating down and
getting that organic material out of thereso that when you do refill the hoil,
it's soil to soil to soil andyou don't have a continued problem.
(13:58):
How question, Yeah, how dowe get under the concrete? Yeah,
that is that's a tricky thing.This is where I'm what I'm about to
suggest to you, because so letme finish my explanation here. The second
thing, we could have a brokenwater line, we could have some other
thing that is washing out soil fromunderneath your property. And that's why I'm
(14:22):
saying a sinkhole is a serious thing. So there's a couple of calls that
you have to start with right away. Number one, I want you to
call your insurance company. I wantyou to find out whether or not a
sinkhole on your property is something thatis covered by your insurance. Number two,
I want you to call your localdepartment of Building and Safety and you
(14:43):
let them know I have a sinkholein my yard. Who needs to be
sent out to take a look atit. And then the reason is that
you call building in Safety and yourmunicipality, is that a sinkhole is a
concern to everybody, not just youand your proper and so the city wants
to know. The city will respond. They will help you figure out what's
(15:07):
going on with that. That doesn'tmean that they're doing all the cost of
everything, but they will look atit and they will advise you. Sometimes
you've got to get a geotechnical engineeringcompany involved in order to figure out exactly
what's going on, test around it. They'll send samples down or rods down
through it. They we've got toget to the bottom of the problem and
(15:31):
find out what's going on. Andas far as getting under the concrete is
concerned, I don't know. Idon't know what to tell you about that
because I don't know the cause,I don't know the extent. There is
a distinct possibility that that portion ofconcrete may need to be removed in order
to treat the sinkhole properly. SoI know that's not great news. But
(15:52):
what I am telling you is you'vegot to call in the city right away
and your insurance company and to takesteps and let no one, no one
get anywhere near that thing now,because we don't know what it is or
what it's going to do next.And the reason I ask you how close
it was to the house is becauseif it was anywhere near the house,
(16:14):
then it's a situation where you mayactually, you know, want to not
be in the house while that sinkholeis there or developing. So very very
very important Janet, that you makethose calls to the local authorities and your
insurance company and get squared away theirfirst steps. Now, as for your
(16:37):
water heater, is it a traditionalwater heater, just a tanked water heater
or is it a tank closet one? How big is it? How big
is it? Do you know?Is it regular? Our house is not
small, so it's not a verysmall one. Is the probably big one?
A big big one like seventy fivegallons? One hundred gallons? You
(17:00):
don't have seventy five seventy five gallon, all right, a seventy five gallon
water heater. And this is justme. I'm just saying a seventy five
gallon water heater on a recirculation pump. At the end of a half hour
shower, you might have exhausted.Depending on the size of your the flow
of your shower heads, you mighthave exhausted the hot water in that water.
(17:25):
Heat is not at the end.When I like in five minutes,
like four minutes, the water getscold, I add more hot water.
Again. One question about the previousyou said called geo technical What what was
the geotechnical A geotechnical engineering service.That's that's an engineer that specializes in soil.
(17:49):
Okay, in the ground. Okay, you've got civil engineers, structural
engineers, and there are soils engineersand that's who. That's who ultimately will
probably be involved one way or theanother figuring out what's going on with the
ground. All right, Janet,we're up against the next break, my
(18:11):
friend. The best and most importantadvice I can give you is about the
sinkhole, and that is please pleaseplease call the city, call your insurance
company, rally the troops, geteyes on this thing, because we don't
want it to get any worse.We don't want it to get any larger,
and we've got to get to theroot of it. So don't let
(18:33):
anybody fill that in. Okay,nobody's filling it in because it's a moot
point. If it's a true sinkhole, it doesn't the way to address it
is not just to some people think, oh, we're going to grout it,
and meaning the grouting means pouring concreteinto a sinkhole. No, we
got to find out what the causeis, fix the cause, and then
(18:55):
the sinkhole can be filled in afterthe fact. So it's a root cause
that's taking that soil out of there. We got to find out what's going
on. Janet, thank you foryour call. I wish you the best
with that. All right, y'all, when we come back, more of
your calls your home with Dean Sharpthe house whisper, Kayfi, Dean Sharp,
(19:17):
the house whisper, Welcome home.Good Saturday morning to you. It's
still the six o'clock hour, soyou can still be proud. Yes,
you are among the early risers,and we are talking about all things home
today. It is an all callsSaturday morning here on the program. Let
me give you the number out eightthree three two ask Dean eight three to
(19:41):
three, the numeral to ask Dean, to ask Dean A three three to
ask Dean. We still have someroom on the callboard for you, but
we got a lot of calls uphere and I choose them at random.
So even if you call right nowyou've got as good a chance as anybody
to get on the air, Sogive me a call. Let's talk about
your home side, outside design,construction, DIY doesn't matter. You set
(20:03):
the agenda today. You guys arein charge of the show. So at
the end of the show, ifit's been a good one, you are
You're the reason. And if ithasn't, then you're fired. Okay,
let's go back to the phones.I want to talk to Alex. Hey,
Alex, welcome home. Good morningDeans, Good morning, sir.
(20:26):
How can I help you? I'mup here. I'm up here in Ventura
County with you. I have apergola in my backyard and it's twenty one
feet by sixteen feet wide. It'smade out of beams that are four by
twelve. It's got six posts fourby eight, and it's covered by a
climbing fig So it's a few poundsup there in the air. Yeah.
(20:48):
My question is there's no sheer protectionagainst it against an earthquake. And I
don't want that thing to pancake downon me if I'm going to look enough
to be under it during an earthquake. And I was just wondering, what
can I add to it to giveit more structural integrity so it doesn't fall
over. It's next to the house. I could attach it to a rafter
(21:12):
that's sticking out of the side ofthe house, but I don't want to
damage the roof of the house ifit does fall down. So what's your
solution. Yeah, I wouldn't dothat either. I wouldn't do Yeah,
that's a that's a good sized pergolaout there. Did you say four x
twelve's up on top. It's abeautiful it's the best one I've ever seen.
The previous owner, who was inthe Navy, built it and he
(21:33):
did a good job. And everyonce in a while I have to replace
one of those beams, and it'sit's a construction project. But you could
build. You can build a secondstory if you wanted to up there.
Yeah, I have no doubt that'sthat's pretty heavy duty. But you're right,
there's a lot of weight up there. And uh so here it's actually
relatively simple. But so the solutionis simple, simple, easy for me
(21:56):
to say. Uh And the keythough, is for you to do it
in a manner that is consistent withthe design of the pergola. So you
don't end up looking like you've justsort of retro fit something on this.
So this is what you'll have tothink through carefully. But basically, crossbracing,
that's what's that's what you need todo on a pergola like that.
(22:19):
That's how if we had designed itfrom the get go, we probably just
would have incorporated that kind of conceptinto design. And when I mean crossbracing,
I mean off of the posts,off of the posts. Forty five
degree boards that are running firmly attachedto the posts, that run up in
(22:41):
both directions at each corner. Okay, forty five degree boards that run up
and then connect to you know thatthe outside rim, the outside beams,
whatever it is that's actually on theoutside there of the pergolas. Sometimes that's
that connection is a little easier tomake than at other times, depending on
what direction the beams are going.But that's really what you need. We
(23:04):
call it knee bracing. And itcan go on the outside edges of the
posts and bolt to the lag boltinto the posts from the outside, or
it can run down and actually hitthe face of the post on the side
that it's running. That's why youwould have to get you know, think
(23:25):
it through design wise so that itis both efficient for the shear and and
by the way, everybody, whenAlex said sheer, we're talking about lateral
load. Okay, a structure thathe just described, no problem. You
know if an elephant accidentally lands ontop of it, Okay, not a
(23:45):
problem. It's got lots of strengthfor what we call dead load, live
load and dead load. That isthat is gravity pulling weight straight down.
But in an earthquake, so oftenthe ground shakes from side to side and
something that that that's that top heavykind of standing on little stilts as it
were. What is keeping all ofthat weight from bending the whole thing over
(24:08):
and collapsing onto his side. Andthe answer is bracing, forty five degree
bracing. But you're going to wantto do it so that it is esthetically
attractive, so that no and thekey is nobody ever walks outside, looks
at your gorgeous pergola and says,oh, and I see you've added some
braces, because then you haven't doneit right. So the key is figuring
(24:30):
out a way to incorporate those bracesinto the design. And we want them,
you know, pretty sizable, notjust I don't mean sizable in terms
of bulk of lumber. But wedon't want to just do go up into
the corner something that heavy and runa little two foot braces, right,
we want to come down down thoseposts a considerable amount and run a nice
(24:52):
brace. Nothing that anybody's going tohit their head on, but just above
that running those braces up and outso that you get in every corner two
braces. So that means that withfour legs, there are going to have
four forty five degree knee braces bracingup this pergola in each direction, a
(25:12):
total of eight. And that's fourin each direction, and that adds a
considerable amount of lateral resistance to thepergola, and you should be good to
go. I do have right nowin place corbel cuts which are eleven by
eleven and they're lag bolted into thecorners. So that's the only thing I
(25:33):
got as far as blocking access.It's an open access pergola, so I
can walk any direction. So Iwould hate to obstruct the walking areas,
right understood, But at the endof the day, it's either going to
be that or a piece of specialtyhardware that and you could always have that
(25:56):
done too. You could always havea piece of heavy duty, specually hardware
made for the post connections at thetop, depending on again, depending Ok,
I can't see how it's connected,but depending on how it's connected.
Sometimes, when we want to goclean and we don't want to put a
knee brace, we design the pergolawith its own innate connective stiffness at the
(26:18):
joints, meaning that it's a bigold piece of steel that's resisting the lateral
weight, but we're not actually visuallyseeing it drop down from the square of
the pergola. That's the best Ican give you, my friend. It's
got to be one or the other. But yeah, you've got to add
some lateral strength there because that isa heavy duty thing. You got four
(26:41):
x twelves up there, multiple fourby twelves and a sixteen by twenty foot
configuration, a lot of weight uptop, and you are wise to be
thinking, you know what, weshould probably brace that up. You're absolutely
right about that, Alex. Thanksfor the call, my friend, and
good luck with that. But considerthe those two options, braces and or
(27:02):
specialty hardware to strengthen that beautiful pergolup. All right, y'all, When
we come back more of your calls. You are Home with Dean Sharp,
the House Whisperer on KFI. You'relistening to Home with Dean Sharp on demand
from KFI AM six forty
KFI AM six forty. You're listeningto Dean Sharp, the House Whisperer on
demand on the iHeart Radio appf IAM six forty and live streaming in HD
everywhere on the iHeart Radio app.Hey, welcome to home where. Every
(00:20):
week we help you better understand thatplace where you live. I am Dean
Sharp, the House Whisperer, customhome builder, custom home designer, and
most importantly, today, your guideto turning your ordinary house into something truly
extraordinary. It is I'm just lettingyou know right now so you can get
to work. It is an allcalls Saturday morning. We do this every
(00:45):
few weeks. We just kind ofclear the decks of any agenda that I've
got and we're just gonna take callstoday. We will take as many calls
as we possibly can. The phonelines are open and here is the number
eight three three two Ask Dean Athree three. The numeral two ask Dean
(01:08):
A three three to ask Dean.Phone lines are open now. Producers Richie
and Kean are staying by ready totake your calls. And as soon as
we get some calls up on theboard, we will go to it.
Saturday Morning's always a you know,low traffic time, right, so everybody's
asleep, well not everybody, You'renot asleep. And that's the point.
(01:32):
If you've tried or wanted to orthought about calling in, Saturday mornings are
always an optimal time to hop onthe old radio traffic freeway because you know,
it's pretty clear out there right now. All right, Uh, I'm
(01:52):
just deciding where I'm you know,I'm off. I'm thrown off a little
bit because there's somebody missing from thestudio. But that's all right, that's
all right. If she's tarty,then she will have a check mark against
her name later today. But theteam is all here for you. I'll
tell you who's not tardy. Samis on the board and ready to rock
and roll. Good morning, Sam, Good morning Dean. It's really good
(02:17):
talking to you, buddy. There'sour studio audience, our live studio audience,
who sounds exactly the same every Saturdaymorning. They are consistent. I'll
tell you that, they're just consistent. Producers Richie and Keana standing by working
it to take your calls again.The number eight three three two ass Dean.
(02:39):
Heather Brooker at the news desk.Good morning, Heather, Good morning,
happy Saturday. Yeah, I'm good. Hey, listen if if you
have time later, I have questionsand I will always take advantage of getting
advice from Dean. Oh heck,yeah, oh, we'll do it.
We'll do it for sure. We'lldo it no matter what day plans this
(03:00):
weekend? What's the what's the scoop? Well, I am pardon me,
still waking up, apparently. No, we're going to brunch and we're going
to take my mom, who justmoved out here from Oklahoma, to brunch
and we're gonna have like a nicelittle seaside. We may go out to
the Malibu area one of the restaurantsout there, and yeah, just enjoy
(03:21):
the day. And then I'm gonnacome home and get ready for work because
I'll be here and there you go, and no rest for the weary exactly.
All right, what are you doingfor Mother's Day? Okay? So
Tina has set up a way tohonor her mom specifically and a couple of
(03:42):
the other moms and our family.She has put together a tea a tea
we are doing. We're not doinga brunch, We're doing a high tea
here at the house. How lovely. That's because her mom loves that kind
of thing. And so, youknow, the full on British high tea
with all the grandcumber sandwiches. Yeah. I don't even know what all those
(04:04):
things are made out of, butyeah, stacks of sandwiches and scones and
biscuits and tea and what times shouldwe be there? What time should well,
you're you're actually going to be outin the area, so you know,
we'll have you swing by. Howdo you swing by? That sounds
great? I myself, if I'mactually going to get full on a tea,
(04:28):
will require about eighty seven of thosetiny little triangles sand fill up on
the scones. The scones are veryfilling. Yeah, I heard. The
secret is scones and no water,and they just go in your stomach and
they they become a rock, andthen you're going to get a feeling of
fullness and also get a little drymouth. Yeah, a little dry mouth
too, Yeah, exactly, allright, perfect, Heather's got questions.
(04:53):
We're gonna we'll we'll get to Heather'squestion in a little bit, all right.
She just slid in under the wirehere. I mean I had to
kind of vamp it for a bit. Yeah, I was ready to give
you a check mark on tardi.Technically you were tardy. I was the
only person sitting across it. Theonly person sitting across the table from me
(05:14):
is a beagle who is asleep.Tina is here, my better half,
my design partner, the best momI know, and my best friend in
all the world. Hey, what'sgoing on? Yeah? All right,
all right? I just you hadme a little nervous that you weren't going
(05:34):
to make it in. That's allI'm saying. You have a house full
of beagles. You're like an astudent who's always late to class. What
do you do with that kind ofa person? Your best? Just praise
them? All right? I seehow this is going. All right,
y'all listen, Uh it is anall call Saturday morning. I'm looking at
(05:58):
the board and guess what we got? So we will get to it.
Kaf I, Jean Sharp. Thehouse was for at your service. Good
Saturday morning to you. It isand all calls Saturday here on the program.
We set aside all other agendas andwe let you, you, my
(06:20):
friend, get to set the agenda. Anything you want to talk about regarding
your home, any kind of question, that you've got, whether it is
DIY construction design, inside, outside, upside, I don't know, downside,
I don't know. Just anything.Anything you want to talk about your
home. So let's not waste anymore time, and let's get to the
(06:44):
phones. I want to talk toJanet. Hey, Janet, welcome home.
I listened to you, and Ireally like it. I have been
living in my house for forty fiveyears and we never had this problem.
Maybe the rain caused it or something. We have a large backyard and it's
(07:09):
it's concrete, and then we havea section that is a grass growing and
there's a walkway to go to oneof those little houses that we put our
shovels and you know, garden stuff. And one day I noticed that under
the walkway there is a hole,and so I called my son and he
(07:34):
put a couple of blocks in there. And the next day I noticed that
the block went down, so Icalled my handyman and he checked and under
the concrete, the site is likeempty and is probably like four five yards
(07:58):
in under the concrete, and there'sa hole that is in the grass that
goes under the concrete. And hesaid he never seen this before, and
this is like forty five years welive in here, never this happened.
So he's trying to find what tofill this with and maybe it's gonna sink
(08:26):
more, and what should we do. And my other question is that I
have a water heater, and whenI'm taking a shower, and this has
happened many times with other water heaters, I'm taking a shower probably takes maybe
forty twenty five minutes or maybe thirtyminutes. Once a week, I wash
(08:50):
my hair and all of that,and the water gets the water at the
beginning, and then I have circulatingwater that goes all over the house.
The water is hot, and sothe water is hot and I'm washing,
and then the water gets cold,so I add more hot water, and
again a few minutes later it getscold. So I returned couple of water
(09:18):
heaters because of that, and thenstill I have the same problem. Actually,
one of the companies send their ownengineer to come and check, and
he didn't understand it and says,oh, this is too hot for summer
in California. You shouldn't put itthis high. Yeah yeah, okay,
(09:41):
okay, I gotcha, I gotcha. I love it when people give weird
expalt. You know when professionals quoteunquote give weird exploit You're like, so,
you know what, you shouldn't bedoing this. That's the problem.
You shouldn't be doing this, allright, Janet. So let's address the
sinkhole first. Okay, and okay, Leon know what, We kind of
(10:03):
had a long explanation there. We'resort of up against the clock and I
don't want Sam to yell at mefor going late. Oh because he will,
Oh he will. So here's thething I'm gonna I'm gonna pop you
back on hold. Everybody, hangtight. We're gonna find out what's going
on with the sinkhole in Janet's backyard. You're listening to Home with Dean Sharp
(10:28):
on demand from KFI AM six fortyKFI AM six forty live streaming in HD
everywhere on the iHeart Radio app.You are Home with Dean Sharp. The
house whisper. We are having anall calls Saturday morning. That means we've
(10:48):
set aside any other agenda but totake your call. The number to reach
me eight three three two. AskDean eight three three the numeral two Ask
Dan. All right, I've gotJanet on the line. Janet has been
in her home for many, manyyears. She now has a sinkhole in
her backyard. She wants to knowwhat in the world is going on and
(11:11):
what can she do with that.I'm not sure I've had a sinkhole question
before or man, maybe not ina while. I don't remember the last
sinkhole question I have. Also,she's got some issues with her water heater,
so let's dive into it, Janet. How close is this sinkhole to
your foundation? Is to my foundation? Probably like ten yard? Okay?
(11:39):
All right? So no, maybemaybe it is, so it's not right
under the house. No, it'snot close to the house, okay.
And how wide is it? Anddeep is it? Right now? The
depth is probably maybe a yard andthe length and the is it the place
that is under the concrete is probablythree yards? Okay, So there's an
(12:03):
area that's getting underneath the concrete patio. Okay. All right. So here's
the thing. Sinkholes are nothing tomess around with, and we don't just
fill them in, Okay, We'vegot to find out what the cause is
so that we know how to doit right. Most sinkholes, I'll let
(12:24):
you know right now, most needto be excavated a little bit even further
beyond the evidence. They are asymptom. They are not the thing.
They are a symptom of something that'sgoing on underneath the ground there. So
it could be a number of differentthings, and I can't tell you what
it is because it could be anumber of different things. Sometimes there is
(12:50):
a batch of organic material that's beenhanging out underneath our property for a long
period of time, and that organicmaterial, for one reason or another,
has finally gotten enough moisture into itthat it has begun to collapse, and
therefore the soil sitting on top ofit has collapsed. That's that would be
(13:11):
the good news sinkhole, meaning that, Okay, yeah, we just found
a bunch of old tree stumps andthis or that something that was dumped here
in years past, decades past,and because the things have been dry here
in California for so long, butwe just went through two incredibly wet winters,
all that stuff got wet. Itnow is decomposing and composting down,
(13:35):
and therefore the space that it usedto take up it's not taking up anymore,
and everything above it is sinking down. That is quite a possibility if
that's the case. That's good news. But still that means excavating down and
getting that organic material out of thereso that when you do refill the hoil,
it's soil to soil to soil andyou don't have a continued problem.
(13:58):
How question, Yeah, how dowe get under the concrete? Yeah,
that is that's a tricky thing.This is where I'm what I'm about to
suggest to you, because so letme finish my explanation here. The second
thing, we could have a brokenwater line, we could have some other
thing that is washing out soil fromunderneath your property. And that's why I'm
(14:22):
saying a sinkhole is a serious thing. So there's a couple of calls that
you have to start with right away. Number one, I want you to
call your insurance company. I wantyou to find out whether or not a
sinkhole on your property is something thatis covered by your insurance. Number two,
I want you to call your localdepartment of Building and Safety and you
(14:43):
let them know I have a sinkholein my yard. Who needs to be
sent out to take a look atit. And then the reason is that
you call building in Safety and yourmunicipality, is that a sinkhole is a
concern to everybody, not just youand your proper and so the city wants
to know. The city will respond. They will help you figure out what's
(15:07):
going on with that. That doesn'tmean that they're doing all the cost of
everything, but they will look atit and they will advise you. Sometimes
you've got to get a geotechnical engineeringcompany involved in order to figure out exactly
what's going on, test around it. They'll send samples down or rods down
through it. They we've got toget to the bottom of the problem and
(15:31):
find out what's going on. Andas far as getting under the concrete is
concerned, I don't know. Idon't know what to tell you about that
because I don't know the cause,I don't know the extent. There is
a distinct possibility that that portion ofconcrete may need to be removed in order
to treat the sinkhole properly. SoI know that's not great news. But
(15:52):
what I am telling you is you'vegot to call in the city right away
and your insurance company and to takesteps and let no one, no one
get anywhere near that thing now,because we don't know what it is or
what it's going to do next.And the reason I ask you how close
it was to the house is becauseif it was anywhere near the house,
(16:14):
then it's a situation where you mayactually, you know, want to not
be in the house while that sinkholeis there or developing. So very very
very important Janet, that you makethose calls to the local authorities and your
insurance company and get squared away theirfirst steps. Now, as for your
(16:37):
water heater, is it a traditionalwater heater, just a tanked water heater
or is it a tank closet one? How big is it? How big
is it? Do you know?Is it regular? Our house is not
small, so it's not a verysmall one. Is the probably big one?
A big big one like seventy fivegallons? One hundred gallons? You
(17:00):
don't have seventy five seventy five gallon, all right, a seventy five gallon
water heater. And this is justme. I'm just saying a seventy five
gallon water heater on a recirculation pump. At the end of a half hour
shower, you might have exhausted.Depending on the size of your the flow
of your shower heads, you mighthave exhausted the hot water in that water.
(17:25):
Heat is not at the end.When I like in five minutes,
like four minutes, the water getscold, I add more hot water.
Again. One question about the previousyou said called geo technical What what was
the geotechnical A geotechnical engineering service.That's that's an engineer that specializes in soil.
(17:49):
Okay, in the ground. Okay, you've got civil engineers, structural
engineers, and there are soils engineersand that's who. That's who ultimately will
probably be involved one way or theanother figuring out what's going on with the
ground. All right, Janet,we're up against the next break, my
(18:11):
friend. The best and most importantadvice I can give you is about the
sinkhole, and that is please pleaseplease call the city, call your insurance
company, rally the troops, geteyes on this thing, because we don't
want it to get any worse.We don't want it to get any larger,
and we've got to get to theroot of it. So don't let
(18:33):
anybody fill that in. Okay,nobody's filling it in because it's a moot
point. If it's a true sinkhole, it doesn't the way to address it
is not just to some people think, oh, we're going to grout it,
and meaning the grouting means pouring concreteinto a sinkhole. No, we
got to find out what the causeis, fix the cause, and then
(18:55):
the sinkhole can be filled in afterthe fact. So it's a root cause
that's taking that soil out of there. We got to find out what's going
on. Janet, thank you foryour call. I wish you the best
with that. All right, y'all, when we come back, more of
your calls your home with Dean Sharpthe house whisper, Kayfi, Dean Sharp,
(19:17):
the house whisper, Welcome home.Good Saturday morning to you. It's
still the six o'clock hour, soyou can still be proud. Yes,
you are among the early risers,and we are talking about all things home
today. It is an all callsSaturday morning here on the program. Let
me give you the number out eightthree three two ask Dean eight three to
(19:41):
three, the numeral to ask Dean, to ask Dean A three three to
ask Dean. We still have someroom on the callboard for you, but
we got a lot of calls uphere and I choose them at random.
So even if you call right nowyou've got as good a chance as anybody
to get on the air, Sogive me a call. Let's talk about
your home side, outside design,construction, DIY doesn't matter. You set
(20:03):
the agenda today. You guys arein charge of the show. So at
the end of the show, ifit's been a good one, you are
You're the reason. And if ithasn't, then you're fired. Okay,
let's go back to the phones.I want to talk to Alex. Hey,
Alex, welcome home. Good morningDeans, Good morning, sir.
(20:26):
How can I help you? I'mup here. I'm up here in Ventura
County with you. I have apergola in my backyard and it's twenty one
feet by sixteen feet wide. It'smade out of beams that are four by
twelve. It's got six posts fourby eight, and it's covered by a
climbing fig So it's a few poundsup there in the air. Yeah.
(20:48):
My question is there's no sheer protectionagainst it against an earthquake. And I
don't want that thing to pancake downon me if I'm going to look enough
to be under it during an earthquake. And I was just wondering, what
can I add to it to giveit more structural integrity so it doesn't fall
over. It's next to the house. I could attach it to a rafter
(21:12):
that's sticking out of the side ofthe house, but I don't want to
damage the roof of the house ifit does fall down. So what's your
solution. Yeah, I wouldn't dothat either. I wouldn't do Yeah,
that's a that's a good sized pergolaout there. Did you say four x
twelve's up on top. It's abeautiful it's the best one I've ever seen.
The previous owner, who was inthe Navy, built it and he
(21:33):
did a good job. And everyonce in a while I have to replace
one of those beams, and it'sit's a construction project. But you could
build. You can build a secondstory if you wanted to up there.
Yeah, I have no doubt that'sthat's pretty heavy duty. But you're right,
there's a lot of weight up there. And uh so here it's actually
relatively simple. But so the solutionis simple, simple, easy for me
(21:56):
to say. Uh And the keythough, is for you to do it
in a manner that is consistent withthe design of the pergola. So you
don't end up looking like you've justsort of retro fit something on this.
So this is what you'll have tothink through carefully. But basically, crossbracing,
that's what's that's what you need todo on a pergola like that.
(22:19):
That's how if we had designed itfrom the get go, we probably just
would have incorporated that kind of conceptinto design. And when I mean crossbracing,
I mean off of the posts,off of the posts. Forty five
degree boards that are running firmly attachedto the posts, that run up in
(22:41):
both directions at each corner. Okay, forty five degree boards that run up
and then connect to you know thatthe outside rim, the outside beams,
whatever it is that's actually on theoutside there of the pergolas. Sometimes that's
that connection is a little easier tomake than at other times, depending on
what direction the beams are going.But that's really what you need. We
(23:04):
call it knee bracing. And itcan go on the outside edges of the
posts and bolt to the lag boltinto the posts from the outside, or
it can run down and actually hitthe face of the post on the side
that it's running. That's why youwould have to get you know, think
(23:25):
it through design wise so that itis both efficient for the shear and and
by the way, everybody, whenAlex said sheer, we're talking about lateral
load. Okay, a structure thathe just described, no problem. You
know if an elephant accidentally lands ontop of it, Okay, not a
(23:45):
problem. It's got lots of strengthfor what we call dead load, live
load and dead load. That isthat is gravity pulling weight straight down.
But in an earthquake, so oftenthe ground shakes from side to side and
something that that that's that top heavykind of standing on little stilts as it
were. What is keeping all ofthat weight from bending the whole thing over
(24:08):
and collapsing onto his side. Andthe answer is bracing, forty five degree
bracing. But you're going to wantto do it so that it is esthetically
attractive, so that no and thekey is nobody ever walks outside, looks
at your gorgeous pergola and says,oh, and I see you've added some
braces, because then you haven't doneit right. So the key is figuring
(24:30):
out a way to incorporate those bracesinto the design. And we want them,
you know, pretty sizable, notjust I don't mean sizable in terms
of bulk of lumber. But wedon't want to just do go up into
the corner something that heavy and runa little two foot braces, right,
we want to come down down thoseposts a considerable amount and run a nice
(24:52):
brace. Nothing that anybody's going tohit their head on, but just above
that running those braces up and outso that you get in every corner two
braces. So that means that withfour legs, there are going to have
four forty five degree knee braces bracingup this pergola in each direction, a
(25:12):
total of eight. And that's fourin each direction, and that adds a
considerable amount of lateral resistance to thepergola, and you should be good to
go. I do have right nowin place corbel cuts which are eleven by
eleven and they're lag bolted into thecorners. So that's the only thing I
(25:33):
got as far as blocking access.It's an open access pergola, so I
can walk any direction. So Iwould hate to obstruct the walking areas,
right understood, But at the endof the day, it's either going to
be that or a piece of specialtyhardware that and you could always have that
(25:56):
done too. You could always havea piece of heavy duty, specually hardware
made for the post connections at thetop, depending on again, depending Ok,
I can't see how it's connected,but depending on how it's connected.
Sometimes, when we want to goclean and we don't want to put a
knee brace, we design the pergolawith its own innate connective stiffness at the
(26:18):
joints, meaning that it's a bigold piece of steel that's resisting the lateral
weight, but we're not actually visuallyseeing it drop down from the square of
the pergola. That's the best Ican give you, my friend. It's
got to be one or the other. But yeah, you've got to add
some lateral strength there because that isa heavy duty thing. You got four
(26:41):
x twelves up there, multiple fourby twelves and a sixteen by twenty foot
configuration, a lot of weight uptop, and you are wise to be
thinking, you know what, weshould probably brace that up. You're absolutely
right about that, Alex. Thanksfor the call, my friend, and
good luck with that. But considerthe those two options, braces and or
(27:02):
specialty hardware to strengthen that beautiful pergolup. All right, y'all, When
we come back more of your calls. You are Home with Dean Sharp,
the House Whisperer on KFI. You'relistening to Home with Dean Sharp on demand
from KFI AM six forty
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