Paul’s Hardware Blog

It seems like everyone is trying to tighten up on spending these days and it has gotten me to thinking about painless ways to save money.  You know, things that don’t really affect your life style.   Here are six random things I thought of:

Fix Leaking Toilets

It is amazing the amount of water that can be wasted by a leaking toilet.  Toilets usually leak for two different reasons.

 

Defective toilet fill valve.  This valve fills the tank after the toilet is flushed.  When they go bad they usually just run continuously.  They aren’t hard to change.  Probably 20-30 minutes.  I think that the supply line feeding the toilet should be changed at the same time.  The total product cost would be under $15.

 

 

 The most common leak culprit on a toilet is the flapper valve.        The flapper lets the water flow from the tank into the bowl when the handle is pushed.  It is designed to stay open long enough to let the tank empty before closing.  Flapper valves are made of rubber and become brittle with time.  They are easy to change and cost under $5.  It is common to hear the fill valve cycle on and off when a flapper is leaking.  To check for a leaking flapper, put dye in the toilet tank.  Do not flush.  Wait a few hours and check to see if the dye has gotten into the bowl.  If it has the flapper is leaking.

 

It is amazing how much fixing a leaking toilet can save.  It is not uncommon for a leaking toilet to waste several hundred gallons of water a day.  I had 2 leaking at my house.  After I fixed the leaks my water bill dropped $40 the next month.                                                                                                                                       

Use Compact Fluorescent Bulbs

Compact Fluorescent bulbs or CFLs really offer a serious saving over the standard incandescent bulbs.  A 20 watt CFL puts out the light that a 75watt incandescent bulb would.  The makers of CFLs also claim that they have a longer life.  I haven’t necessarily found that to be true.  I think usage patterns have a lot to do with longevity. 

The early CFLs didn’t produce a particularly pleasing light.  It was a sort of blue color.  The new ones are much better.

 

Electricity is priced per kilowatt hour.  1000 watts usage for one hour.

We pay around 10.8 cents per kilowatt hour.  So if we compare the cost for 100 hours of use for a standard bulb and a CFL we find that the standard bulb will cost 81 cents and the cfl will cost 21 cents

Fix Leaking Faucets

There is nothing more annoying or costly than the drip of a leaking faucet.  Most faucet leaks are easy for the homeowner to repair.  The only problem is that there are hundreds of different types of faucets.  

Washer and Seat style.

Stem                      Seats

 

              

These are usually the older faucets. They are also sometimes some of the best.  They work when a stem (part the handle is connected to) presses a rubber washer onto a seat to stop the flow of water.  Stems, seats, washers and other parts are easily replaceable on most faucets.  The best way to match them up is to bring in your old stem.

Washerless faucets are not usually hard to repair either.  They work in different ways but usually have replaceable parts.  Again the best way for us to match them for you is to bring them in.  Some of these are always easy to take apart.  If you have trouble, come by and we will show you how on our Demo faucet.

 

Install a Programmable Thermostat

 

If your house is not occupied for a period of time during the day you may be able to save a few hundred dollars a year by installing a programmable thermostat.  They usually cost between $30-$60 depending on the model you get.  The more expensive ones are capable of more elaborate programs.

These aren’t always easy to install.  If you aren’t careful, it is easy to damage your heating system.

 

Insulate Your Doors and Windows

 

 

Any place you can stop air infiltration will really help lower your utility bills.  It really isn’t difficult or expensive to stop up leaks. 

 

 

Check all of your doors and windows for drafts.  Doors are especially prone to have gaps at the bottom.  Door bottom strips  are made with a piece of soft rubber at the bottom to stop leaks.  Be sure and check garage doors too.   There is special weather stripping made for the sides and bottoms for them.  Basements and garages, while not usually heated; still should be made as weatherproof as possible.  Stand in a darkened basement during the day and look for light coming in from outside.  Anywhere you see light you will have an air leak.  Large irregular gaps can be filled with expanding foam like Great Stuff.  It really does expand though so be sure not to use too much.

 

 

It is impossible to tell how much all of this will save.  It depends on the condition of your house to begin with.

Insulate Your Hot Water Pipes

If your pipes past through basements, garages and other unheated spaces you can save some money by insulating them.  Rigid foam pipe insulation with adhesive slits is the easiest to use.  This doesn’t save a huge amount ($50 – $200 a year) but it adds up.  If your water heater is more than 5 years old it will also help to use an insulating blanket on it.  The newer heaters have enough insulation that they don’t really need any additional.

Another thing I really like about insulating the water pipes is that I don’t have to wait as long for the water to warm up when I turn on a faucet.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Share on Facebook

I have had about six people come into the store today with Christmas light problems.  Most of them just had blown or missing bulbs but a few had blown fuses.

Most modern light sets are “string to string” sets.  You can plug the next set of lights into the end of the previous set.  There are warnings on the box that tell you to only run a certain number of sets this way.  The is to prevent the overloading of the wire the sets are made of.  As you increase the number of bulbs the current increases.  If enough sets were run together the current could get high enough to be dangerous.  To protect against this situation fuses are in the plugs of each light set.  If the current gets too high the fuse blows.  This is almost always caused by plugging in more than the recommended number of sets.  So if you have blowing fuses in your lights check to make sure there aren’t too many sets plugged together.

Share on Facebook

I think maybe the bargain hunting went too far this year. http://www.nytimes.com/2008/11/29/business/29walmart.html?_r=1

Share on Facebook

Every year Ace Hardware promotes a big day after Thanksgiving sale. We call it the DATS.  This year is no different.  I enjoy these events.  It is great to see all of the customers.  It’s exciting to see long lines at the registers.  And I am always happy when we have items that are a really good deal and are able to provide a service to our customers.  Sometimes though, I wonder if we aren’t making a big mistake.

This year there are around 45 items in the sale.  We had to order these things back in the mid summer. What we order then is it.  We usually can’t get anymore.   It is always such a gamble.  Predicting six months in advance what the hot items are going to be is a guess at best.  I am not sure it is even an educated guess.  I wish that we could order enough of each item so that no matter what the demand is we would never run out.  That just isn’t possible.  One year we had a portable DVD player in the sale.  What should we do?  Would people come to a hardware store for electronics?  We decided to gamble.  We ordered around a hundred I think.  They were gone by noon.  The gamble paid off.  You see, on sale items we rarely make anything.  Maybe pennies.  So if I order 100 items that cost around $100 I have invested $10,000.  Now not all of the things on sale cost that much but it is easy to see that we could risk a serious amount of money.  The next year we had MP3 players in the sale.  I thought that since the DVD players had done well the MP3s would too.  WRONG.  We had dozens left over.  That was a big loser. I think we ended up losing around $5000 on them.  We just can’t do that on 45 items. In a small business like ours it doesn’t take many missteps to be fatal.

The Ace Hardware customer service department says that the vast number of customer complaints they get are about out of stock sale items.  We are at heart retailers who want more than anything to have the products the customers want.  It pains us to be out of something.  We just can’t afford  the risk to have huge quantities of everything. So on Friday when you brave the crowds realize that we are as frustrated as you with out of stocks.  If we run out of things we will do our best to get more if possible and we sincerely regret it when we can’t. 

This doesn’t apply just to us.  It is a problem for the big stores too.  I just hate to do anything that disappoints our customers and I am afraid that it is inevitable that is what happens during these sales.  I also have nightmare remembrances of a fight at one of the local discount stores over a television that was on sale.  So far we haven’t had that problem.    It is a good thing that some people are able to get really good deals so maybe the good outweighs the bad.

Rebates

I can honestly say that I hate rebates.  I have had more rebate complaints at our store than all other issues combined. 

The thing to keep in mind with rebates is that they are funded by the vendors.  The more rebates redeemed the higher their costs.  Companies are hired to handle and verify all of the rebate submissions to make sure that the rules are followed.  And believe me, people try to cheat.  A few years ago we had a rebate deal that was limited to one per household.   I had a family (mother father and two children under five) all in line with one of the item.  It was sort of funny looking.  Obviously, when these rebate forms were submitted the computer saw the same address and rejected all but one of them.  Rightly so.  The problem is that sometimes the innocent are punished too.  We have an assisted living center near our store.  The residents are really good customers.  They have a van that will bring them to shop from time to time and they buy items with rebates.  Guess what.  They all share the same mailing address.  All but one of their rebate forms will be rejected in error.  This is just wrong. 

When you get ready to send in your rebate forms be really careful follow the instructions exactly.  Make sure you conform to the date ranges for submission and send all items requested.  If you have to send the original receipt make a copy for your records. 

If you have a problem let the store know.  I don’t have any way of knowing whose rebate forms are rejected if the customer doesn’t tell me.  I know that I want to know if you have a problem and I bet most other stores do to.  My greatest rebate fear is that one of our customers will be denied wrongly and we won’t have to chance to rectify the problem.

Happy Shopping Friday!

 

Share on Facebook

I have come to the conclusion that I hate squirrels.  I haven’t always felt that way.  I used to think of them as cute little animals scurrying around in a benevolent search for the perfect acorn.  Maybe it was from watching Chip & Dale (yes I realize Chip n Dale were really chipmunks) cartoons as a child.  I don’t know, but I had no pre-conceived Squirrel bias. 

Now I know better.  I have come to recognize them as the chattering, beady eyed little bastards they really are.  It all started a few months ago with a bird feeder.

We started selling Coles gourmet bird seed in the store.  So I thought hmm, maybe I should give this bird feeding thing a try.  After all, to be a knowledgeable salesperson I should at least try the product.  Here the trouble begins.  You see I have this neighbor who likes to feed the squirrels.  They have corn cobs, peanuts and even pecans scattered all over the yard.  A veritable squirrel buffet.  We have a pretty healthy squirrel population on my street.  I have another neighbor that has 20 cats. You would think there would be some squirrel population decline.

 One particular squirrel, for some unknown reason,  ignores all of the goodies next door.  He focused on my Bird Feeder.   So I have been in a BATTLE for several weeks now.  I tried metal feeders, squirrel proof feeders and every other thing I could think of.  Finally a solution.  Coles makes a bird seed called Hot Meats to fight the problem.  It seems that birds don’t taste Capsaicin, the compound in peppers that makes them hot.  Squirrels do and don’t like it.  This bird seed is HOT.  I know that because I got the brilliant idea of tasting it.  Bad mistake.    

 I thought that I had won.  I filled the feeder.  All went well.  The birds seemed as happy as usual.  And the squirrel stayed away.  He didn’t really leave.  Just sort of skirted around and chattered defiantly.  I took pleasure in my victory.  It was short lived.

One night I came home late and decided to grill a steak.  I went out to heat up the grill, reached down to turn on the propane tank and was blasted with a cloud of propane gas.  I was a little baffled, that hadn’t ever happened before.  I bent down to look at the tank and realized he had gotten me back.

 

 

Share on Facebook

One of the most common questions we are asked  is, “my water heater is leaking. How do I fix it.” The question is more complicated than it sounds. I am inspired to write this post today because, guess what, my water heater is leaking. I didn’t really expect that my first entry would be so entertaining (boring) but it is a really common problem. So, here goes.

There are usually 4 things that cause a water heater to leak.

1. A failed tank. This one is pretty easy to spot since there is usually a flood coming out of the bottom of the water heater. There isn’t any good fix other than replacing the water heater.

2. A bad temperature and pressure release valve. The temperature and pressure release valve is a really important thing. If, for some reason the water heater malfunctions and the water gets too hot and boils there could be a really serious explosion. (see video below) Don’t EVER plug, cap or block in any way, a T&P valve. It will release water if the pressure in the tank goes above a certain amount (usually 150 psi) or the temperature goes above a specified number (usually 210 F).  Sometimes these valves fail and release water when the temperature and pressure are normal.  In that case you just replace the T&P valve.

 2. A bad Pressure Reducing Valve. PRV  The pressure reducing valve controls the amount of pressure in the plumbing system of your house.  It is usually located in a basement or crawl space where the main water line enters the house.  They can also be outside the house in a box in the ground. The pressure in the water main is usually higher than the 50-70psi that is recommended for home equipment and appliances.  If the PRV fails, the pressure in the house will rise.  If it gets high enough the T&P valve on the water heater will leak, toilet valves will fail and faucets will drip.  The question is how do you know if the dripping  is the PRV or the T&P?  (I’ve always thought it is funny how plumbers use initials for things. Its almost like another language)  You have to test the water pressure in the house.

To test the pressure I used a recording pressure valve with a fitting for a garden hose.  I attached it to the drain on the water heater.  You need to use a valve that records the highest pressure reached since it really goes up during the night.  I took this picture in the mid morning.  The pressure was a little above 50psi.  During the night though it had reached 150psi.  I had a mini flood.  Since the pressure went substantially above 50psi I knew that the problem was my pressure reducing valve.  I was in a hurry and didn’t want to drag out a torch and solder (I have copper pipes) so I used Sharkbite fittings.   They have to be one of the best inventions in years.  You just slide them on the pipe and they seal.  It took me 12 minutes to finish the job. 

4.  Thermal Expansion.  When water is heated it expands.  In the old days it wasn’t really a problem.  The water back flowed into the water supply (municipal or tank).  This can be dangerous so most localities passed regulations requiring back flow preventers.  The water has to go somewhere.  The answer is a thermal expansion tank.  It uses an air cushion and diaphragm to absorb excess pressure.  Sometimes these tanks fail.  There is an air valve (like a car tire) on the bottom of the tank.  If when you release a little air you get water you know that the tank is defective.

So now, thankfully, I have dry basement again.

This post is for informational purposes only.  I am not a plumber.  You should not attempt any repairs yourself without checking your local codes and regulations.

 

  

Share on Facebook