by Shawn Chesney | Apr 2, 2017 | Shawn Chesney Home Inspections Blog
Bar-B Que Safety Bar-B Que Safety Barbeque Safety With barbeque season fast approaching, homeowners should heed the following Bar-B Que Safety precautions in order to keep their families and property safe. Regardless of the type of grill you have, there are risks for improper use. Propane grills present an enormous fire hazard, as the Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) is aware of more than 500 fires that result annually from their misuse or malfunction. Charcoal grills pose a serious poisoning threat due to the venting of carbon monoxide (CO). The CPSC estimates that 20 people die annually from accidentally ingesting CO from charcoal grills. These grills can also pose a serious fire hazard, especially by using excessive lighter fluid, failing to monitor the grill while in use, or improperly disposing of ash. Electric grills are probably safer than propane and charcoal grills, but safety precautions need to be used with them, as well. Safety Recommendations for General Grill Use Always make sure that the grill is used in a safe place, where kids and pets won’t touch or bump into it. Keep in mind that the grill will still be hot after you finish cooking, and anyone coming into contact with it could be burned. If you use a grill lighter, make sure you don’t leave it lying around where children can reach it. They will quickly learn how to use it. Never leave the grill unattended, as this is generally when accidents happen. Keep a fire extinguisher or garden hose nearby. Ensure that the grill is completely cooled before moving it or placing it back in storage. Ensure that the grill is only used on a flat surface...
by Shawn Chesney | Feb 22, 2017 | Shawn Chesney Home Inspections Blog
Test Your Sump Pump or Risk a Flood Test Your Sump Pump or Risk a Flood. Spring thaw, April showers on their way, you can easily forget about something as important as your sump pump.Shawn Chesney Home Inspections wants to remind you how important it is to make sure your sump pump is in good working order. You should never Forget to check your sump pump! You could end up just like the homeowner who returned from a weekend trip to discover his entire basement floor covered in three feet of water. Once he safely shut down the power, he waded over to the sump pump and noticed it hadn’t and wasn’t working. Upon closer inspection, he realized that the cable attached to the float must have gotten tangled somehow. He took merely two seconds to untangle the cable, and then he spent the next 15 hours dragging out waterlogged carpet, running the wet/dry vac and moving fans around before beginning to calculate how many thousands of dollars damage had been caused and what ordeal he would have to face with his Insurance Company. To avoid a similar disaster, We recommend that you be sure that your pump has a vertical float switch. You will also want to check your pump at least a couple times a year by dumping water into the basin to make sure everything is working properly. Make sure your plugs have not been disconnected to temporarily plug in another device and then forgotten about. Recommendations Sump Pumps are expected to last anywhere from 3 to 7 years on average. We also recommend the installation of a sump pump system to...
by Shawn Chesney | Feb 7, 2017 | Shawn Chesney Home Inspections Blog
The Safe Room The Safe Room, also known as a panic room, is a fortified room that is installed in a private residence (or business) to provide a safe hiding place for inhabitants in the event of an emergency. Why are safe rooms used? Some reasons include: to hide from intruders. The protection of a safe room will afford residents extra time to contact police; to hide from would-be kidnappers. Many professional athletes, actors and politicians have installed safe rooms in their homes; for protection against natural disasters, such as tornadoes and hurricanes. Underground tornado bunkers are common in certain tornado-prone regions of the United States; for protection against a nuclear attack. While safe rooms near the blast may be incinerated, those far away may be shielded from radioactive fallout; and to provide social distancing in the event of a serious disease outbreak. Location The safe room’s location must be chosen carefully. You should plan multiple routes to avoid detection by an intruder who may be blocking the main route. Design Designs vary with budget and intended use. Even a closet can be converted into a rudimentary safe room, although it should have a solid-core door with a deadbolt lock. High-end custom models costing hundreds of thousands of dollars can have a tamper-proof and bulletproof door, concrete floor, thick steel, soundproof walls, video monitors, computers, an air-cleaning system and protection against bacterial and chemical infiltration, and a self-contained power-generating system. Items to keep in a safe room: bottled water and non-perishable foods; communication devices independent of the safe room’s video-monitoring system, including a cell phone and charger, a landline, and...
by Shawn Chesney | Jan 16, 2017 | Shawn Chesney Home Inspections Blog
lead-based paint lead-based paint If ingested, lead-based paint can lead to a variety of health problems, especially for children, including brain damage and other serious issues. Lead-based paint may be a hazard when found on surfaces that children can chew or that get a lot of wear and tear, such as windows and window sills, doors and door frames, stairs, railings, banisters, porches and fences. Lead from paint chips that are visible and lead dust that is not always visible can both be serious hazards. Lead dust can form when lead-based paint is dry-scraped, dry-sanded, or heated. Dust also forms when painted surfaces bump or rub together, such as when windows open and close. Lead chips and dust can get on surfaces and objects that people touch. Settled lead dust can re-enter the air when people vacuum, sweep or walk through it. In 1978, the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) set the legal limit of lead in most types of paint to a trace amount. As a result, homes built after 1978 should be nearly free of lead-based paint. In 1996, the U.S. Congress passed the final phase of the Residential Lead-Based Paint Hazard Reduction Act, Title X, which mandates that real estate agents, sellers and landlords disclose the known presence of lead-based paint in homes built prior to 1978. Lead paint that is in good condition and out of the reach of children is usually not a hazard. Peeling, chipping, chalking or cracking lead-based paint is a hazard and needs immediate attention. If the house is thought to contain lead paint, consider having a qualified professional check...
by Shawn Chesney | Jan 10, 2017 | Shawn Chesney Home Inspections Blog
Asbestos Asbestos is a naturally occurring fibrous mineral used in many construction products. It is considered to be a carcinogen and has been used in: sealant, putty, and spackling compounds; vinyl floor tiles, backing for vinyl sheet flooring, and flooring adhesives; ceiling tiles; textured paint; exterior wall and ceiling insulation; roofing shingles; cement board for many uses, including siding; door gaskets for furnaces and wood-burning stoves; concrete piping; paper, mill-board and cement board sheets used to protect walls and floors around wood-burning stoves; fabric connectors between pieces of metal duct-work; hot water and steam piping insulation, blanket covering and tape; and as insulation on boilers, oil-fired furnaces, and coal-fired furnaces. The use of asbestos was phased out in 1978, but many older houses contain asbestos-bearing products. Products containing asbestos are not always a health hazard. The potential health risk occurs when these products become worn or deteriorate in a way that releases asbestos fibers into the air. Of particular concern are those asbestos-containing products that are soft, that were sprayed or troweled on, or that have become crumbly. In this condition, it is considered to be in a friable state. Various Environmental Agencies believe that as long as the bearing product is intact, is not likely to be disturbed, and is in an area where repairs or rehabilitation will not occur, it is best to leave the product in place. If it is deteriorated, it may be enclosed, coated or sealed up (encapsulated) in place, depending upon the degree of deterioration. Otherwise, it should be removed by a certified professional. What to do A certified environmental professional could perform an...
by Shawn Chesney | Oct 23, 2016 | Shawn Chesney Home Inspections Blog
Retaining Walls Retaining Walls are a structure designed and constructed to resist the lateral pressure of soil when there is a desired change in ground elevation that exceeds the angle of repose of the soil. A basement wall is thus one kind of retaining wall. Shawn Chesney Home Inspections recommends when and if possible, Retaining Walls and all their components including weep holes and related drains should be assessed following a heavy rain to make sure they are working properly. If they are not discharging water, the drains should be cleaned out and observed again in the next rain. Retaining walls more than 2 feet high should be backed with drainage material, such as gravel. There should be drains at the bottom of the drainage material that should discharge the water either at the end of the wall or through pipes. These drains and the drainage material behind the wall relieve the pressure of groundwater on the wall. Failure to drain could be remedied by excavating behind the wall, replacing the drainage material and damaged drainage piping, and back filling. In all but the driest climates, improper drainage of water from behind a retaining wall can cause the wall to fail. Types of retaining walls include the following: Gravity Construction types of gravity retaining walls Gravity walls depend on their mass (stone, concrete or other heavy material) to resist pressure from behind and may have a ‘batter’ setback to improve stability by leaning back toward the retained soil. For short landscaping walls, they are often made from mortarless stone or segmental concrete units (masonry units). Dry-stacked gravity walls are somewhat flexible...
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