I'd like the moderators to approve this post and the URL *********** ****NOPE**** mainly because the topic of DIY disasters is too great to repeat for every story. Three months ago we moved into an Edwardian house, and every since then I have been having to take apart virtually everything. We did have the house surveyed beforehand, there was report of bridging causing rising damp, the damage could have become structural during the next 12 months. Water was standing on a concrete path along side of the the house, turns out that all the path needed was sweeping and that a 2 inch gulley had already been put in the path in the 1970's and the two previous owners had let it fill up with mud, rubble and earth.
There's pictures that show that the debris build up was so great that it even covered air bricks in the wall. Other bodged jobs include a plum tree that was badly pruned so that a pool of water rotted the heart and a bough fell 9 feet a few days ago missing my 7 year old son that had been standing there a few minutes before, the next day another third of the tree came down in the wind. Tomorrow I hope to finish the documentation of the "18 hour toilet", where a faulty inlet valve required breaking the toilet out of a wooden cabinet, only to find that it had been superglued and sealed into place and required hacksawing and drilling to fit the new valve. Holding the new and old valves side by side, I discovered the old one didn't have a single washer on it.
A typical example of the incompetence of the former owners, is that a loft extension blind was in one room in January when we viewed the house, I have a photograph of it. When we moved in, in March, the blind had been moved 14 feet to the room next door (there's a bit more to that story). During this massive journey, 4 out of the 6 screws that hold the blind in place had gone missing.
There's too much to list, the survey was actually very precise and accurate, it just didn't take into account things like 2 out of 3 toilets not working when the former owner was a newly qualified plumber.
There's pictures that show that the debris build up was so great that it even covered air bricks in the wall. Other bodged jobs include a plum tree that was badly pruned so that a pool of water rotted the heart and a bough fell 9 feet a few days ago missing my 7 year old son that had been standing there a few minutes before, the next day another third of the tree came down in the wind. Tomorrow I hope to finish the documentation of the "18 hour toilet", where a faulty inlet valve required breaking the toilet out of a wooden cabinet, only to find that it had been superglued and sealed into place and required hacksawing and drilling to fit the new valve. Holding the new and old valves side by side, I discovered the old one didn't have a single washer on it.
A typical example of the incompetence of the former owners, is that a loft extension blind was in one room in January when we viewed the house, I have a photograph of it. When we moved in, in March, the blind had been moved 14 feet to the room next door (there's a bit more to that story). During this massive journey, 4 out of the 6 screws that hold the blind in place had gone missing.
There's too much to list, the survey was actually very precise and accurate, it just didn't take into account things like 2 out of 3 toilets not working when the former owner was a newly qualified plumber.
