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A nationwide fast food chicken joint which shall remain unnamed had a recent health inspection which noted flies and offensive odors near the walk in cooler, compounded with its inability of maintaining temp. I checked the condenser unit (which looked cobbled together, literally a piece of...

Ah, as I suspected! I had a hunch that these slats below the window were for ventilation purposes. Since I first noticed them on the older motels, and motels often have air conditioning, my wife thought that those were prehistoric air conditioners (predecessor to a modern PTAC was what I...

I found an example of what I am talking about...

I've noticed something about some older homes and especially motels in beach communities in the PNW (Washington and Oregon) when I'm driving around those areas. A lot of the older homes and motels have wooden louvers directly below the windowpane, spanning the whole width of the window. They...

I've heard about there being differences in quality of the "old" Sanitaire vs the "new" Sanitaire but I just don't see it. The build quality looks to be unchanged. My newer, made in Mexico SC886 seems just as well made as the USA-made Sanitaire that I had. I do know that a while back there was...

Looks like the loss leader in vacuums, Bissell, has acquired Sanitaire along with BEAM central vacuums, both formerly owned by Electrolux. Hopefully the quality and durability of the F&G style uprights stay the same. Hopefully they change nothing on these iconic uprights, which, by the way...

I'm an HVACR tech but have a Bachelors in Information Systems. I'm Cisco certified, Microsoft certified, CompTIA A+/Net+ certified, yet I work on and install heat pumps, air conditioners, furnaces and commercial equipment all day (and love it). I actually took some HVAC classes when I went to...

I have the Cuisinart DLC-21 It's more of a chopper than a food processor, but it comes in really handy for chopping all of my taco fixin's (usually, I make tacos weekly) among other things. The only thing that I don't like about it is that the bowl could be sturdier, as in thicker acrylic. The...

Energy costs have to be the biggest expense for hotels, so any new or retrofit PTACs are going to have all kinds of energy-saving measures built in. Gone are the old PTACs that were simply plugged into the wall and ran only according to how the dials were set by the guest (sound familiar?)...

Because of the fact that ice/water dispensers are too hard to clean to be hygenically acceptable and the fact that nobody has figured out the drainage situation beyond having to carry the drip tray to dump down the sink (which I think would be easily solved, routing some PVC tubing from the...

I prefer properties with interior corridors. If and when I can't fall asleep, I wander the halls in my PJs until I start to feel somewhat tired, then I try falling asleep again. I have a problem with falling asleep in any other bed except my own, no matter how "good" the mattress is. The other...

Check the filter for dust and clean it if you haven't already. If you are handy, disassemble the unit and check for additional buildup on the evap, which is possible since most portable and window ACs filters are of similar material of dryer filters and aren't all that effective. Also, look...

I went to grab lunch and decided to stop in Sears today to get a 1/2 in. ratchet replaced (this was not my local one, it closed a few weeks back) since it was across the street from where I stopped for lunch. I figured that I'd swap it out and be back on the job in five minutes like my past...

You'd spend almost as much taking the motor to a shop for a bearing job as you would for the new motor. I'd nix that idea. Motor shops tend to only bother with heavy-duty industrial motors anyway. I'm doubtful that the bearings in the motor failed due to the fact that you cleaned the unit and...

My Kenmore FL gets a load done around an hour on Bulky/Bedding on "Heavy" soil level, about 50 minutes if you just leave the soil level at its default, "Normal" (soil levels just modify the wash time and AFAIK has nothing to do with water levels). The Bulky cycle is the cycle that uses more...

@arbilab Have been in many attics in my HVAC career - can confirm! Especially with the attics of older homes. Better to use this system with outdoor air on warmer days. Even still, what about filtration?

I just use Bulky/Bedding on all my cycles. It's the cycle that best imitates the way old style front loaders washed before the DOE stepped in and thought that even front loaders used too much water (since the beginning, front loaders were always "high efficency" or at least water efficient...

I remember when I first saw the Frigidaire front loaders when they were reintroduced in '97-98 (it was actually a Kenmore at Sears). I was about five or six years old. I thought "cool, you could have laundromat style washers at home!". I wanted my parents to get one, but they were quite...

These 1990s kitchens look great (nevermind the stainless appliances). I like the soffit design in the second picture. Too bad I don't have a high vaulted ceiling, or I'd totally copy that!

I think I might switch to bisque next time around, if bisque is even available in 2020-2030. Probably not. Stainless will be the new BOL and some weird color/finish/material will take its place. I think I want to go for a premium 1990's look, complete with track lighting, light oak cabinets and...