If you look at the first photo above you will see a very strange thing. I am running a vacuum hose down the backside of a toilet.In the second photo you see what I caught with that vacuum hose, a little ball of polystyrene.In the third photo you see where that little white ball belongs, on the i...
Rob from Clinton, Ontario has a great suggestion for getting those fine steel wool fibers out of the wood before finishing. Wrap a strong magnet in a clean cloth and simply wipe over the area.Removing the cloth from the magnet allows you to shake the little pieces of steel wool into the garbage c...
Many years ago when I was active in my cabinet shop I had a place where I could purchase Stainless Steel Wool. This was the best stuff for finishing off oak between coats of finish because if little pieces got caught in the pores of the wood and I failed to get them out, they would not eventuall...
First you have to have a toilet plunger. That is one that has a bulb shape, or a folded skirt inside a flat plunger. The round shape or skirt is needed to seal to the sides of the toilet bowl. A flat plunger just won't do the job.Then push down gently so as to not squirt everything all over th...
Heather asked: "I have a 75 year old brick semi. I've noticed that on one of the pillars there's white powder. I'm wondering what it is and how to prevent it?"I assume that her pillars are on her front porch. We took some brick and soaked it in salt water. When it dried, the salt was all over...
All siding gets dirty, but cedar siding, often used in humid parts of the country, has more of a tendency than other siding to support the growth of mould and mildew. Unless it is really bad, cleaning is basically done in the same manner as for aluminium or vinyl siding, with much the same produ...
I have received several viewer tips on how to bring back a shine to that old enamel bathtub, particularly after harsh cleaning agents have cut into the porcelain finish, so I thought I would try out a few.Auto polish didn't really do much. In fact in one area where the enamel actually was slight...
We get a lot of tips from our TV viewers and web visitors. Here are a couple for cleaning metal around the house.Ketchup cleans Copper. Really. There is acid in the tomatoes that just shines up that copper.Limes cleans Brass. Actually Ketchup and Lime both work because of the natural acids.To...
One viewer caught our cameras in the renovation store and asked how to remove stains from laminate counter tops.The reality is that it is very difficult to stain laminate counter tops although high temperatures can easily scorch it. We tried for a week and couldn't get any colour from coffee to b...
Lani from Burnaby, B.C. writes: "We have a gas fireplace and the pilot light won't light. A gas company technician inspected the situation and told us the pilot light needs cleaning. Can we do this safely ourselves?"Why didn't he just clean it while he was inspecting it?But, yes you can clean i...
