Welcome to Builder Bill's Wrinkles.

1. What is mulleting?
2. What is the difference between a handrail wreath and a handrail scroll?
3. Where would you use a back flap hinge?
4. What are herringbone struts?
5. What is a helm roof?

Cooling a house down without using air-conditioners.

Hi Mike,
You say, "We are coming into the wet season". Tell me about it! Here in Darwin we have had a run of hottest night time temperatures on record.

The methods that you mention and some others all work, no doubt about it.  The bad news is that none of them will give you that instant result like turning on an air conditioner.
Each house is different so I am just generalising here, but here are the things that I would consider in your place.

1. Whirly birds etc do work and like the rest of the methods here, they work for years and they work for free after the initial cost.
   I have a mate who repairs small engines and he tells me that quite often that after running an engine in his shed/workshop he gets out and has a cup of coffee on his verandah.  He can quite often see the fumes and smoke being drawn out by his two whirlybirds.  If they are turning at all then they DO change the air fairly quickly.   They are a lot better in this respect than the old style passive ridge vents.
   1. The tricks with whirlybirds are to get them as high on the roof as you can,(close to the ridge).
   2. Spend time making them level.
   3. Provide vents at the eaves to let fresh air in to replace the hot air extracted. You must enable a circulation of air in the roof space.
   4. This cuts down heat, but also condensation in high humidity. If your pink batts become slightly damp their efficiency drops.
2. Reflective paint definitely works.
   1. Especially so if you are changing from a dark coloured roof.
   2. Our previous house had a colourbond green roof, I painted it white as soon as we moved in and repainted it every few years.  The difference was noticeable straight away.
   3. I used ordinary Wattyl Solarguard. (A standard good quality external acrylic house paint designed for application without primer, three coats of the same stuff.  It's expensive as paints go but cheap for the job It does.
   4. Don't get trapped with one of these Roofseal companies.  See note below.
   5. Wash it down every few years with a small pressure cleaner to get rid of accumulated grime.
   6. The first house that we built for ourselves had a red Monier tile roof. Without doubt the hottest house that we have lived in!
3. The BCA (Building Code of Australia)have over the years have brought in requirements for energy efficiency and conservation in new houses.  Thermal insulation of walls, shading walls with overhanging eaves and awnings over door and window openings are all measures that are definitely worth while.
   Through ventilation, breeze paths etc. etc.
4. Quite a few of these measures can be applied to existing houses.  For more details Google "BCA energy efficiency".
   1. Awnings over windows have obvious advantages and could be applied to old houses with immediate effect on the amenity and cooling to a certain extent.
   2. Old sliding windows can be replaced with say louvres, which straight away doubles the size of the opening as far as the air movement goes.
   3. Old sliding doors can be changed to French doors more than doubling the clear opening size.

All these things work, no doubt about it, but you tend not to notice the difference after a while, and on hot nights the only comfort is to remind yourself that it would be a lot hotter and you would be turning on the A/C a lot sooner if you hadn't made the effort.
Cheers
Bill.

Sealing a leaky roof

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Stop your barge ends from rotting.

Looking at one of the barge board ends.

Looking from the top at the barge end and the gutter.

My home was built in the late 80s and has three "wooden" fascia gables (about 50 degree slop). As per code the house shingles overhang these gables edges by about 1 inch. The lower ends of these gables at the(bottom of the roof) stick out 4 inches passed the gutter corners most outer edge. (this I guess gives the home more of a nicer look). The gutters are installed "in-between" these wooden gable ends which in turn "allows" water from the shingles overhang to run down missing the gutters completely resulting in the rotting the lower gable ends. These lower gable ends, as well always drip during any rain which is unsatisfactory.

As this had always bugged me I went to "several" building supplies stores which had never heard of something that would divert the water away from the gable overhang into the gutter.

DESCRIPTION: After studying this it was quite simple. I got a piece of white 8x3" tin. Folded the length in half to make a 90* angle. With cutters I cut out a V in the centre and folded the tin another 90* to make a complete L shaped diverter. The L shaped diverter is approx 4" in length at both ends and 1 inch tall for a dam effect. I siliconed the inside corner so not to leak. Once done..this just simply slid under the shingles. Therefore, theres now a 4" edge running with the roofs gable stopping roof water prior to reaching the gables wooden overhang.

One of the divertors in position.

NOTE: Around my area many homes have the same problem with rotting gable ends and if this was a good idea to help others to stay away from future damage problems it may help and would be very cheap.

Thanks for that Rodney.

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How to build a garden shed concrete slab

I actually started typing an answer to Doug on this one, but I soon realised it was going to be a bit long, so I posted a nee page just about how I go about doing a quick and easy concrete slab.

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Answers

Not a name that immediately comes to mind when thinking about joinery, but it doesn't really matter what you call it as long as you use it when fitting panels. It is a small offcut section of framing that is used to test rebated panels for a fit before assembling them. Most panels today are made on super accurate expensive machines but the home workshop joiner would still check the fit on things like this.
I have recently revised my stair pages an this is a photo that I dug up in the process A handrail wreath is the curved section of a stair handrail that connects the straight sections at a change in direction. In the old days and I guess still in some small shops, the timber versions where carved out of a solid block with some quite sophisticated geometry involved.  I've seen them done during my apprenticeship but never did one myself.  (I quit and went working on formwork, much more fun for a 21 year old.)
A handrail scroll is again an extra to a straight section of handrail.  This time at the bottom of the stair. Typically it transforms from the sloping section to a flat spiral curve that sits on top of the newel post. This particular scroll has a brass scroll cap.
A Backflap hinge is a face fixing hinge that can fold back flat on itself. Sturdy galvanised versions are used on metal gates etc. The one drawn here is a different thing altogether.  Used in fine joinery and cabinet work, dovetail shaped, it is either made out of brass or stainless.  Typical use in in counter tops in pubs and shops.  The hinge is always housed flush with the surface for easy cleaning of the top.
Herringbone struts are an excellent way to stiffen up floor joists. Once again it is an old technique that has gone out of fashion.  Mainly I guess that it is perceived to be time consuming. The alternative to doing it this way of course is just to use short lengths of joist material, which is what we do most of the time because we can use up a lot of offcuts that way. The herringbone method is great with deep joists for straightening twisted ones. Mid span bridging to floor joists can stiffen up a springy floor noticeably.
Used often on church steeples the hips start at the apex of a gable end.

I have been pondering on the possibility of including a glossary on the site. I have scattered a few definitions on a few pages, most recently I had to do it on the recently reworked stairs intro page.

Being the way I am, graphic oriented I am tempted to build one that is very graphical, but it is a lot of work which I guess is why I have not seen one on the web.

Here's another question for you, do you think it is a good idea?

Send me a reply with any comments to my builderbill e-mail address if you are interested.