Home Improvement Show
Hour 1 - Smoke alarm testing
At your service, it's the Home Improvement Show presented by Mosby Building Arts. To ask a question, call 314-436-7900 or 800-925-1120. Now, the host of the Home Improvement Show, Rich Horace, on the voice of St. Louis, King of Oax. All right. Good morning, St. Louis. You're tuned into the Home Improvement Radio Show right here on KMOX. Like he said, the voice of St. Louis. I'm Rich Horace. Your go-to guy for all things home maintenance, remodeling and renovation. Whether you're maybe you got a leaky faucet, a kitchen that needs some upgrades or a big project that you're not sure just how to tackle. Well, I am here to help. We've got two hours for you today. You can give me a call. Any questions you may have right here, 314-436-7900. And let's talk about your home from quick fixes to full renovations. No project is too big or small. Whether you're a seasoned DIY-er or just getting started, we've got something for everyone today right here. So grab your favorite drink, cup of coffee, settle in, and let's make your house feel like home. Remember, again, don't be shy. The phone lines right here, 314-436-7900. And let's get to work. And so last week, I was like kind of recap because you can go back. If you if you hear something that you'd like to know about that we're not speaking about, but we've gone over, you can go back into Odyssey's website. You can get on the podcast and you can hear past shows. So last week was a really, really good one. I thought with a special guest I had here, Greg Boss, a master sweep and the owner of English sweep. So we were talking about this past week. We just had basically ending today is fire protection week. And then this coming week starting tomorrow is chimney safety week. So we spoke a whole lot about the fire safety, what needs to happen, your chimneys, safety for your chimneys, what to do, how to clean them and really maintain and take care of this. And the whole this year's whole campaign for the fire safety week was working with smoke alarms in the home and trying to educate everyone with smoke alarms in their home. And we did we had so many good conversations, calls and topics, talking with Greg and different questions and everything. I really didn't get a chance to tell a whole lot of these stories because I've done a lot of work in the past over the years and still today with English sweep. We partner a lot when we run in two things that kind of coexist, which happens often because if I'm in there we're remodeling a living room or adding a fireplace to a master bathroom or a master bedroom. Sometimes you do the see through where you can get it both from both sides. And so there's all these different kinds of projects and sometimes we're just remodeling and we're facing we're making it look better. But it's older and it's in older homes. We do a lot of older homes in St. Louis city in Kirkwood in Webster groves and all over St. Louis. So we run into a lot the the older wood burning fireplaces. A lot of times we want to add gas log sets to it. And so I've had some older ones where we have English sweep come in with us and they can repair, they can get inside, they can run new flue liners, they can fix old flue liners. They can get everything kind of up running and working for us and they've partnered with us plenty of times to come up with great solutions to get people's fireplaces running again, not leaking the brickwork done. They do the full masonry everything. So so it's a big help when we get into these projects. But another one. So I've had those happen. And another one I wanted to kind of bring up was then you get into kind of the aesthetics of things. And and not always I'm not always talking just inside the home. You know, our designers can kind of design what type of fireplace you like the shape can change. How if it's modern or if it's more traditional and what's around it the materials can change that also. And so we can figure all that out and have their help with that. But then you go outside and you get up top and we're in Old Town Webster groves very old house lot of copper lot of slate tile different things aesthetics on the outside of the home. And I had one a few years ago in Webster groves. It was really really cool. They did this big copper chimney cap. They needed work on the chimney and they had to add some flue liners and get things running from inside the chimney. And the owner was like, you know, I've always thought that there could be something more up there that fits with the home better that goes with everything. And there was all this copper flashing over top and in the valleys of the roofing itself and on the ridges. And so it really, really look cool. We were fixing a lot of that. We were putting a lot of new copper in to fix the roof and update the whole house. And and it had been over, you know, house was over 100 years old. So English sweep came up with this really cool custom sized made copper chimney cap that kind of covered over the top of everything and just really brought that visual point in that aesthetic view of the outside of that chimney to place with the rest of the home. So it was really, really fun. It was really, really cool. It's one thing to fix and maintain and keep things working and help people out like that. But it's a whole other enjoyable type of position when you get to really change the home, bring it back kind of historical, keep the same look and really make it visually nice like that also, because then then everyone gets to enjoy that. And we do a lot of work here. And I do a lot of work here at Mosby Building Arts that not all of it is is this great, enjoyable thing because it's behind the scenes. And it's behind the existing siding or it's inside the chimney or it's it's this maintenance stuff. And and keeping everything healthy is so important and keeping it safe. All of that is so, so important. But doing that, that doesn't always come hand-in-hand with new floors and the new copper chimney cap and all these great things that can really help with the home that everyone can know about and appreciate. And when you have it where I just know what we did, our workers know what we did, the homeowners good, they know what we did and they understand it was important it had to happen. But sometimes they're just like, wow, I really wish I had my new hardwood floors. Instead, I'm doing things that are behind the scenes to keep everything smart, healthy, and safe for everyone around the home. It's a very important thing to do. So don't forget, we're going to take our first break here, but we will take any questions, any calls that you have got plenty of time for you here today. Don't forget to give us a shout, 314-436-7900. I'll be here for you and we'll take a short break and we'll have more to come after this. Now back to the Home Improvement Show presented by Mosby Building Arts on King of OX. Once again, here's Rich Ores. All right, we are back. Got a lot going on today. Got a lot of good information for you today. I know it is a beautiful, beautiful day out in St. Louis. Going to get a little bit warm this afternoon, but not too, too terrible. So great day to work on that honeydew list, get some things going around the house and get some of that outdoor work done prior to winter. Remember, this is October and October is typically, I know it's warm right now, but it's going to be dropping again and somewhere in mid to late October is where we typically always get our first frost, our first overnight freeze, though. So definitely unhook all of your outside hoses off of your hose spigots. Think about dressing up your driveways, sealing, concrete, sidewalks, driveways, getting them prepared and good for winter to keep that frost and freeze. Out of the pores of your concrete, a lot of things we can be doing outside the home. And definitely just maybe some reminders on these smoke detectors for this fire prevention week. And there's some interesting facts. There's some really good tips out there. But I think the main thing to kind of really know and understand is the basic function is that smoke alarms save lives. When they're properly installed and maintained, they play just a really vital role in reducing fire deaths and injuries. If there's a fire in your home, smoke spreads really fast. And you need those smoke alarms to give you time to get out of your house. And I have this conversation way too often because of the local codes here in our St. Louis city and county area of when they make us update smoke detectors. And when we do certain projects, we're modeling projects in the house. And some people, when they find that out there, they're not taking real super kindly to that. And it's just an added expense. And they're saying, well, I've been in my house, everything's fine. But really, if these new smoke detectors can get you out of your home, give you more time and get you out quicker in the event of a fire, you will be extremely happy that your municipality forced you to spend that money. It'll get you a definite different look on it. And what I've always kind of advised of doing that and our position on it, because we have to do that, we can't go around it. And if we're supposed to pull permits, then it's our obligation to do that. And if the smoke detectors are a part of it, it's our obligation to along with the municipality to make sure that it's in there. And that happens. And I don't want to be the person making that decision for someone else on how many they have. And if something were to happen, how much time do they have to get in and out of their house? But so just some simple tips when thinking about fire, when thinking about smoke detectors is that a closed door, this is a big thing is it'll really slow down the spread of smoke, heat and fire. So and that's why they make us install these smoke alarms in every sleeping room outside of each separate sleeping area. And on every level of the home in different areas, including the basement, the codes around here also, we can get into this a little bit deeper, but they also include carbon monoxide detectors on each level of the home as well. But the smoke alarms should be interconnected. So that when one sounds, they all sound. So you'll get it no matter where it is in a house. So if this is starts in your basement in the furnace room, and that's on the other end of the house, you will know in your bedroom as soon as the furnace room smoke alarm knows. So it's very important there. Large homes may need extra smoke alarms. So I just had one in Clayton, a really big big house in Clayton, and three floors and all that. And basically, there's there's newer systems you can put in that are like a radio frequency so that we're not they're not forcing us to run a hard wire to every single smoke detector anymore. Because when you do get into these older homes and you're going three floors and across them and their plaster, it can be very hard to. But this home, we actually had to put in even more smoke detectors than what was required by code. And we had to do that because we needed them to speak to one another. And they there was so many and so far apart. The first one to the last one had such a great distance. We had to add one in the middle that would send that frequency again so that we were reassured that all of them would go off. So they actually ended up with one additional than what the code would have required. But we needed it in order to make sure that they would all go off and they would all work and give them the time to get out of their home. So that is another huge thing. And here's a thing in a in a tip that I know we're all guilty of. I am certainly guilty of this too. But it's what they recommend is testing your smoke alarms at least once a month. Press the test button, make sure that they go off, make sure that they all go off and make sure that they're all working. And I know I don't do that. I'm as guilty as everyone else once a month is pretty often. And it's just to me, it's hard to remember. So if if you want to remember, I kind of did the same thing for advise on the furnace for checking your your filter is we all have these smartphones. If this concerns you enough, put it in your calendar, put a reminder, you can just put a task with a reminder and it can remind you once a month. I'd say set it up in the evening. So when you're maybe sitting around either having dinner or or watching TV or something and you're and you're more likely to be at home, it just reminds you, hey, check the smoke alarms and you can just kind of jump up and do it. It's a super simple thing to actually do. It's just hard to remember that you need to do it. And when you did it last, that is a really, really huge thing. So there's, there's all these different statistics out there now. And about testing and what people know about them and how long they last, they basically recommend replacing these smoke alarms every 10 years. And carbon monoxide detectors, they say five to seven years, it's recommended to replace them because they can wear out and become questionable after that point. So good to be safe. But some of these interesting statistics on people knowing what to do and kind of understanding one of the coolest things that I saw when I was looking some of this up was now in these days and in these municipalities and these codes are probably helping this a lot. But now 99% of homes have at least one working smoke alarm or have at least one smoke alarm in that. It doesn't necessarily mean it's working. It just means that they have one. And so it's really jumped the last time they they checked into that it was at 88%. So awareness, this is working and the awareness is getting a lot better. But now the awareness we need to start spreading more is really what we need to do, how you maintain them and check them and make sure you have them and making sure you have the right kind in the right places in that they are up to code and will work and help out. So basically, like 26% of people surveyed, so they surveyed all these different people. And in 26% of people surveyed responded that they really know nothing at all about carbon monoxide alarms and only 55% said they have one in their home. So that's much, much lower when you start to get to the carbon monoxide side of this smoke alarm protection and protecting now from carbon monoxide as well as just fire and smoke. So it and basically 51% of households were always they didn't know the accurate age of their smoke alarms or their carbon monoxide detectors if they even knew about them at all. So the awareness is up and we're getting more of them in there. But now we need to bring that awareness because barely half of people know if their smoke alarms are 10 years newer or older and should they is it time to think about replacing them they have no idea. And so they can just go bad and they can just kind of wear out and if taken too long, then they just won't work in the event of a fire with with smoke from a fire and everything. So in another amazing kind of figure there was that 61% were reported testing their smoke alarms, but less frequency than once a month, which I'm kind of in that group for sure. But then a third 33% said they never test their smoke alarm. So they have no idea if they're going to work anything about it. So again, it is very important to test them out, look at them, check the date, change the batteries, check the dates. If it's 10 years or older, just replace them all to be safe and make sure that they're going to work and going to be there for you. We just want to be good and safe for everybody. So we're going to get into our second break here, our middle hour break. But again, don't forget, I'm right here, right here for you, you can call in any questions you have about anything, any of this or anything going on around your home, 314-436-7900 is how you will get to me. We'll jump into this break and I'll have more for you when we get back. The Voice of St. Louis News Radio 1120, King of OX. All right, everybody, we are back. Got a lot of show planned for you. Got a lot we can't cover and talk about today. But again, don't be shy, jump in. If you have anything going on around your house, maybe you're working on your honeydew list, you got some things you're finding or just anything that you've always been kind of curious about that's you've kind of seen or has happened with it. And we always talk about doing that, walk about the house, kind of go around, look outside, just visually inspect, look for cracks in the caulk and foundations and look at the roof. Just walk around all four sides of your house and examine the roof visually see if anything looks out of place. That's a good time. Once you see something looks out of place, get your professionals involved or right here, right today, you can call me and ask me about whatever it is that you're seeing or you're finding three, one, four, four, three, six, seven, 900 get you in. Right now, phone lines are wide open for everybody. And we've been kind of recapping all of the fire safety, the smoke alarm awareness. And we kind of in the last segment just learned a lot about how the smoke alarms give you a advanced notice to getting out of your house. But another thing that is a really big deal to do once you have all that in place is to do some advanced planning. Think about planning that escape, get with everybody in the household, make a home escape plan. You can look it up and online and they'll kind of tell you and show you how to go through that. Know the routes, know where certain people should get out, have a spot to go to on the outside. Once you're out there, I'm telling you, it's a great idea to have the practice and have the plan and practice that plan so that you're kind of there and know it and understand it. So that's kind of hopefully will help everybody. I got a funny story I can get back to in a little bit about fire safety and smoke and everything. But we've got we've got Sue on the line. So let's get over here to Sue right away and see what's going on. Sue, are you there? Can you hear me? Hi, yes, I can hear you. Oh, great. Thanks for calling. I just have one question. I have two hardwired fire alarms. They have batteries in them. But they're hardwired, I think. So do I need, I don't need to replace those, do I? Yes, yeah, even if they're hardwired, once they get around 10 years or older, and I did them all in my house a few years ago, just basically went through and replaced every single smoke detector in the house. Because they do they actually wear out in what I've heard is they will they will still detect, and this is kind of a fable and a myth thing with smoke detectors that a lot of people don't understand. But I've heard like if you strike a match, the sulfur, all that stuff, you blow that smoke, you blow the match out. The smoke alarm detects that smoke, and it goes off and people think, yep, I'm good. But that doesn't mean even though it did that, it doesn't mean it's going to pick up on the smoke from a couch carpet curtains or drywall because it's a there's different chemicals and there's different. It's just a little bit different smoke, so they can go bad, they can wear out and not work properly. And they said they have found them just kind of where they just never went off in the event of a fire. And that's another reason why they put them in so many places now, so that if one did go bad, eventually it would get to another one. And they put them in so many places so that you hear them and there's always one near you. So and that's 30 years old. Yeah, yeah, exactly. And that's the thing. Glad we didn't have any fires because it's seems like it's fine until it's not and it doesn't happen to everybody, but God forbid it does. It's great to be prepared. So I would consider changing the two that you have for sure with brand new ones, but then I would also consider getting more of them that are integrated with that system where you put one in each bedroom, one outside of the bedroom areas. You have one in the basement, you have one somewhere in the main area living floor and you have second floor for sure. And then it's good to have carbon monoxide on each level also. Okay, well, I think I think I think I think they're well, two of them I think are hooked up to my alarm system. I think the one in the kitchen it responds to heat. Yeah, yeah, it does heat but not smoke from an alarm system. And that's a that's a good idea too. Yep. So and you can that need to be replaced? You know, I don't know about the heat ones, but if they're 30 years old, I would say it's a great it would be a great idea just to get it up to date the newest stuff. And with the smoke alarms, you can't get a combination smoke carbon monoxide detector in the same device. And that's the easiest way to get carbon monoxide on each level. No, I don't have a basement. Okay, a lot of slabs. So am I subject to carbon monoxide? Yeah, because you still probably have either a gas water heater, gas furnace, anything that burns gas in the in the home, you're subject to carbon monoxide. Okay, it's all electric. So maybe I'm okay that way then. So then you could be okay that way. The next thing to watch would be the garage if anything came from the garage or car in the garage. I actually went when my house where you walk in the garage, like from the garage to the house, there's a little hallway with the the laundry room on the right. And then you walk into like where starting where the kitchen goes, everything. I put one on the outlet by that door. It's about four or five feet from the garage door, just in case something happened with the garage or you accidentally left a car running. Something could happen and you just literally forget. My wife actually did that on Monday, not in our garage, but our grandson had an emergency, ended up in Children's Hospital. My wife left her car running in the parking garage for like six hours. She just got out. So you do your garage and you don't realize it because something's happening or you know, you just that that temporary loss of your your your general mind, your general reactions. I mean, usually got a car, you turn off the key, you hit the button, whatever you do, you do it every time right until you have something strange, weird or emergency happening. And then all of a sudden you've had a car running in your garage all night long. So what happened to her car out of curiosity? Well, we still want to guess or what? No, she had enough gas for it to last. And I was really I was I was really happy that no one just didn't see it running and just decided to drive off with it. Yes. Not recommended. Don't leave your keys in your car at the gas station, all that stuff. But yeah, yeah. Oh, life is so different now. It is it added added things turned out with your grip. Oh, everything that you brought it up. No, he's he's good. Yeah, he just he heard his finger had to get some stitches and stuff. And he's he's only eight months. It's he's very resilient. And but yes, and it's hard to wrapped up hand all this stuff is definitely very hard to deal with with someone with someone so young. Yeah, for sure. He just wants to do his thing and doesn't understand. So but yeah, so yeah, we'll get into maybe we'll get into child safety here a little bit and child proofing the house because the whole room was child proof set one item and it was the one item he got to. That's how that happens. Yep. Oh, yeah. What was that item? So it was a it was one of those salt lamps, the big salt rock that like lights up. So that it was just like on the TV shelf and like underneath the TV on like a shelf and we think weighs so much. I mean, it just wasn't they thought he's no one's gonna move that like this thing weighs a lot. Well, he just grabbed the shelf and to pull up and it it kind of rocked and that thing tipped over and smashed the tip of his finger. Yeah, it was pretty it was it was a rough day for my daughter and my grandson and my wife and yeah. So but hey, so I appreciate the call a great conversation. Thank you very much. Yep, you're welcome. Get those changed for you and Betty and Dorothy, if you could hold real quick through the break, I'll jump to you guys as soon as we come back. We're gonna take a short break. Don't touch that dial. It's the home improvement show presented by Mosby Building Arts on King of OX. Now once again, Rich Orus. All right, we are back. I want to remind everybody after this segment, we have a whole nother hour of home improvement for everybody. Feel free to keep the questions coming three one four four three six seven nine hundred is how you'll find me. And let's jump right to Betty and see what's going on there. Hi Betty, thanks for calling. Yeah, everybody says, you know, class or smoke effectors. Well, when you test them, also train your dogs. When the smoking pressure goes off. Yeah, it runs at one of the outside doors. Yeah, no, that is that is a great idea. I actually, when we were talking about it last week, I mentioned that too, because my sister, one of my little younger sisters, had trained one of our dogs to do to go down into the basement under the stairs when she blew this certain whistle. And it was because of the earthquake, somebody and had like predicted we were going to have like a major earthquake and the new major fall would go off and it never ended up happening. But yeah, if you so you can train your dogs to hit a bell when they need to go outside and all that, you're right. You're right, Betty, train them to to run to you or where you need them when those smoke alarms go off. Yeah, so you only have to look for them. Yeah. You can rescue yourself and they'll be at the door waiting for you. In fact, they might take you through the door. Yeah, yeah, be a great idea. And training them, it gets you to test them out probably once a month like they recommend anyway. So that's good thing. And also for the tornado warnings. Uh huh. You have them go to the basement door or to the place of safety for our tornado. Yeah. They haven't go to the bathroom or grab the place of safety is. So you only have to look for them, have the kids go there too. Yep. And I just this place of safety or go to an outside door that everybody, you know, a fire alarm. Don't go looking for each other. Go to the place of safety. Yep. I just saw a story like last night of the night before about somebody that did they were talking about how they went back in their house to find their pets when it was on fire and luckily they were safe and successful. But that's just a great idea. So yeah, appreciate the call, Betty. Great thought, great thing to do. Let's jump over to Dorothy and see what's going on there. Dorothy, are you there? Yes. Yes, I am. Good. What's your question? Is it possible for a toilet to leak onto the ground of a tile floor? Oh, yeah. Yeah, absolutely. It can there's there's a it can leak from either kind of behind the tank where the shut off where where the where the supply line and everything is or it can be slightly leaking. If it's right around the base of the toilet and in close, it's probably your wax ring is slightly leaking and you're starting to see the moisture in the grout on the tile floor around it. So yeah, you need to get a you need to get a plumber to come in, pull that toilet up and check it and then replace the wax ring and get it all seated down good again to stop that. Is your basement unfinished? No. Is it finished? Yeah. Okay, so yeah, because if it's unfinished, a lot of times you can go downstairs and look up where the toilet pipe is and see if you see stains around the plywood, you'll see it there too. But if it's finished and there's a ceiling and stuff and you won't see it, then you might not know. And it and it won't always drip down to the ceiling because it's soaking into the plywood and the tile and the grout. Okay, thank you. So, oh, you're welcome. Yeah. Get yourself a plumber and get that checked out. Okay, thank you. You're very welcome. Good common questions, things going on all the time. Those toilets, definitely those wax rings, and they're such a slow kind of leak that you really don't necessarily see. I had that last year at the townhouse that my son had purchased. And the first floor, there's no basement, first floor is concrete. And they had a luxury vinyl kind of tile floor installed in the half bathroom off the kitchen there. And I was just going into, we were fixing up, painting, doing some work like that, and fixing a lot of stuff. And so we were just changing the toilet, but you couldn't tell because it was all going between the concrete and that luxury vinyl tile, you couldn't really see that it was happening. But the minute I pulled that toilet and you could start to see the mold and the stuff back by the trim and underneath and around that floor where that wax ring. So when they whoever installed the other floor, they didn't put it back very well, they didn't reinstall the toilet very well. And it had that slow wax ring leak and started getting water spreading out underneath that floor. So we had a lot more to repair once we saw that. And it's you just don't always see it. And until it's too late sometimes, because it is a slow, kind of spread out kind of leak when you get to those wax rings. So yep, pull them up, get them changed. Kind of easy thing to do. A lot of DIY people can can take up a toilet and work on them and all of that. But sometimes the the ceramic tile gets a little too thick. And that's where you need to adjust the flange of that toilet mount to get that thing mounted right and to get that wax ring to seat and keep that water in. So hey, like I said, we got a whole another hour for everybody three one four four three six seven nine hundred is where you will find me and get to me in the next hour. We're going to have a good long news break here. And then we'll have be back with more home improvement.