Expert Advice for your Lawn & Garden TV Host of Today's Homeowner^® and home expert for The Weather Channel

(624) 10 Common Interior Repairs

Repairs and Installation, Today's Homeowner Published 04/09/2007 by Danny Lipford

---

---

In this episode, Danny demonstrates how to handle some of the most typical problems found inside the home including:

• Repairing an interior door by putting pressure on the hinge pin
• Eliminating water stains on ceilings
• Repairing drywall nail pops
• Restoring drywall when a towel rod pulls off the wall
• How to fix a slow bath drain
• Repairing leaky faucets
• Fixing a running toilet
• Cracked ceramic tile replacement
• Dealing with stained grout
• Mending squeaky floors

Our show’s director likes to call these episodes “themed” shows. I like to refer to it as a hodgepodge of useful information. There are so many common repairs to try and tackle. We could literally do a few of these episodes each year and not hit on the same repair. That’s one of the things that made this show so fun to work on. The ten areas we focused on in this show are very common, but we hope to hear more from people across the country as to what other problems they’d like to see Danny demonstrate.

Although we demonstrated the “tapping of the door hinge pin” solution, I think it’s important to caution anyone who does this to understand that what they are doing is bending the hinge pin. Yes, this will create some pressure on the hinge, which is what holds the door in place. However, you can put too much of a bend in the pin which will result in you not being able to replace it in the hinge. In other words, you could do more damage if you’re not careful. Follow Danny’s advice and tap the pin gently only once or twice. It doesn’t take very much to accomplish this quick fix.

It’s pure luck if you are spraying a sealer on the ceiling to remove a water stain and the color of the sealer blends with the existing ceiling. Truthfully, I think you have better odds of winning the lottery. If you have water stains to remove on the ceiling, I think you need to be prepared to have to paint the entire ceiling, too. With an acoustical textured ceiling, or “popcorn” texture, you may think that you have to rent a sprayer to apply the paint. Not so. You can easily roll a textured ceiling. The key is purchasing a roller cover with a thicker nap. The nap is the thickness of the fibers. Most paint jobs are done with a roller having a 3/8” nap. For popcorn ceilings, use a roller with a nap of at least 1/2”. Some of the texture will come off, but not that much. It’s tedious work and tiring on the arms, but it’s better than having to pay for the sprayer, covering everything to protect from overspray and having to clean the sprayer afterwards.

I love the Drain Stick. Three and a half bucks for a prickly-ended piece of plastic, but what a great tool. I happened on it by accident. It was buried on the shelf, still packed in the box that held a dozen of them. If you don’t find any them where you are though, you can accomplish a lot with a small plunger. You can buy little plumber’s helpers that are about 12” long, which is perfect for sinks and tubs.

The tool we used to stop the squeaks under carpets is truly amazing. (Find our more about Squeeeeek No More.) It works like a charm, but I was shocked to hear one of the associates at Home Depot tell me that they would likely discontinue carrying it because hardly anyone was buying it. Take my word for it, it works. It can be a pain in the backside trying to locate the floor joist, but locating screw that comes with the kit definitely comes in handy and once you do locate the joist, it’s a piece of cake. If you have multiple floor levels with wood decking, you’ll eventually have squeaks. Go buy this tool before you can’t find them any more! We bought two!