Ask A Tradie with Simon Stevenson

Now on weekends ask training thanks to not Be Kitchens since nineteen thirty nine and with Sydney's largest kitchen showrooms and free in home design servers.

At that time, and a Saturday when Simon Stephenson joins me in the studio to answer all your home reno questions. There's no job that's either too big or too small. There's no question that's silly. Jump on the line one three, one eight seven three. We want to help you. This is what particularly Simon wanting to help you. One three one eight seven three. If you're doing some stuff around the house and you're not sure on what to do next or where to go, We'll tell you where to go.

Good?

May yourself very well? Indeed, that's good. We're talking about fillers today. Yes, and I had a jip rock wall I had to repair and gosh, I'm hopeless of that. I am just hopeless. I put too much filler in. I'm frightened to stand it in case I strip it all out. I'm just hopeless. But does it come down to the right filler?

Look it does?

I mean, there's a lot of differ from fillers and making sure you use the correct one.

For your job.

But you know, like you just said, I come across so many people doing it that put too much filler one, so they're wasting product. They're also then have to send all that product back, so they're just taking way much too much time. They're going to cause too much dust. So if you are filling nail holes chip rock areas, two tight skims, you know, just put enough filler on that you need without going too much.

We had six thousand nail.

Holes to fill this week.

Yeah, I calculated it by measuring one row and then it worked out. So we had a roughly roughly about six thousand nail holes to fill this week.

You've got the you know, the the chippies there with.

Their nail guns going going berserk.

It's not like the days with the old hammer where they don't want to hammer too many in there.

When the guns come back back back back, Yeah, painter's nightmare.

So escape skim.

So we're you a filler and it was a gloss filler, so it's designed for.

Small hole loss filler.

Yeah, so it sort of stops too much bleeding through the paint sort of things.

It's something you mix up.

No, no, it comes in a container.

It's a polypiller product we used, and it's it's a great product.

It's designed for water.

You know, water outside, use it inside as well. Try as fast. But the thing is, I said to the guys, make sure you do a really tight skim. We use a flexible blade. Make sure you do a tight skim because there's going to be less sanding. I made a plastic blade, steel blade, just really flexible one, and I said, virtually fill the hole and then just wipe all excess off. It's going to save us a lot of work of sandy,

So I end up with not quite well, a mound that's clearly visible off the wall, and I sand it and sand it and get smooth, and then I painted and it's still it's still prominent. The idea is to not have that prominence and meant to look like the wall.

You're better off putting multiple coats of filler on right, right, and thinner coats.

You think about that too.

It's going to dry faster being a thinner coats and fill, it's not going to shrink. Sometimes if you put too much fill on, they can then when they when they're drying, they'll shrink and they'll actually crack. So, yeah, you're better off multiple coats, drying faster and less sanding. Yeah, much better job.

Just don't want to let Mitch know we're not talking about the filler that your well as you refer to her, your ex wife might have used. This is filling.

This is for timber and jip rock, not for facial products.

Now, dare you turn this show into that? Steve? How can we help you?

Well, Good morning Simon, and good morning. Look a wonderful segment you've got here, and thank you for taking my call.

Thank you.

I've got so I have a problem. I've got a pool that was used in Pebble Crute and it's got a beachfront entryway to it, and on the beach the beachfront part under Pebble Crute was there's no chance in the world you can slip over there. It wouldn't matter how much Graham or whatever was there. I've recoded it in the Duels for Pools Glass breeding product and it is absolutely beautiful. But it doesn't matter how clean I make the beachfront.

Entryway, it is still slippery as.

You know what. So and I contacted an Or Glass about this. I mean, I've been of I listen to this program every week and before you before you're breaking, after your return and a North Glass has been the greatest thing on earth. But they reply to me to the extent of they didn't. They couldn't provide me with

I know.

I look, I know all about banging heads because I did it this week.

On the concrete.

So not real good mate, to be honest with you, I think that is this area you're talking about, is it going to be underwater where you're slipping?

It's always underwater? Okay, Okay, so it's only a gradual slope, right, But the gradual slope is it can get slippery yep, and like and when I walk up with your trab, walk up there and you just walk out standing up again?

So are you saying the pebble crete?

See I've now got the duels for pool.

Okay, so the glass booded product, I read to put something on top of that product. So you've got a bit of bit of purchase when you're trying to get out of the pool.

All right.

So what I have done I have painted a few swimming pools previously. And when i've painted them, when I've done steps, and I learned this from a pool painter. We coated the swimming pool and when we did the steps, we actually got coarse salt and we dropped the salt into the paint while it was wet, and it would make little holes in the paint work. And then when you filled the swimming pool up, the salt would disappear and leave a grit and leave a little bit.

Of a rough surface. And it was fantastic. It worked really really well.

Now, whether you can do something like that with this area, you need to put another coat of something down, You need some sort of aggregate in there. But whether this pulls I don't know the product you've used, but whether it's something you can coat on put some of that rough salt in it and create a bit of a rough area.

You mean, like rock salt the biggest absolutely.

So, yeah, some core salt, you know, it sat in there and then once you've filled the water up, the salt disappeared and left these little.

Crators And it worked on real, worked one real.

So I just don't know. Maybe you can send me some information via email a little bit more and maybe we can discuss it a little bit more.

Excellent, Steve, stay there, mate, and Kitty will give you the way to contact Simon with more information. That's amazing.

Oh, look the things you learn from trading, you know, from other trades that I learned. Yeah, it's just great, you know, you get some information on that to do something.

Good morning, Serena, Oh, good morning, Simon. We have a problem with discoloring off.

Roof tiles and the riches.

Need re cementing. Do you have anybody that's reliable? And you know, I'm a bit scared. We're you know, we're not young. You know, we don't want to just get somebody from the paper or what.

And look, I totally understand where you're coming from. Can you tell me what area you're from? What suburb Kelly Kelly. Look, I don't have anybody in Kellyville, the Kellyville area. What I can suggest is possibly go to a roofing company, somebody that supplies roof tiles. It is roof tiles you're dealing with. I guess yes, you know, maybe one of the companies, the smaller companies that supply, because they will supply to tradesmen, right, they will supply the roof tiles.

You know what I mean. I've done that myself.

If I've needed a tradesperson, I'll go into a company. And we're not talking about Bunnings. We're talking about, you know, a small roofing company and ask them that way.

Yeah, and that's sometimes it works.

Advice. Yeah, I've done that, my soul.

I've done it with tilers. I've gone to a tile shop yeah and said can I have six recommendations?

Yeah, and you get them.

Absolutely.

There you go, Serena, best of luck, Thank you for your call. It's coming up to thirteen to eleven. We better say, get at a gill or sorry, Jill, Hi, Jilly, how.

Good mate yourself?

Good?

Good listen. I've seen in the last week some bubbling of the paint down the bottom of the wall near the skirting board.

Yep.

And I just wonder whether I should scrape that back and let it breathe or what should I do?

Yeah?

Absolutely I would do that. What's the other side of that wall? Is it a bathroom or a kitchen? U?

Neither.

It's double brick, okay, so it's an outside walls. No, No, it's internal. So on the other side I've got. It's kind of in between a bathroom and a bedroom.

Okay, so the wall, the other side of the wall that you're talking about could be the bathroom.

Is that what you're saying, could be the bathroom or half half, but it's the bathroom door.

It's not the plumbing.

Yeah yeah, but there might be some plumbing through there. There could be some water issue on the floor getting leaking through. I would say that there's an issue in the bathroom with a waterproof membrane. Somewhere, there's water getting into that wall and it's it's actually soaking into the double brick and then it's causing the bubble bubbling of the paint. So you need to find out what's causing it. What I would do is turn all the taps off at home and go and look at your water meter.

So that's another issue.

Right, how do you you can there is a device with which you can measure moisture, isn't there?

Is it?

Yeah?

Yeah?

But do they work?

Yeah?

Absolutely they do.

I've got one so they you know, you'll put two prongs onto it and it'll give you a percentage of how much moisture. But we know there's moisture there because there's bubbling paint. Paint doesn't bubble for no reason. It's usually moisture that's causing it. So it's a matter of now finding why the water is getting in there, whether it's a membrane breakdown, a pipe or leaking in from somewhere else.

All right, one three one eight seven three to have a chat to Simon. We'll take a break back after this. It's eleven to eleven, eight to eleven times getting a way. Nathaniel Smith is CEO of Master Plumbers Association of New South Wales. Is called through Simon Nathaniel, good to chat again and you can help us out with where we should send people that want licensed plumbers.

Mate, Yes, thank you, Luke, thank you, Simon, thank you.

Important that you use license plumber if you have any plumbing issues, and the best way to do that is to go to master Plumbers dot com dot au and search for find a plumber and in that segment of the website you just put your postcode and you'll find a local licensed plumber. All about plumbers are licensed, they've got company licenses and they.

Follow a code of ethnics.

Yeah, excellent, fantastic mate. I really appreciate that. And as you said, you know, don't do plumbing yourself. Absolutely you need a license plumber. It's not something you're allowed to do yourself. Yeah, it is something you have to have a plumber to do.

So thanks Nathaniel. Good to chat mate Bob online. One. We have to be quick with callers with apologies. Bob. How can we help you, mate?

Yeah, I had a branch on the tree fall down onto the roof and crack the tile and with all the ryme came through and it splended on the ceiling, came through the insulation bat yep, and there's a big stain on the ceiling. I was just wondering do I have to replace that or can you as long.

As long as there's no bowing to the ceiling, you know, as long as it hasn't collapsed at all, and it's only a stain itself, you need to put a stained ceiler on there. I use something called zinsap bin b i N. It's a red and white label, so it's a methylated spirits based paint and it will hold back those stains. So that's what you used to hold the stain back, and then you can put on a ceiling paint over the top.

All right, best of Like Bob bros. How can we help you this morning?

Yes, good morning, Simon Luke.

Good one.

I have very slippery tiles in both my bathrooms and here's a rubber mass in the show. But I'm still terrified at going to fall. Is there anything I can put on the tiles other than ripping them up that would make them less slippery?

Look, you can try a product called d T a anti slip, available at a tile shops sometimes at Bunnings or might a ten might carry it as well. So it's the three letters d T a anti slip. And what you do is you actually put that onto the surface, let it sit for fifteen minutes. And it microscopically etches the surface of your tiles. It says in the directions to do an inconspicuous area. So if you've got a spare tile, first try it out, okay, before you go doing the whole bathroom.

Okay, So dta anti slip yep Ross. I've got the same problem in Feares and I'll be doing that in the next week. And thank you so much for calling, Margaret. Don't hang up to stay there. I'm sure Simon'll chat to you briefly on the way out. Good to see you, mate, Good to see you mate. I'm glad you survived the four you told us about that. People got to be careful, don't Well.

Look, I've contacted the ladder company. I found a little bit of a designed faulge in the ladder.

Which I think needs to be changed. Well, see what happens.

We'll maybe talk about this next week. See you mate. Thanks great stuff, Thank you Simon Stevenson