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The brick wall at the end of my garden is probably about 200 years old and the faces of the bricks are quite crumbly and powdery. The wall is quite solid in spite of its age but I would like to seal the external surface to prevent further wearing away. Would it be better to use a thinned PVA...

My lounge was fitted with high-quality engineered wood flooring. The floor was laid on an acoustic underlay and each board is firmly locked side, back and front to adjacent boards by tongue and grooves. After less than a year, one of the boards developed a bulge at its edge, which became raised...

About 6 years ago, I had an Ecoair DCW10 dehumidifier fitted high up on the wall of a small bathroom. For the first couple of years, it was very effective at keeping down condensation but, thereafter, was a constant problem with leaking water and extremely frequent sessions (every 5 or 10...

I have a couple of security lights with PIR sensors. However, they are fairly old and are failing, so I want to replace them. Both of them have halogen bulbs and switching the power off and on quickly, overrides the sensor/timer so that the light stays on. This is useful when, for example...

My deck is about 5 square metres in size; it is 8 years old and has been treated regularly with decking oil. However, it has become very dark and stained. Can anyone recommend a good decking stripper that would take it back to something like its original colour? I was looking at Ronseal Decking...

I have a Henderson electric roller door on my garage but have lost one of the two remote operating fobs. A new Henderson fob (if I can find one) is likely to cost around £50 but I have seen “clone” fobs at under £6. As I understand them, these simply clone the proper fob that I still have. I...

I had Rehau Heritage uPVC double-glazed sash windows fitted in 2006. One of the windows will not remain in the raised position. The window frame has a thin nylon cord running down each side and fastening to the bottom of the window. On one side, the cord is very tight and the tension is pulling...

High-quality kitchen cabinets were fitted to my kitchen about 12 years ago. The rear of each cabinet consists of a thin hardboard sheet that appears to fit into slots at each side and one at the bottom (just like the rear of flat-pack bookcases). How can these rear boards be removed? There isn’t...

Can anyone please give a rough cost comparison between an EPDM versus a felt roof (each professionally fitted)? What I would like is something like: EPDM is likely to be around the same price as a felt roof, or twice as much or whatever.

Every 6 months or so, I have treated my wood clad garden office with Coloutrend Natural Glow Timber Oil. It is quite expensive but has kept the office looking good. However, there are few stockists and it is very hard to obtain without a long journey or a long wait for delivery. Can anyone...

The back door to my house is a modern uPVC one that, when fully open, is at right-angles to the house. In windy conditions, it easily blows shut, or is forced back against the door stay. I want to fit a kickdown door holder so that the danger of damage caused by high winds blowing the door is...

I would like to fit a device that, when the house is unoccupied, would detect any water leaks and turn off the water. My feeling is that nothing would detect a very slight leak but I would like something more serious to be detected. I would welcome any views as to how effective such devices are...

Does anyone know of a wireless smoke detector that can be integrated with the Friedland Response type SL (868MHz) intruder alarm system? Friedland announced in 2010 that they were going to market a wireless smoke alarm but seem to have discontinued it and, in any case, it was, I believe, only...

I have a Henderson roller garage door which has become very noisy, particularly when going up. It is less than 3 years old and is fairly wide, being for a double garage. The alignment has been checked, there is no apparent damage anywhere, the "claws" that suspend the door are properly fixed and...

A kitchen sink 40mm waste pipe has cracked close to the point at which is disappears behind the cabinet rear wall. I have repaired this by cutting the pipe and joining the two ends with a compression fit coupler, However, the end that disappears behind the cabinet is close to a junction and will...

I am having a single-room extension built over my garage and need to decide on a heating system. Answers to similar queries in this forum all seem to advise extending the Gas Central Heating to provide radiators in the new room. British Gas advise that, because the existing boiler is over 13...

The gutters on my house are constantly being blocked by moss and seeds from nearby tall sycamore trees. I am getting past the point of getting up a ladder to clear them out and am looking for something I can use from ground level. A pressure washer lance would probably work but splashes would...

The Henderson electric roller door fitted to my garage has a "safe-stop" device to stop the door moving if something is in the way. This device has a small A23 battery which seems to last up to only about a couple of months and sometimes less. Is this a reasonable life? I understand that...

My garage flat roof is surrounded by a low parapet with flat coping stones on top. A few years ago when the roof was replaced, the roofer sealed the coping stones, which were old and porous, with what looked like very thick, sticky grey paint with coarse fibres in it. This coating is starting to...

I am not sure if this is the right forum but here's my query. I want to install some garden lights but, for various reasons cannot use a mains source of power so am considering 12v lamps powered by a 12v 12Ah sealed, rechargeble lead-acid battery (eg a Yuasa NP12-12). I thought that a solar...