Family Handyman September 2013

editors@thefamilyhandyman.com DECK REMODEL IN A CAN I had a great experience last weekend restoring the cedar bridge in our hosta garden. I took it from faded and cracked back to beautiful in one day, using Rust-Oleum’s new Deck & Concrete Restore ($30 a gallon at Home Depot). You apply this resurfacer with a special roller sleeve, and it feels like you’re rolling on liquid rubber. Because it’s so thick (about the consistency of sour cream), it doesn’t go far—it took an entire gallon to double-coat my 8-ft. bridge. But the result is an attractive, slip-resistant coating that should last for years. Restore is formulated for decks and concrete, but only for foot traffic and only for rougher broom-finished surfaces. If your deck needs a face-lift, consider this product. It costs…

SHINGLE REPAIRS MADE EASIER Replacing damaged shingles is tough on super-hot days—the shingles are soft and tear apart. It’s not much easier on cold days—frozen shingles break in two if you pry them up too far. But the “Goldilocks approach,” waiting for the temperature to be just right, isn’t always an option. The Roof Snake by PacTool International makes shingle repairs easier. Just pry up a little bit on the surrounding shingles to remove the nails that hold down the damaged one. Pull out the old one and slide a new shingle into place. Flip the tool around and insert a roofing nail into the nail slot. Slip the tool under the overlapping shingle, and (here’s the ingenious part) hit the tool with your hammer to get the nail started.…

FROM OUR READERS handyhints@thefamilyhandyman.com FISH FOR LEAVES IN YOUR POND If you have trees growing over your pond, falling leaves and seed pods will make a mess of your crystal clear water. Just use a fish landing net to catch that debris (leave your koi where they are!). The water drains right through the loosely woven netting, and the leaves are ready to dump. Ray Serverian Easy-on-the-hands bucket handles I had some old buckets with broken plastic handles. Whenever I carried heavy bucket loads, the wire cut into my hands. So I retrofitted the buckets with new handles made from an old garden hose. I cut short lengths of hose, slit each one with a utility knife and slid them over the handles. If you can remove one side of…

editors@thefamilyhandyman.com Most of us don’t have space to keep a large worktable set up in the middle of the garage or hobby room. But this cleverly designed cabinet solves that problem. Smooth-rolling locking casters allow you to roll the cabinet out when you need it. And it only takes seconds to flip up the top and swing out the support wings to double the work surface. We built this project from shop-grade plywood purchased at a home center. At $40 a sheet, it wasn’t the least expensive choice, but we liked the smooth surface and almost void-free veneer core. We ordered 3-in. polyurethane-wheeled casters from Amazon, and we used full-extension ball-bearing slides for the drawers. You’ll find a full Materials List on p. 28. Construction-wise, this is closer to a…

More outlets, too! editors@thefamilyhandyman.com If your garage doesn’t have enough outlets and you’re sick of squinting to see what you’re working on, then we’ve got the solution. Using PVC conduit and metal surface-mount electrical boxes, we’ll show you how to connect additional outlets to an existing garage outlet and how to add bright, energy-efficient fluorescent lights to an existing ceiling box without cutting into your walls or fishing wires. Our upgrades cost about $600. Most of that went toward the eight fluorescent light fixtures. In our garage, we extended conduit from an outlet to add outlets and a hanging fixture over our workbench area. We also removed a ceiling light fixture and extended wiring from it to install eight new fluorescent fixtures. Remember, though, your existing wiring may not be…

editors@thefamilyhandyman.com My brother Curtis is a building maintenance guy, so he knows a thing or two about tools and how to store them. I recently visited his workshop and was instantly drawn to the pegboard cabinet he’d built. He told me that pegboard is his favorite way to store tools. He loves the easy access, and an empty peg always lets him know that a tool has gone AWOL. What he doesn’t like about pegboard is that it takes up wall space, which is scarce in any shop. So he built a pegboard cabinet that delivers the best of both worlds. His design provides almost 48 sq. ft. of pegboard while taking up only 16 sq. ft. of wall space. He always was the smart one in the family. Build…