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Home Improvement - Undoing Previous Owners "Landlord" Specials

My "smart" garage door has been more dumb as of late than advertised. Stupid Chamberlain products. And this doesn't involve their inability to play nice with *any* home automation service.

It seems like the last few months the garage door opener is "offline" in their app every time I need it. I haven't moved the router, the opener's antenna hasn't moved, no configuration changes, and no new wireless signals that would interfere (Nest camera on same channel has no communication issues, and the garage door has lived in harmony with it for years before this).

To add insult to injury, the wireless key pad, which has also lived in harmony with my house and is NOT smart, seems to forget what its designed to do despite new batteries. It will decide on the fourth or fifth try that "oh hey, you have been putting in the right code," and open the door.

Chamberlain is just garbage.
 
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**Insert Clark W. Griswold plugging in the light strand here and Cousin Eddie flipping the switch GIF here.**
 
We have LiftMaster, which is pretty much Chamberlain IIRC. Our keypad started doing the same thing last autumn. I took it off and threw it out after reading that the things wear out eventually and it’s easier to replace them. We were looking into doing the more “smart” route, but realized it was going to be a hassle with our openers, which appears to have been correct given your complaints.

We ended up ordering another dumb keypad and putting an extra Wyze camera we had out there. (Had it in the kiddo’s room a while ago, received an upgraded one as a gift) All I really wanted was to be able to see that the garages are closed from inside the house anyway, and this accomplished it for very little money.
 
state of hockey said:
We have LiftMaster, which is pretty much Chamberlain IIRC. Our keypad started doing the same thing last autumn. I took it off and threw it out after reading that the things wear out eventually and it’s easier to replace them. We were looking into doing the more “smart” route, but realized it was going to be a hassle with our openers, which appears to have been correct given your complaints.

We ended up ordering another dumb keypad and putting an extra Wyze camera we had out there. (Had it in the kiddo’s room a while ago, received an upgraded one as a gift) All I really wanted was to be able to see that the garages are closed from inside the house anyway, and this accomplished it for very little money.
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My wife and I are thinking about doing the same with our garage. We have been using a Wyze as a baby monitor, I’m just not sure if it’s able to work in cold weather.
 
aparch said:
My "smart" garage door has been more dumb as of late than advertised. Stupid Chamberlain products. And this doesn't involve their inability to play nice with *any* home automation service.

It seems like the last few months the garage door opener is "offline" in their app every time I need it. I haven't moved the router, the opener's antenna hasn't moved, no configuration changes, and no new wireless signals that would interfere (Nest camera on same channel has no communication issues, and the garage door has lived in harmony with it for years before this).

To add insult to injury, the wireless key pad, which has also lived in harmony with my house and is NOT smart, seems to forget what its designed to do despite new batteries. It will decide on the fourth or fifth try that "oh hey, you have been putting in the right code," and open the door.

Chamberlain is just garbage.
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Get a Ratgdo (you will need something like home assistant, but there may be other options). I ditched that chamberlain myQ garbage and haven't looked back.

i added a couple of basic limit switches too to know if it's opened or closed. My opener was so old it didn't have terminals for those (but the function exists within the opener itself, just can't access). Wired them up and presto, I now know if it's open, closed, or stuck in between.
 
Raccoon got up on the deck (first time in a week and an error that has been remedied)

anyways, it was a very bizarre encounter. I opened the door and he started to climb back down. He stopped so I grabbed the plastic shovel to wave at him. I went out onto the deck to get closer and he started to climb back over the railing. I thought for sure he was coming to bite me so I started to back up to the door quickly.

instead of coming over the the railing he reached the top, turned around, and Tosca-ed himself off the second-story deck.

tosca-out.jpg


If it weren't 11 I'd had yelled "FROM THE TOP ROPES!!!!!!"
 
Look for companies that specialize in custom wallplates to ensure you get exactly what you need. It might be worth checking with zook cabins customer service to see if they offer custom wallplate services or if they can recommend a reliable provider. We've had some good experiences with zook cabins in the past, and their customer service team has always been helpful and knowledgeable.
 
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We’re finally dropping the second of the two huge silver maples in our yard tomorrow. While I’m eager to not have white knuckles any time there’s a stiff breeze, I’m a little heartbroken at the same time. This thing must be at least 70 years old. The drip line is probably two-thirds our lot. I’m really going to miss the thing.
 
state of hockey said:
We’re finally dropping the second of the two huge silver maples in our yard tomorrow. While I’m eager to not have white knuckles any time there’s a stiff breeze, I’m a little heartbroken at the same time. This thing must be at least 70 years old. The drip line is probably two-thirds our lot. I’m really going to miss the thing.
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I just sold my house, but I always white knuckled storms as my neighbor has the worlds largest silver maple. It once dropped a few branches at 6am on a perfectly clear day. Power lines down in my yard. Xcel comes out and guy said something to the effect of “silver maples are about as sturdy as a toothpick”
 
Deutsche Gopher Fan said:
I just sold my house, but I always white knuckled storms as my neighbor has the worlds largest silver maple. It once dropped a few branches at 6am on a perfectly clear day. Power lines down in my yard. Xcel comes out and guy said something to the effect of “silver maples are about as sturdy as a toothpick”
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Yeah, just like a lot of trees that grow rapidly they aren’t terribly strong. In their younger years this is a benefit, they’ll just bend in the wind. But once they hit a certain height and width that starts going out the window. This one clearly has the dreaded “maple decline” where first the last half of a branch goes bare, then the next year the whole branch is gone and you see other half branches bare, etc.

Each year lower winds bring down larger branches, so I decided to rip the band aid off and drop it before one of these massive lions tail limbs comes through my roof.
 
Well, the monster tree is gone. Yard feels strange without it. It’ll take some getting used to.

Anyone need a shitload of wood chips?
 
We have a monster silver maple just to the side of our house. When it goes, we will have to install AC, which we now do just fine without. But man, there will be some big beautiful burls when that time comes.
 
burd said:
We have a monster silver maple just to the side of our house. When it goes, we will have to install AC, which we now do just fine without. But man, there will be some big beautiful burls when that time comes.
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Are you going to have a few bits of it cut into slabs and taken to a drying kiln? Burled wood can make for some truly beautiful pieces.
 
St. Clown said:
Are you going to have a few bits of it cut into slabs and taken to a drying kiln? Burled wood can make for some truly beautiful pieces.
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I will certainly have all the burls cut and some of the crotches, where the grain will be heavily featured (curly, mostly). The burls I will turn on my lathe. It is less likely that I will have some wood slabbed and dried for furniture, though it depends on what the log pieces look like. You are exactly right, though. Burl can be beautiful, and having pieces that came from a tree living with us on our property would be special. That said, I hope the tree outlives me.
 
We had moldy siding. Previously we paid a power wash company to come out to soap and blast the stuff off the siding.

Tried something new this year. Bride and I went out and bought a softwash solution that touts spray it on (with the handy applicator), wait 10 minutes and then rinse it off.

By golly, it worked!! We were quoted $1,200 to wash the siding, deck and flagstone. Did it ourselves (took 2 days to avoid direct sun on the siding). Took maybe 5 hrs total, 2 Aleve, and < $200.

If you want the product's name and particulars, let me know.
 
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