Not just the 30's. I've seen drywall (modern) over plaster walls around here, from the past few decades.

Drywall over plaster is how some people "fix" old walls.  What I was describing was drywall under plaster.  When I get a moment I will take a picture to post here.  

I've been under the weather for about 3 weeks straight now.  Finally starting to feel better.  Other than planting some mums in the concrete pots on the stone wall and mowing the yard I haven't done much.  That should change soon.  

This year I have lost several green healthy branches with leaves from walnut trees and I'm not sure why.  The branches are anywhere from 2 to 5 inches in diameter.  The 2" branches I see how it would be possible that a heavy load of walnuts could cause them to snap.   I don't see how that is possible with the larger branches though.  The branches would be 20 to 30 feet long if I had to estimate.






This one is 5 inches in diameter.




Besides that going on I finally got around to hauling some brush.  It is all getting stacked in a pile to be turned into wood chips when I rent a commercial wood chipper.  I have a 10hp residential chipper, it works but it is a pain, loud, and dirty.  Without a self feeding device the chipper is very limited even with the 10hp motor.  The cute just constantly cloggs and you spend half your time trying to ram the sticks through the debris in the chute so that they can be ground.  I will wait for the next major thunder storm that knocks down branches and then sell it on Craigslist.  Unless someone wants to buy it.  I got it fairly cheap and would sell it to someone here for the same price.

A load of brush.



One interesting thing is the dam/waterfall.  It has been pretty dry for awhile so the water level is fairly low.  I need to do a creek clean up but that is another project.






Here is what it looks like with normal water flowing.  The spring and other wet periods it will nearly cover the rocks.

It was when the earlier second picture was taken.  This year we had lots of heavy rainstorms and caused a lot of washout.  Also, even though the waterfall is only 1,500 feet from where the spring comes out of the ground and the first 400 feet of that is protected, people still manage to throw their trash and junk into it.  Right now there are 2 what appear to be twin size foam mattress pads laying on the bank along with a bunch of other junk.  The whole area smells like urine, I'm guessing from animals going to the bathroom and those foam pads soaking it all up.  I need some tall rubber boots and a hazmat suit to clean it up.   It looks like I have through Thursday to get that done with the low water, as rain is expected Friday.

I hope you can prune your trees fairly cheap and that they recover.  

One of the pictures I promised.  Drywall under plaster.  Meaning they installed drywall but then put a layer of plaster over it.




ETA: added a second picture of the drywall and plaster, showing the plaster is as this as the drywall and not just a skim coat.

My house was remodeled in the late 50s, they did the same thing. Foil backed dry wall covered in plaster like product.

Well it is 2am and I'm drenched.  There was some heavy rain that came in so I checked the sunroom to see how bad the drips were as the roof still isn't 100% over that room.  Water was pouring in, as if part of the roof was missing.  There is easily a 1/2 inch of standing water in the lower corner of the room.  I know the roof was still there and thought maybe the stupid walnut tree leaves were backing up water, they do that.  Walnuts and walnut leaves are everywhere right now.  So I grab a push broom and go outside on the roof in a downpour. 

The leaves were a problem in one spot but then as I was cleaning off the rest of flat roof over the sunroom I hit a snag.  That's not right, as it is low slop roof with a rubber membrane, there is nothing to snag on.  I ran the broom past that area and the same thing happened, the broom stopped on a snag.  I took a closer look and there is a 3 inch hole chewed through the rubber membrane!  About a foot away was an inch and a half hole chewed through the membrane. 

The damn squirrels have chewed multiple holes through the EPDM membrane that makes up my roof.  It is game on now.  When I bought the house a lot of the wiring was chewed on by squirrels.  That is a big part of the reason the roof isn't 100%.  I had to pull up a whole section of roof to get to the wiring under it.  The roof project went from 1 project to 5 projects primarily due to the squirrels chewing on wiring.  

I've already trapped one squirrel in the house.  The others seem to have gotten smart and have figured out a way to lick the peanut butter off the trap pressure plate without tripping it.  

I need to redo the whole ceiling in that room.  On one hand I'm tempted to gut it and then put drywall back.  On the other hand I could just put drywall over it and preserve the history of how they initially built the room.  Still debating that.  The old ways of the house are still there, which makes it an interesting property.  But who really cares about drywall?  

imho, stop digging.  your old water line is simply going to develop more and more leaks, and the more often you use the water the more pressure variation you will have in the supply line and the faster those leaks will develop.  you are pushing a rock up a hill.  

your frost line is so shallow that you can easily pull a new line with a ditch witch in 20 minutes.  no trenching, no backfill, no heavy labor except to dig at the street connection and at the house.   buy a length of 200psi black poly, some good stainless clamps, and either rent a ditch witch vibratory plow for a half day OR easier yet find a sprinkler installer with nothing to do for half a day.  seriously, after you see how easy it is to pull poly pipe with a vibratory plow you will wonder why you were so worried about this.  a midsized machine will set the water line down 16" and barely leave a mark on the grass.  water the slit immediately after and in one week you will not be able to tell where the line was run.  

now then, you may in the future want a light post or some such out by the end of the driveway.  the ditchwitch guy can pull additional conduit or he can pull UF wire.   these can be run alongside the water line.  note NEC codes while you are dong this.

similarly, while the ditch witch is on site you can run a water line out into the back yard to the garden or other location.  even if you don't plumb things in right away, you can use some hose etc to make a temporary connection between the poly pipe and a hose bib.   moreover, you might want to drag power out there as well for an outlet or security lighting or whatever.  

see also for reference
https://www.ar15.com/forums/general/-/5-1991706/#i65962027

you can see from the second video below how quickly 100 feet of poly goes into the ground.

in northern states can not pull this ditch witch trick off, as (for example, here in the northeast) code for the supply line is 48" down from grade.   much higher, it will freeze up solid in February and thaw sometime in April.  and at higher latitudes it has to be deeper still; so a backhoe and a big mess is the only way to get a new water line in.

ar-jedi

found a video pulling 2 pipes/conduit AND wire at the same time... see 3:00 in at the following

Thanks for the info.  That does make it look very easy.  I do plan on running electrical wires and sprinkler lines out the front, in addition to replacing the supply.  

Do you know how well the ditch witch handles rocks, bricks, and tree stumps/roots?  The property is full of all 3.  Does the vibration cut through them or is it not strong enough to do that?

The patch on the supply line is just a temporary patch.  Right now I would like to get the water turned on, to a point it doesn't leak inside or outside the house.  The supply line goes under the concrete porch slab, under the rock foundation, and into a crawlspace that I really can't fit in.  From there it goes somewhere underground to another crawlspace.  Ideally I would like to reroute the line over to the partial basement.  And then run Pex everywhere.  That can happen over time but I need to be able to turn on the supply line so I have water to part of the house.  So I'm just trying to patch it.  I know it will leak again but if it buys me a year of time then that would be good.  

The front yard rises about 3 feet above the sidewalk from the hole that I have to the street.  It also goes past one or more tree stumps.  To dig down the level the street supply I would need to dig a hole at least 5 feet down and big enough for a person to get in and dig under the front retaining wall.  So a backhoe or excavator is going to required to do the work by the street.  

rocks up to and including the size of a basketball will just be pulled up and pushed out of the way.  larger ones will cause problems, especially if they are just at the depth of the "bullet".  if the whole machine starts "bouncing", you may want to reduce down pressure...  red bricks or even concrete blocks will just be cracked into pieces, and/or pushed out the way.  do not run the ditch witch plow over a tree stump, as you know a tree stump once supported a ton or so of standing wood up 30 to 80 feet high, so it's not going to move at all.  wood does not fracture like stone or concrete does.

but reasonable size tree roots, sprinkler pipes, electrical wires, sewer pipes, gas mains, cable tv lines, FIOS fiber, electrical cables, etc etc etc -- forget it, the vibrating ditch witch plow will either sever them or pull them out of the house foundation or street box.  a typical ditch witch 410 (as shown above) has a 50HP engine, 4wd, weighs 3500lbs, and pulls from really low in a super low granny gear.  the geometry of the plow actually increases ground pressure at the tires, increasing traction.  it's going forward, despite what the plow encounters under the ground.  T1: "It can't be bargained with. It can't be reasoned with. It doesn't feel pity, or remorse, or fear. And it absolutely will not stop, ever, until you are dead your gas main is cut."

it's not evident from the videos but the "vibrating" action of the plow is in two forms: a rapid vibration that is too fast to see, and a slow methodical movement of "humping" which pulls the pipe forward.  the former simply beats the shit out of anything in front of the plow.  

this is always the case, you have to dig at the endpoints.

good luck.

ar-jedi

my experience with a vibratory plow taught me one thing: don't fuck around with the unspooling poly pipe.  200psi black poly is REALLY strong in any diameter.  if you get your hand, wrist, arm, or leg involved with the pipe at the entrance to the ground while the ditch witch operator is looking the other way 30 feet away, you are going to lose something really important.  as the "junior sprinkler installer" on the team your job is to make sure the poly NEVER twists and kinks as it is unspooling from the roll, because it can stay that way once underground and you'll have a flow blockage.  this is the reason those "unspooling carts" i linked to above exist.  you can't get over-committed to keeping the pipe straight though, at some point you have to let go because as i mentioned above the ditch witch at the other end will not care one wit and will happily pull both the pipe and a part of you underground.  

watch that third video, with the 2" pvc going underground.  as the ditch witch plow heads underground, the pull point adapter folds the 2" pvc back on itself like you fold a paper clip.   next time you are at HD or Lowes, try to fold up a piece of 2" PVC...

ar-jedi

If I ever get the well going, I plan on using that as a source to water everything, that way I don't have to pay for city water and sewer.  It would make quick work of the back yard and getting pipe around the house to the front yard.  When it comes time for that I will definitely be using one.  

I was talking with Kitties-with-Sigs about losing some walnut tree branches earlier this year  A heavy walnut crop was suspected to be the main cause of the problem.  I would say she was right.  

Just a few walnuts on the roof...




There are at least 25 walnuts in this picture.  The spindly looking plant is a tomato plant.  The green egg shaped object new the center of the picture is actually roma tomato.  

Fall colors are out.

The house seems to be a bit haunted as well.

I figured I would use what I had, which is a creepy looking run down house.  The projection on the door is a video actually, different scenes can be projected and there is sound.  I will try to get video of that tonight if I have time.  

Trump managed to do that to the WhiteHouse.   A huge spider or spiders taking over a house would be a good decoration.  

I didn't know they did it either but I found a picture of Obama having an event as well.  I assume it is an annual thing.  

*teaser*

Something unexpected but of a slight significance just got put in motion. I will post an update once it is finalized, which should be less than a month from now, but wanted to mention it now.

*back to the regularly scheduled posts*

I previously mentioned squirrels have chewed holes in my EPDM roof.  I still don't have that fixed but hope to do that this weekend.

Here are the holes.  The roof isn't glued down yet which is why it has the ripples in it.  I was able to put the holes at the top of the ripple and put a brick under it to redirect the water.  Prior to that the hole lines up perfectly with the low part of the ripple and was channeling water into the sun room.

Here is an overview of the repairs.  The roofing material is called EPDM which is basically rubber.  It isn't used much in the US but used a lot in Europe.  It is rated as a 10 year roof material and this roof is at least 10 years old.  

The holes and most of the materials.




The surface needs to be cleaned.  I use Simply Green which seems to work really well.




Hose it down with Simply Green and let it soak.




Wipe it down.  The roof is mess.




I am using a 5 inch seem/edge/patch material.  There are various materials included dedicated patches that can be used.  What they have in common is a cured membrane and sticky side covered by paper.   The proper fix requires 3" of pateching material on each side of a hole.  I was close with the patch but not ideal.  Another type of fix would require using a black adhesive and another piece of EPDM.  The black adhesive would be rolled on and the other piece of EPDM placed.  The peel and stick kind of patch eliminates the mess that comes with trying to roll on the adhesive.




Cut the patch to the proper length.




Round the corners so they are less likely to snag on anything.




Apply the Seam Primer.  I'm not sure exactly what this does.  It does flash off and become tacky to the touch, which is when you apply the patch on top of it.  I don't know if the primer does anything to activate the glue in the patch or if it just provides a clean surface.  It is required with the peel and stick patch but not with the black adhesive type of patch.




The scratching pad is used to smooth out the primer and scratch it into the existing membrane.





Peel the patch from the paper.




Once the patch the applied use the roller and roll out the entire surface of the patch to make sure it has made contact.




The last step is to run a bead of EPDM safe tar/calk around the patch.  Since the roof is rubber the components of regular roofing tar would eat away at the EPDM membrane.




I found another section where the squirlles had started chewing and made cuts in the membrane.  So I patched that as well.




That is all it takes to patch an EPDM roof.  It is very easy.  The material does only have a 10 year life but does last much longer than that.  Bigger repairs become a problem as a membrane is glued down and the material will shrink over time.  The ripples in this part of the roof are due to me pulling up the membrane to do some major repairs.  As soon as peeled up the existing membrane I realized it would never fit back in place because it had shrunk.  I could probably hire a crew of people to help re-stretch and secure the membrane but that wouldn't be cheap.  I extended part of the roof anyway and will have to run some additional material.  That can't happen until the initial membrane has been glued down again.

Work items preventing the membrande from being glued down are:
1: reenforcing the ladder rafter
2: running new electrical through the ladder rafter
3: running network cables through the ladder rafter for cameras

An Honorable mention work item is:
Figuring out where the wires inside go and what switches they connect to

Fall colors and a new addition to the font garden.





New garden bench. 





Close up of the bench.  I need to get a better picture.




Nice aerial shot of the fall colors.

That's a question I refuse to think about at this time.  That's the answer my fiance gets when she talks about replacing a chandler or other interior cosmetic changes.  Right now it rains inside the house during heavy rains.  My focus is on trying to get that fixed (see my work item list related to the roof) and other key infrastructure pieces 100% before I consider other changes.  When I have a house that I can walk inside, turn on lights in every room, every faucet works, and it doesn't rain inside; then I will consider additional changes.

The property is mentally overwhelming as I'm trying to identify everything that needs work, learning how to do the work, actually doing the work, probably redoing the work because I didn't do it right the first time as I'm learning, and then figuring out how that work will tie into other work.  So to keep my sanity, I've through up mental boundaries on what I will or won't think about.  

However, early on and before I was completely overwhelmed, I did give it some thought.  The rubber roof is a roof over the roofs on two different periods of the house.  Flat roofs suck as they leak and the leak quickly turns into a big leak.  The material is easy enough to repair and seems to work if it is given constant maintenance.  The flat roof is fun to walk on and enjoy the view.  The flat roof ties into the length of the entire single story and behind part of the 2 story.  A change will require a change along that entire area which would be significant.  

That is as far I've gotten on that flat roof.  The flat roof over the great room is not connected is something that could be pitched; however the pitch would require extending the chimney and tying into to the pitched roof over the master bedroom.

The flat roof is accessible through one of the windows of the 2 story side; which I use when I just need to make a single trip out to it.  A thought that has crossed my mind as I'm climbing through the window has been "I should make this a door."  That then opens up the idea of "why not build some type of deck on the flat roof."  But those are just fleeting thoughts and nothing that I've even started considering.  

Video of the backyard and neighborhood.

All of those great leaves had turned into a great yard mess. I put the bagger on the mower and went to fire it up about 3 weeks ago but it wouldn't crank. I tried jumping the battery but still wouldn't really turn over. I noticed the started had ground away half the teeth. Then the started didn't seem to want to engage at all.

A friend had given me his used MTD Yard Machine which happened to have the same engine in it. Swapping starters would be about as much work as swapping an engine and since the current engine had some previous difficulties in not wanting to start when it was warm, I decided to do another engine swap. Work keep me busy, dark when I left and dark when I got home, so I didn't really work on the swap. Building a large she is one project on the to do list so I can work indoors and at night on such things.

Turns out there were several problems. First the positive battery lead was failing. It had gotten caught in the seat spring 10 years, frayed, started shorting, and melting. I just patched it up and everything was fine, until now. I guess the wire has corroded enough that it could no longer pass enough current through to reliably turn the starter. The starter solenoid was also failing/failed. It too showed some signs of damage due to the previous short problem. Then the bad or going bad starter on what must be a hard engine to turn over since it was chewing teeth.

Here is the best part about buying an MTD mower. They are all made the same and have been for decades. This isn't first engine swap in the mower. I was also about to take the starter solinoid from the Yard Machine and use it in my mower along with the battery lead. That is an engine swap with starter, starter solenoid, and battery cable repair that didn't cost me a single cent. All because someone had no use for an old mower. I will probably take what remains of the scavenged mower to the next Kentucky ARFCOM shoot just like I did the last time I was given a mower and pulled the engine.

First a picture that make my house look like a redneck lawnmower graveyard. It was only temporary as I made the swap.

I finally finished the engine swap last Sunday but had promised a guy I would mow his 3 acres.  So finally I had time this weekend to do some over do yard clean up.

As you can see the mower is all put back together and running as good as ever.  Also attached is the bagging equipment.  The truck is full of leaves.  That is just from one section of the yard.  I couldn't even make a trip around the yard section with the bags getting full.



Before I started.  All the pretty leaves turned into a pretty big mess.  At this point I had already cleaned up the leaves in front of the wall and on the sidewalk.  That filled my truck bed as well.  Ignore the hole that is still in my front yard where the water pipe had broken.  I still don't have the pipe fixed and need to dig up more of the line.

This is the Homestead, Farm, and Garden forum correct?  I make my own leaf compost.    I will post some pictures from what I did last year.

We do have the curb side leaf pickup here.  Trying to blow all those leaves to the curb would take a lot longer than bagging them with the mower.   Heavy piles of leaves do not like to blown.  Once you get over a foot thick the leaves don't like to move.  That is 1 cubic yard of shredded leaves in the back of my truck, they came from 30'x40' area.  That is how thick the leaves fall.  Now that the main bulk of the leaves have been moved the blower would work pretty well.

I learned about the compost company in Lexington just this year.  They charge $15 a cubic yard for leaf compost.  That is what I was putting on my gardens earlier this year.  For that price it makes me question doing my own composting.  They will deliver as well but seem to think Georgetown is 20 miles away instead of 12.  When I explained my location the lady in the office agreed to come down the delivery price and quoted me $225 to have 10 cubic yards of leaf compost delivered.  That is only a $75 delivery fee and making 10 trips in my truck would probably cost me that in gas, not to mention 10 hours of time.  So I plan on getting that delivered if they will honor the price.  Before delivery I need to trim a lot of trees and bushes so that the dump truck could get into the back yard.

Last years leaf pile.  I need to grab an after picture of what the compost pile now looks like.

Location where I put up a compost bin.

]

Bin is up and the first load of leaves ready to go in.



The mower does an ok job at shredding the leaves.



One truck load of leaves.



The bin is full after 3 loads of leaves.  For a point of reference those are 7 foot tall fence post set in the ground a foot.

Here is the compost bin 1 year later.  I did nothing to it. I added water or turned it.  The bin came into existance basically out of the question "what can I do with all these leaves".  That was a year ago, before I learned about first hand about juglone.  The leaves actually have very few walnut leaves in them since they came from the front of the house.  However, the tree I set the compost bin up under a year ago is a walnut.    I'm still working on a juglone neutralizer.



This year you can say I tried something new or I just got lazy.  I had put together another smaller bin just for random things to compost.  This is with one truck load of leaves.



For the other side of the yard I decided just to dump the bagged leaves into the circle garden around the fountain.  I had put some wood chips down earlier and it really helped with the weeds.  That garden will need a lot of work and as much organic matter as I can add.  There is already a walnut tree with branches over that garden, so no point in worrying about the type of leaves.  I threw some nitrogen fertilizer on it as well and really need to drag a hose back and soak them down well.  I still have a truck load of leaves that I need to dump somewhere.

Can anyone identify this plant and explain why it only emerged after several hard killing frosts?  It has come up all over the garden, which is great, but I didn't plan for it.  I plan to rework the garden, add compost and woodchips on top, level it out which would change how much dirt is above the plant.   Not sure if they are worth worrying about, should I dig them up and relocate them before I do major work on the garden?

Drone shots of my gardens at the end of fall 2017.  The brush pile is just a tiny portion of the brush that I've gathered from clearing out Honeysuckle bushes.  There are a few branches in there as well.  I found a place that gives out free woodchips and will even load your vehicle for free Monday mornings.  So the cost of renting a chipper to make my own wood chips is not worth it; however, I will still do it at least once.  The city will also collect brush that is placed by the street.  Not sure what they would if I drug all that out to the street.  For a size comparison the log behind it is 12 feet long and 32 inches wide.

The purple plants are two different varieties of blackberries.  I will need to rig a trellis up for them before spring. The bottom center of the image is 1 cubic yard of leaf compost from the company mentioned a few posts up.



Compost bins are in the top left.  The blue tarp is there just to kill off the area.  The rest of the area is the strawberry patch and where the tomatos and peppers were.

That looks like it.  After you gave me the name I did some research and it is considered a deep shade perennial.  The way it was coming up is what had me concerned it was more a noxious weed.  Under a walnut tree we moved the pavers off to side, the several dozen plants have come up through the cracks in the pavers.  I had also assumed the garden was done for the year and hit it was a heavy dose of 10-10-10 fertilizer as I expect to add compost/woodchips before spring.  Everything that was in the garden died off due to the heavy dose of the fertilizer.  Then these guys popped up all over.

I will try to get some better pictures, especially how they are coming through the pavers.