Nearly half a million pounds of lottery funding has been allocated to support Age Concern´s “Men in Sheds” scheme, a program aimed at supporting men over the age of 55 who have been affected by life-changing events – such as bereavement and redundancy – and providing an opportunity to socialise and learn practical skills from each other in a supportive environment.
A pilot scheme, launched earlier this year in Cheshire, was based on the Australian model “Mensheds”, which has received worldwide acclaim for its innovation and the value to over-55´s of integrating back into the community after a major trauma in their lives.
John Standing from the scheme has said that men over the age of 55 are welcome to work on projects at the charities warehouse. “They make things and share resources and skills to help each other. It is also a great way for them to access other services which may be useful to them”.
Alex Major of Age Concern Cheshire highlighted the need for more projects involving older men: ‘There are a lot of projects for older people, but they mainly appeal to women and men can feel left out.’ The pilot project had 20 members who helped the charity in the area with jobs such as repairing furniture and minor DIY tasks. Ken Clemens, also of Age Concern Cheshire, said: ‘The atmosphere in the shed is very informal with men coming together to do activities such as wood working, producing items that are sold to help support the work of the shed – or just to socialise and share time with other men.’
Initially, the scheme in Greenwich is the only one planned for the immediate future in the London area, but Age Concern are monitoring the success of “Men in Sheds” and hoping it can be spread nationwide in the near future.
If you are a retired handyman in South London and would like to learn more about the scheme, details are expected to be posted soon on the News pages of the Age Concern web site, or you can callAge Concern Greenwich on 08452 707 507
The Chief Executive of Travis Perkins – the parent company for Wickes – has commented that the spending cuts announced by the government could actually be a good thing for the DIY retail section. Speaking after announcing a group growth of 7%, Geoff Cooper said that at a time home owners are feeling uncertain about the impact the spending cuts will have on them, home owners will be looking to improve the appeal and value of their home through DIY projects and by using local tradesmen for more home improvements.
Wickes currently has 190 stores throughout the UK – with 34 located in the London area – and Mr Cooper put the company´s growth to their range of products being competitively priced to attract business from London tradesmen amongst others.
His optimistic comments were backed up by the latest “Money Mood Survey” from Legal & General which found that 60% of those questioned were actively saving for the future during the last month. One of the biggest categories that people were saving for was home improvements, with the survey showing that the fear of job losses and difficult economic times are forcing people to reconsider how they spend their money.
If you are one of the many people re-assessing how to make the most of your home, we suggest that you use our “Post-a-Job” facility to get tradesman quotes on the jobs you would like to give priority to, or contact a local tradesman in London through our Tradesmen´s Directory.
Most DIY enthusiasts, handymen and builders in London will have a case full of different drill bits to cope with different drilling tasks. Wood drill bits, metal drill bits and masonry drill bits are the three most common, and inasmuch as many people appreciate that the drill bits are manufactured for specific tasks, not a lot of people know why drill bits are designed the way they are and how best to use them.
Drilling Wood
Almost any drill bit can be used for drilling a hole in a soft wood, but the “lip and spur” drill bit is best to use. It has a centring point which keeps the drill bit steady against the wood (the “spur”) whilst the raised corners of the drill bit cut through fibres within the grain of the wood cleanly – before the inner parts of the cutting edges plane off the base of the hole. Also ideal for drilling through soft plastics, the “lip and spur” is usually used in sizes from 3mm (1/8th inch) to 16mm (5/8th inch).
For wider holes, spade or paddle bits are recommended. These are flat-headed drill bits with a centring point and two cutters which are equipped with spurs to enable a cleaner cutting edge.
Augur wood drill bits are made with a spur, single cutting edge and a “flute” for removing waste from the drilled hole and are particularly useful for drilling deep holes in wooden surfaces.
Drilling Metal
There are many different types of drill bits for drilling through metal, and your choice of bit should depend on the type of metal you are drilling through (steel, stainless steel or aluminium for example) and the size of hole that you wish to make. The larger the hole, the more friction will be created and the hotter the drill bit will become leading to overheating and damage to the drill bit. Most power drill handbooks provided recommended drilling speeds for drilling through metal and you can also refer to Mr Skill´s Project Advice article on “How to Drill Through Metal” and our “Drill Speed Chart”.
The cheaper metal drill bits are made from high carbon steel, but lose their cutting edge quickly if allowed to overheat. Therefore, most builders in London have a preference for “high speed steel” which can be used to drill through metal, hardwood and most other materials at higher speeds. Although being more brittle than “high speed steel”, drill bits made from cobalt steel alloys hold their hardness at much higher temperatures, whilst tungsten carbide drill bits are the toughest of the lot. Due to its expense, tungsten carbide – and polycrystalline diamond (PCD) – is most commonly used on the tips of metal cutting drill bits.
Coatings are frequently used on metal cutting drill bits to provide heat resistance and increase lubricity. The most common are black oxide and titanium nitrate, which can extend the life of a drill bit three or four times, although the benefits or titanium aluminium nitride and titanium carbon nitride are worth the expense if you do a lot of drilling through metals such as stainless steel and nickel alloys.
Drilling Masonry
Masonry bits are usually used with a hammer drill by builders in London. The bit is both hammered and rotated into the masonry – the hammering breaks up the masonry at the drill bit tip, whilst the rotating flutes of the drill bit body carry away the dust. Rotating the bit brings the cutting edges in contact with a fresh portion of the hole with every hammer blow.
Masonry bits of the style shown are commonly available in diameters from 5mm (¼ inch) to 40mm (1½ inches). For larger diameters, core bits are used. Masonry bits up to 1000mm (39 inches) long can be used with hand-portable power tools, and are very effective for installing wiring and plumbing.
This is only a selection of the most common drill bits used in home improvement. If you require any further information on specialist drilling tools, please consult one of the highly rated builders in London featured in our Tradesmen´s Directory.
People have been decorating their walls with paper for millennia. The ancient Egyptians and Chinese were the first to hang paper on their walls two thousand years ago, King Louis XI of France (1423-1483) commissioned Jean Bourdichon to paint 50 rolls of paper with images of angels because he found it necessary to move frequently from castle to castle and wanted to take the “wallpaper” with him, and the UK`s love of flock wall coverings developed after Henry VIII´s excommunication from the Catholic Church in Rome and the English gentry could no longer get tapestries imported from Europe.
These days, it seems that there is practically nothing you cannot do with wallpaper. They can be manufactured from many different materials – textile wallpapers include silks, linens, grass cloths, strings, rattan, and actual impressed leaves -, can be printed with life-size images or photographs and you can submit your own design if there is nothing suitable to choose from in the shop or online! Wallpaper can be printed in the style of a mosaic (see below) or as if the wall was bare brick and there was no wallpaper at all. There is even a charity in the UK promoting “wallpaper awareness” with examples of wallpaper designs over the last six centuries (for more information visit – Wallpaper History Society).
This really is wallpaper printed in the form of a mosiac
Whether you are looking for wallpaper that is modern or retro, Arabesque or Anglo-Japanese, geometric or neo-classical, the video below may offer some inspiration to you. Created with the assistance of the Cooper-Hewett National Design Museum in New York, it goes through three hundred years of wallpaper designs in a little over three minutes. Once you have chosen your particular favourite, you might then wish to use the services of a local handyman in London to help you hang it. In which case you will find our Tradesmen´s Directory an invaluable resource to help attract competitive quotes from handymen in London.
Wallpapering is one of those jobs that nobody can honestly say that they look forward to, and wherever possible will fix peeling wallpaper rather than remove all the old paper and start afresh. However, there comes a stage when completely redecorating the room can no longer be avoided and, reluctantly, you give up a Saturday afternoon to re-paper the room.
Whereas employing a handyman in London might be an ideal option to save you all the grief, people tend to feel that there is something personal about hanging wallpaper once they have been to all the trouble of choosing it, buying it and bringing it home. Nonetheless, the decision to do-it-yourself may well be regretted once you get to a corner!
Corners and light switches are the DIY-ers least favourite part of a room – whilst wallpapering at least – but there are some ways in which you can paper from one wall to the next, quickly and easily, in a smooth operation.
90 Degree Corners
When you reach a corner, it is much easier to hang a length of paper that has been cut into two vertical strips than to fold the paper into the corner – it looks better too! Measure from the last vertical strip to the corner at the top, middle and bottom of the wall (Some walls are slightly crooked and the corners not completely square).
Cut the paper to allow an extra inch (25mm) so it reaches slightly beyond the corner and paste this onto the wall – using a soft paper-hanging brush to smooth it into the corner. Then use a narrow roller to press the paper firmly against the wall and wipe off any excess paste.
Measure the width of the cut-off left over from the wallpaper you have just hung, and hang a plumb line that distance from the corner to get a perfectly vertical line. That line will enable you to start the next wall off correctly once you have pasted the cut-off up onto the wall.
270 Degree Corners
Some rooms have what is known as an “external” corner when there is a chimney breast or recessed window in the room. The procedure for papering around a 270 degree corner is exactly the same as above however use a side wall rather than a front-facing wall for aligning the two strips cut from the same length.
If you experience any difficulty manoeuvring your wallpaper around the corners of a room, look in our Tradesmen´s Directory for a local London handyman to come and give you a helping hand.
If you have read our Project Advice on “How to Wallpaper around Corners”, you will know that plug sockets and light switches are of equal nuisance when it comes to wallpapering a room. Every room has light switches and sockets, and as much as you might get away with making a hash of the wallpapering in a dark corner, you will notice poor wallpapering every time you go to switch on a light or put in a plug – so it is worthwhile to take the extra effort to paper around switches and sockets carefully.
Whenever you are dealing with switches and sockets, turn off the power from the mains before you start.
Hang the wallpaper from the top of the wall as normal and cover the switch or socket. Brush gently over the fitting with a dry paper-hanging brush to make a slight impression on the paper, but take care not to tear it. With the wallpaper over the fitting, draw two diagonal lines from opposing corners through the centre of the faceplate and pierce a small hole in the paper at the centre point. With a small pair of scissors, cut the paper to the corners and pull back the flaps.
Trim the flaps back to just inside the outer edges of the switch or socket so there is an overlap of about a quarter of an inch (6mm) covering the fitting. Partially unscrew the faceplate and pull it out a little way from the wall. Use a small paintbrush to ease the trimmed edges of the wallpaper gently behind the faceplate and smooth away any air bubbles. Put the faceplate back in place and secure the screws. It is best to allow the paste to dry before turning on the power.
Wallpapering around light switches and electric sockets is not particularly complicated, just fiddly and requires a steady hand. As you only get one chance to get it right, you may wish to use the services of a handyman in London to help with the most difficult aspects of wallpapering a room. There are plenty to be found in our Tradesmen´s Directory, or you can attract quotes from handymen in London by using the “Post-a-Job” facility at the top of each page.
Floating shelves look impressive in your home, and putting them up is no harder than putting up brackets for a regular shelf. One thing that you have to conscious of is the load that the shelf will ultimately bear – floating shelves are not ideal for a number of heavy items.
You will also need to consider the fixings that you intend using are suitable for the wall the shelf is being fixed to. A local handyman in London will be able to provide special plugs which are suitable for plasterboard walls, or screws and rawl plugs will generally suffice for brick and wooden walls.
Before you start, check that there are no pipes or cables behind the wall where you intend to put up the shelf. This can be done with an electronic detector and it is advisable never to drill immediately above or below a light or electrical socket – because that is where the cables will be!
Place the bracket for the floating shelf against the wall, with the holes in the protruding prongs facing downwards, and check with a spirit level to ensure it is level.
Mark the wall with a pencil where the holes need to go for the fixings, and a useful tip is to put a little piece of tape around the top of the drill bit where it corresponds with the length of the rawl plug.
Drill the holes in the wall and insert the rawl plugs. Tap them in with a hammer and then screw in the bracket – ensuring that the holes in the prongs are still facing down.
Once the bracket is secured to the wall, slide the shelf onto it and fix from beneath with the screws provided with the shelf. There should also have been some hole covers supplied with the shelf, and these can go on now as well.
Putting up a floating shelf is a very straightforward job, however sometimes a second pair of hands can be useful and you may wish to use the services of a London handyman. If so, please do not hesitate to search our Tradesmen´s Directory for a local handyman in your area of London, or use the “Post-a-Job” facility at the top of the page to attract handyman quotes straight into your inbox.
Quality range cookers blend perfectly with just about any style of kitchen. Either free-standing or built-in, there is a wide range (pun!) of both contemporary and classic styles to suit any home. Range cookers are manufactured to run from electric, gas or “dual fuel” and a kitchen fitter in London will be able to both recommend a suitable range cooker to match the decor of your kitchen and install it both quickly and economically.
Ranging in size from 60cm to a 150cm width, domestic range cookers offer the convenience of twin ovens (fan or conventional), built-in grills and up to eight rings plus a griddle – wonderful if you are catering for a party or have a large family, and they just look so good in your kitchen. The additional storage space offered by a range cooker is also useful for storing pots and pans and cooking implements that you rarely use or using as a warming area.
If you are contemplating replacing your existing cooker, and have the space to include a range cooker in your kitchen, you will find that they cost little more than a standard cooker yet add appeal and value to your home. As mentioned above, you can ask a kitchen fitter in London for their input, or chose and install a range cooker yourself. Provided your work is checked by a certified gas fitter or electrician to conform to the appropriate regulations, the installation is fairly straightforward.
Range cookers are enjoying a renaissance at present, and with so many options available to homeowners, you can easily integrate them into a kitchen layout when planning a new kitchen or simply making a few changes to an existing one. Whatever your circumstances, be sure to use a local tradesman in London recommended in Mr Skill´s Tradesmen´s Directory for you peace of mind and for the benefit of your wallet!
If you are a long suffering parent, trying to get your kids to shower frequently (girls as well as boys in our experience!), you might find a solution to your problem amongst our inspirational shower options. Although many may look like you need an advanced physics degree in order to get your hair wet, these showers offer the ultimate in comfort, style and hygiene.
Modern shower cabins may closely resemble the appearance of the space shuttle, but for a healthy and luxurious “vertical bathing experience” there is nothing that comes close in personal hygiene. Many of these cabins double up as saunas with a high temperature steam generation facility to expedite blood circulation.
Saunas also help to relax your body, improve blood circulation, eliminate fatigue and recover physical strength. For anybody who has breathing difficulties in your family, the shower cabin steam facility has a curative effect on asthma and bronchitis as well as easing rheumatism, rheumatic arthritis, and back pain. It helps you lose weight too!
The more advanced models have computerised LCD control panels to control the flow of water in the “rainfall” ceiling shower, production of steam, lighting, massaging jets, foot massager, ozone sterilisation system, sound system, telephone and the Whirlpool 96 model (pictured right) has an 8.4 inch television and four litre fridge!
And it is not just shower cabins that can provide the ultimate showering experience. This exceptional shower from German manufacturer Kuhler (pictured right) is built into the entrance of an en-suite bathroom, so there is no excuse for forgetting to have that shower in the morning yourself – it is barely something you can walk past and ignore!
We have added a few more inspirational designs below to encourage your children to step into a world they may have never experienced before (a shower cabin – not a wash!). At around three grand per installation, you are going to spend a lot of money keeping your kids clean, but surely the little darlings are worth it?
For something a little more modest, you might like to try your hand at fitting your own shower units. We have a four part guide in our Project Advice section which covers how to install the drainage, how to connect the water supply, how to fit the shower tray and how to install the shower enclosure. If you do not fancy doing it yourself, why not ask one of the highly rated tradesmen in our Tradesmen´s Directory to email you with some tradesmen´s quotes. London is also the home for many good plumbers, builders, electricians and handymen, andyou can alert them to your need for a new shower installation in our “Post-a-Job” facility at the top of each page.
To install a shower in your bathroom requires four stages – the waste pipes and trap, the water supply for your shower, the installation of a shower tray and fitting the shower enclosure. For the first two elements, you may need the services of a plumber in London or, for the latter two, a local handyman to help with the installation. Also, if you are going to be including a direct heat water boiler in your shower installation (rather than run it from your existing central heating supply) or a new shower pump, you will need to have your electrical work checked by a London electrician to ensure that it complies with the Building Regulations Part P.
Please note that if you are considering a body jet shower, direct heat water boilers do not have the power capacity for delivering a sufficient volume of water.
Stage4 – Fitting the Shower Enclosure
If you have not yet bought your shower enclosure, you might just want to take a look at our “Inspirations” feature about body jet showers and shower cabins. There are many different types of shower enclosures you can choose from and many of them will come with their own fitting instructions, but as a rule they follow the procedures below.
Note: With any enclosure it is vital that the wall and tray are fully waterproof, and that the uprights of the frame are vertical.
Start by laying the two fixed side panels flat, and putting a bead of anti-fungal silicone sealant into the channels at the top and bottom. Then gently attach the head and sill rails (there are normally screws provided) and slide on the plastic guide tracks. If the tracks are too long, use a hacksaw to trim them to the required length.
Push two of doorstops into the guide tracks and move them into the middle but do not tighten them up yet.
Stand the shower enclosure upright and slide the curved sliding doors into the head and sill rails, ensuring that the doors are the right way round! Then insert another doorstop into both the head and sill rails. Again, do not tighten them up yet.
Attach the wall channels to each side of the shower enclosure and stand it up on the shower tray – double checking that it is vertical. From the inside of the shower enclosure, use a wipe-dry marker pen to mark the positions for the fixing holes on the wall through the pre-drilled holes in the wall channels.
Take the shower enclosure away from the shower tray and check for hidden pipes and cables behind the fixing positions you have just made on the wall with an electronic detector. If all is clear then drill the fixing holes in the marked positions. Push rawlplugs into the holes, making sure they go in beyond the depth of the tile.
Run a generous bead of anti-fungal silicone sealant down both wall channels. Put the enclosure back onto the shower tray, screw in the fixing screws and remove any excess sealant with a wet sponge.
From inside the shower enclosure, drill holes in the wall channels and into the frame. Secure with the screws that are normally provided and cover the heads with screw caps (usually also normally provided). Drill through the plastic guide track and inner head channel, and now you can screw the doorstops into position.
If you have not already done so, seal the join between the tray and the tiled wall with a continuous bead of sanitary silicone sealant and continue around the outside edges of the enclosure.
If you have difficulty with fitting the shower enclosure, or with any stage of installing a new shower, you may wish to take advantage of some of the services available from tradesmen in London to help you finish the job
A tiler in London if your bathroom or shower room requires tiling or you have recessed the pipework into a wall. This is best done before completing the installation of your new shower.
A London plumber will also be able to help connect the waste pipe from your new shower to an existing waste water escape and assist with construction of the pipework for a new installation.
Local electricians in London will be required if you are installing an electric water heater or pump for your shower. Even if you are confident of doing this part of the job by yourself, your finished installation still requires “approval” under Part P of the Building Regulations
For other stages of “How to Install a Shower”, please see:-
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Nearly half a million pounds of lottery funding has been allocated to support Age Concern´s “Men in Sheds” scheme, a program aimed at supporting men over the age of 55 who have been affected by life-changing events – such as bereavement and redundancy – and providing an opportunity to socialise and learn practical skills from each other in a supportive environment.
