Wire brace will support, raise wood gate

Published 2:37 pm Sunday, October 6, 2002

Question: I have a wood picket fence around my front yard and the gate has sagged, so that now it doesn’t open and close properly.

Any suggestions as to how I can repair this without having to rebuild or replace the entire gate?

Answer: Start by checking the hinges to see if any of the screws have worked loose or have pulled out entirely.

If that is not the problem and the frame of the gate has actually sagged, then the simplest way to square up and brace the gate is to install a diagonal wire brace with a turnbuckle.

The wire is fastened to a bottom and top corner of the gate’s frame with the turnbuckle in the center so that you can tighten as much as necessary to correct the sagging.

In some cases, especially on wider gates, you may have to install two such wire braces going to opposite corners so as to form an “X” that will brace the gate in both directions.

Question: We have fiberglass insulation (with its foil facing down) installed up between the rafters in our attic roof.

This foil has torn and split is some places, allowing the fiberglass behind and above to spill out.

Can we just nail up sheets of drywall panels to cover the whole thing without doing anything about the foil, or is the foil necessary for some reason?

Answer: The foil is needed as a vapor barrier.

If it is torn and/or split, it is no longer effective, so a new vapor barrier should be put up to cover the foil.

Usually this is done by stapling large sheets of polyethylene plastic that you can buy in rolls.

Cover the foil by stapling this up to the exposed rafters with the sheets overlapping at the edges to make certain all the wood is covered.

Question: Our old house has steam heat and the cast iron radiator in our bedroom makes a knocking or banging noise for a few minutes after the heat first comes up. What can we do about this?

Answer: Sounds as though water is getting trapped inside that radiator and bangs around when the steam tries to enter. Chances are that this is because the radiator is sloping the wrong way.

It should either be absolutely level, or should slope slightly toward the end where the steam comes in.

That way condensed water inside the radiator can run out freely before steam tries to enter.

Question: We had tile put down on our front porch and when it gets wet it becomes slippery to walk on.

Is there any coating, or anything else you can suggest that we can put on these tiles to make them safer to walk on?

Answer: The tiles apparently have a glossy finish, so they will become slippery when wet. Floor tiles usually do not have a glossy or very smooth finish.

There is not much you can do about this without damaging or marring the tiles. There are, however, clear non-skid coatings that are sold in marine supply outlets for use on boats. Or you can put down some strips of carpet or similar material during wet weather. This can be rolled up and stored out of the way when not needed.

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Questions about home-repair problems should be addressed to Bernard Gladstone, care of The New York Times Syndication Sales Corp., 122 E. 42nd St., New York, N.Y. 10168. Questions of general interest will be answered in this column.