My wife and I just moved into a new apartment in Manhattan (new to us, anyway) and discovered a little problem - ROACHES!!! The place isn’t overrun with them, but there are more than enough running around to make us freak out.

I didn’t discover the problem until I was painting the place before we moved in. There wasn’t enough time to bug-bomb the apartment before moving in (I needed every minute to paint and prep to get ready for move-in day.) So, I’ve had to take a multi-prong approach to ending the cockroach problem.

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How Would You Like To FIRE YOUR BUG MAN…

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The first thing I did was spread Boric Acid along the baseboards, behind the refrigerator and stove, inside the kitchen cabinets and under the radiators. I’ve done this at other apartments and it seems to keep roaches in check. The powder stays active for a good long while, the roaches track it back into the walls (which helps kill them in the nests) and there is no awful chemical smell.

In this case, the Boric Acid wasn’t enough. There were still roaches when the painting was finished and we moved in. So, I moved on to the next step in the plan - seal up cracks and holes and use aggressive poison sprays along the baseboards in select areas (we have a young daughter and don’t want her getting into the poisons and becoming sick so we are spraying in very limited areas.)

I caulked all of the seams inside the kitchen cabinets using clear silicon caulk. I also sealed every wall opening I could find with expanding spray foam. I closed up holes around the drain and water lines in the kitchen and bathroom. I sealed holes around steam pipes and electrical boxes too. Then I sprayed poison along the baseboards in the kitchen and behind furniture in the living room.

For a day or two it seemed like the roach problem was dissipating, but we woke up again to discover several of them crawling around the kitchen and later that morning, one crawled across the baby’s high-chair while she was eating. We may be making progress, but not fast enough. So I went a step further.

I bought a bunch of RAID Double Control roach baits to place all around the kitchen and bathroom. These also came with 3 special ‘egg stoppers‘ as well. The egg-killers involved some kind of liquid in a glass vial and a fabric pad to disperse it. You crack the glass and the liquid soaks into the pad. Whatever is in this liquid is supposed to screw up the roaches ability to reproduce. Once we get a handle on this problem, I’m throwing these out because I don’t want chemicals like that floating around my house any longer than necessary.

I also picked up a jug of bleach and am pouring bleach into the drains at night to keep the roaches from crawling up through the pipes at night. (We’re also regularly mixing a bleach solution in the sink to clean the baby’s toys until we are confident that the roach problem has been resolved!) The bleach stays in the trap in the drain to create a barrier that the roaches cannot cross. It also kills a lot of germs and leaves a stink in the room, so I put the drain plug in after pouring the bleach. I’m hitting the kitchen sink, bathroom sink and tub drains on my evening bleach runs.

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How Would You Like To FIRE YOUR BUG MAN…

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My wife had used a device in a previous apartment that is supposed to send a magnetic charge through the wiring in your house which agitates the roaches and drives them out of the walls in search of other nesting spots. We searched around online and found a similar product at Amazon and ordered a couple. You just plug them into an outlet and it does it’s thing. If the device works at all, this will be a non-toxic long-term control tactic for keeping the roaches away. It can’t hurt (although the manufacturer says that the first few days the device is used, there will be more roaches in the house as they are driven out of the walls - I’ll be keeping the roach spray handy!)

While she was searching, my wife came across another product called Diatomaceous Earth, which is a non-toxic powder that kill roaches and other bugs. The powder is actually the fossilized remains of tiny phytoplanktons called diatoms which live in lakes and seas. The microscopic remains of these creatures have a jagged surface that scratches the roaches as they move across it which causes them to dry out and die. They also ingest the powder which does unpleasant things to their insides and kills as well. Like the Boric Acid, this powder is tracked back into the walls by the roaches and kills others in the nest. Unlike Boric Acid, it is safe around pets and humans (including babies) and does not lose potency over time.

I’m looking for a local supplier for the Diatomaeous Earth. If I can’t find one, I know it’s available on Amazon. My plan is to spread it around on the same places I have used Boric Acid and leave it behind the stove, under the refrigerator, and around the radiators. I’m also considering drilling some small holes in the kitchen walls in each stud cavity and blowing a mix of Boric Acid and Diatomaceous Earth inside to kill of any nesting problems around the kitchen. This is a pretty aggressive step, so I’ll wait and see how the other options work first.

Several non-toxic sprays have come up in my searches for roach killers and I might order some to keep on hand once the war is over. They seem to use either orange oils or mint oils to kill the roaches. Both leave a strong smell, but I think I’d rather smell intense mint than whatever is in a typical can of roach spray.

You can probably tell I REALLY DON’T LIKE ROACHES!!!! I’m on a mission (possibly a fool’s errand) to rid my new apartment of this filthy invasion. I think I’ve covered all my bases (we’re keeping all our food in sealed containers and being aggressively clean in addition to everything else.) If these tactics don’t work, I fear I might start tearing up the walls and floors soon, so wish me luck and leave a comment if you have any solutions I haven’t mentioned here.

The Go-To Guy!

Technorati Tags: boric acid, cockroaches, diatomaceous earth, killing cockroaches, killing roaches, mint oil, orange oil, roaches

I was checking out a home improvement blog today and saw a cool looking video projector on the Entetainment Ideas page. Instead of hanging from the ceiling or sitting on a stand, this one hangs on the wall like a speaker. They must do some funky mirror tricks inside to get it to work, but it looked pretty interesting (specially for people like me who live in a space challenged New York apartment!)

Some day I will have a nice big house in the country (or a hideously expensive apartment) and will indulge my desire for a private screening room in my home. Mrs. Go-To Guy is pretty adamant about my waiting until we have a home large enough for a “guy room” before I go home theater crazy.

A man can dream…

The Go-To Guy!

Building a home theater? I just posted a new article on my www.ColossalTV.com website titled How to Make A Projection Screen.

Check it out and let me know what you think. I’d appreciate feedback.

The Go-To Guy

I received a call this week from my church’s office manager saying we needed to have some repairs made before a visit from the building inspectors next week. One of the repairs was a hole in the drywall where a door handle had punched through the wall. The doorstop had broken and next thing you know there’s a repair job for the Go-To Guy.

Knowing how to do a patch like this is handy even when you’re not repairing damage. The first time I did one was when I installed phone and cable television service into an older home that my parents had purchased. My brother and I cut holes at the top and bottom of the wall to fish through the new wire, and then I patched up the holes and repainted and you’d never know the wall had been repaired. The same goes for running a new electrical wire or anything else that requires getting inside the wall.

If you don’t already know, a typical wall is mostly air. It is either 2×4 wood studs or metal studs that are placed every 16 inches on-center (when building walls you measure from the center of each stud and not the edges.) The surface is covered with drywall (a gypsum board covered with a heavy layer of paper) which is screwed or nailed to the studs. It’s quick to build and looks great, but can be easily damaged - especially when the builder uses 1/4 inch thick drywall instead of 1/2 inch or 3/4 inch (these are the standard thicknesses.)

When you have a damaged wall you need to replace the broken area with new drywall and then patch the seams and paint.

The supplies you’ll need for this project are:

• Drywall Saw
• Utility Knife
• Drywall piece large enough to fill the hole
• 1×3 inch Lumber or pieces of Scrap Plywood for supports
• Drywall Screws
• Joint Compound
• Mesh Fiberglass Drywall Tape
• 6 inch or larger Spreader
• Fine Grit Sand Paper or Drywall Sanding Screen
• Drill with Drywall Bit

All of these supplies can be found at your local home center in the construction materials area near the drywall. If you have a small patch, they may give you a scrap of drywall so you won’t have to buy a full sheet. There are usually plenty of scraps laying around in various thicknesses.

Here’s the step-by-step process:

1. Cut a hole larger than the damaged area. Make the corners of the cut as square as possible to make it easier to cut the replacement patch. Use a drywall saw cut the hole
2. Cut several pieces of 1×3 inch wood or plywood scraps that are several inches taller than the hole. Place them in the wall near the edges of the hole and use drywall screws to secure the wood to the exisiting wall. (Tighten the screws until the heads are slightly below the surface but don’t completely tear through the paper. A drywall bit for your drill is designed to prevent overtightening. It’s not essetial, but recommended.) The point here is to create a good solid surface to attach the patch too. If you have a large opening you can put an additional support in the center.
3. Using a utility knife, cut a new patch piece that is slightly smaller than the hole. (To cut drywall, cut the paper on the finished side and then bend the board backward until the gypsum ’snaps.’ You’ll want to support the back along the cut so it breaks evenly. Once it has snapped, use the utility knife to cut the paper on the back.)
4. Insert the patch into the opening and securely attach it to the supports you installed using drywall screws. One screw at the top and bottom of each support should be sufficent. (Don’t put the screws too close to the edges or the gypsum will crumble.)
5. Now that the hole is filled you need to cover the seams. Apply fiberglass mesh tape over the seams. (The joint compound used to fill the seams is not strong and will crack if not reinforced.)
6. The last step is applying joint compound to the seams with a wide spreading knife Spread the joint compound over the screw holes and tape creating the smoothest surface you can. Don’t get too fussy at this stage. Just get it close. Let this dry overnight and then put on one more light coat. After this coat dries, smooth out any surface bumps with a light sanding.

Your wall is repaired, good as new. Put a coat of wall primer over the patch to seal the surface and then paint it to match the rest of the wall. It’s important to put on the primer, because raw drywall and joint compound, when painted, will dull the finish of the paint and give away your patch job.

Happy home repair,

The Go-To Guy