kurt

I think the sign on a warranty inspection is a very smart marketing tool; nothing unethical about it. It just plain wouldn't work on resale inspections, at least not in my market.

Jim, that's one of my favorite Seuss' works. I like to imagine that I'm the worm most of the time, but know that I have been the bear & rabbit on occasion. Better analogy than the Branding thingie; apologies to Hockstein.

Hey Dan, thanks for responding. Yes, there is something regarding the FTC & ASHI, but it has everything to do w/ silly politics & bent noses & nothing to do w/ anything of particular substance. Someone didn't get their way in an unreasonable situation, & decided to throw a tantrum. The rumor swirled around IW this afternoon. Ask someone else about details; it's too silly for me to waste time typing about it. I'm gonna talk about the cool stuff @ IW; go to General Chit Chat for an up to date report...

1) What are you shooting that requires more than 3.3 megapixels? 2) Do you need zoom >3x optical? My C-730 UltraZoom is 3.2 megapixels & has reasonable macro capability. I have found that inadequacies of image quality are more often my inexperience w/ the equipment than problems w/ the pixel range. IOW, it's the settings, not the camera, that may be limiting you. Do you consider yourself completely competent & knowledgeable about your cameras settings? What about media? Many newer cameras are now using X-Cards instead of Compact Flash or SmartMedia. If you have a lot of media cards you want to reuse, this may also be an issue. What's the budget range? There are some "SLR" type bodies w/ interchangeable lense systems that are finally getting within range of the budget conscious. Are you ready to commit to that level of investment (which is substantial, simply due to the proprietary nature of lense systems).

Hmmmm, this thread drift is hung on technicalities; flight, no flight......[:-propeller] I would like to second Mikes request to fill in the profiles; whenever I see a new member, I click on the their highlighted link to see who they are & where they're from. It's a nice way to show one is interested in the group AND it shows a modicum of respect for the efforts of the Mikes' in putting this place together. Knowing who's who is also a way for us to verify what information goes up on the board; credibility is key when discussing technical issues. [:-magnify]

If I am not mistaken, Texas also requires that Inspectors check the accuracy of the oven temperature, in addition to a couple other nerdly items. It sounds as if you are somewhat taken w/ the Texas approach; maybe I'm misinterpreting your viewpoint. While you are, on one hand, commending Texas for regulating the profession, you are, on the other hand, condemning other states for regulating the profession. Explain, if possible, how it is all right for Texas to require various items & considerations in the report, but it is not all right for other States to require things like insurance as a means of protection against incompetent inspectors/inspection companies. Stating that "insurance doesn't work", or similar expulsions of insurance as an option, are not what I have in mind regarding explanation.

We could take it that final step & realize that everybody is like everybody, i.e., why the need to focus on ASHI? It's a large world, we populate an extremely tiny segment of it, & I sense that there is more than necessary focus on how "those other people" behave; taken to its extreme, this practice lies pretty much @ the core of all conflict. Categorizing ones distinguishable personality traits by ones professional association affiliations seems like fuzzy science, no?

I see a few dozen Burnham boilers annually; I always use the ANSI date & add a couple years. Burnham has maintained a practice of having nearly indecipherable serial # sequence(s), & I got tired of trying to decipher them. They are a good quality component, albeit old fashioned, technology.

Now those are some useful tips. I'm gonna use it on my squeaky fan belt on the work truck. I'm a lousy mechanic (I hate working on cars), so any little insights I can gain before I succumb to my local wrench is valuable. I have used them to figure out the proliferation of radiant floor heating systems I'm now seeing; shooting the floor temps is a decent way to begin understanding the distribution pattern.

Beats me; no clue.

They're about $3000 to start; the one you want is around $4400. I thought about getting one, then I ran into union problems because I'm not a union plumber (this is Chicago!). I've been using a couple union shops & handling scheduling for a small fee. I get dirty enough w/out hauling around sewage laden equipment; I don't really want one anymore.

The Thoroseal parge/red paint approach is frighteningly common here also, although we tend to just go w/ the plain Thoroseal. Yummm....

When you say "water treatment system", what exactly are you talking about? Potable water filtration, wastewater treatment(?).....

DEFINITELY! I'm still laughing........ Glad to hear you're OK, bud[:-thumbu]

There's an interesting theory; let's not think about what we can't see. sheeeesh...... All those National Power Rodding trucks we see cleaning out the sewers in the middle of the night are sucking the mud out of the sewer that washes in through broken & cracked tiles. I'm still surprised that some customers don't take my advice, & then call me back to ask who can fix it; usually they're newbies who still don't get what's at stake & in play in the real estate game.

I like your statement "what it isn't telling you is more important than what it is telling you". I am looking forward to reading your articles. The use of "fancy tools" is of constant concern to me; I own too many, & have discovered w/ many of them that they lead me down paths that shouldn't have been gone down.

This was priceless. Download Attachment: service connection (WinCE).JPG 8.76 KB

Here's a little picture of what happens when one happens to "tuckpoint" w/ incompatible mortars. The underlying lime mortar was saturated, new Type N was laid over it, moisture was held into the wall, & resulting freeze/thaw blew the sucker apart in a couple seasons. It has become somewhat of a campaign for me; fine old masonry is being destroyed by the misapplication of modern mortars over the old original lime putty material. Anyone else have experience w/ this problem? If you do, let's talk. This building is only a block away from where the Valentines Day Massacre occurred, for those inclined to be interested in such stuff. Download Attachment: parapet deteriorationa.JPG 8.82 KB Download Attachment: parpetcloseup.JPG 8.85 KB

How many out there recommend, or even think about, condition of the building sewer? This has become a surprisingly common defect in my work area (inner City Chicago). Everything is terra cotta clay tile around here; that's the problem. The number of sewers all blown apart by tree roots, building settlement, or general aging is quite large. Just curious........ I've gotten to the point where I advise the videoscope on about 75% of the properties I inspect.

Kurt, I hope they learned their lesson and the presentation at the convention is clear and not just a lot of smoke and mirrors. This is their last chance to pull in the members that are still on the fence. So true, oh brother.... Although, for me, the big draw of InspectionWorld is the chance to hang out w/a bunch of my chums in this goofy business. Branding on, branding off, I don't really care. Some of my best friends in the world were met through ASHI; branding doesn't change that even one little itty bit.

It is an unfortunate fact of the business that most HI's price their service based upon what the other geek is charging. It's very similar to homebuilding, remodeling, & the trades in general. Nobody does the math to figure out what it really costs to do a home inspection. There is a zen buddhist concept of remaining above the fray, i.e., if one acts w/pure intention & without longing for desired result, magic happens. Or something like that. Marketing efforts can be surprisingly similar. If one focuses on the process, & does not allow personal frustrations to cloud the pursuit, interesting results accrue. Maybe I've been hanging around so long I don't have to think about it; there are so many realtors that hate my guts and have blackballed me (without much success), I don't really care what anyone thinks, or perceives, about my "ethical" standards. I just try to do good jobs; the other stuff takes care of itself.

I think Scott is right w/ his analogy; the surface temp of various objects can be different than the ambient. In many cases, it may not matter. I can think of two instances where the trusty old Raytek didn't tell me what I needed to know. I was shooting registers to verify function; the sucker was hot, I thought it was OK. What I wasn't checking was volume of air flow; heck, just stand in the door, shoot the register, move on to the next room. I got to pay for an additional air return on that job, since the room was not heating adequately. The other instance was taking temp splits on an AC; I shot the metal grill above the AC condenser instead of measuring air temp. Maybe it was the sun on the grill, maybe it was me, I don't know. What I do know is that I had a bad measurement, & a resulting inaccurate assessment of the condition. The longer I inspect, the larger the bag of unused fancy tools gets.

Pete, all worthwhile thoughts & ideas, but what one charges, grosses, nets, or otherwise gets to walk away with has nothing to do w/ realtors, non-association w/ realtors, or anything other than a practical sense of business economics & the intelligence to act on that practical intelligence. I used to teach a class to home builders (I'm a home builder) about margin, profit, how to calculate those things, & how to apply them to ones' business. Most of the folks in the class would listen quietly for several days & then ask "that's all well & good, but how do we make more money?". Most folks didn't get it. Charge what you're worth; people pay it. It has nothing to do w/anything other than intelligent business practice. You will probably even be surprised that there are realtors out there that understand, & steer clients to you. Not many, but it's a big world, & the idea that any group can be painted w/ a single brush is not nice, un-American, & bad business.

Richard, you're cracking me up[:-smile_green]. Thanks for not posting pictures, & hope the system is clean & in sound condition.

In a larger vein, we will all know what this branding thing is in just one little weeks time. Let's check back in when we all actually know what it is.