I know a guy (used to live in Irongate) who mowed his neighbor’s lawns whenever he mowed his own. Just did it, didn’t ask for their permission.

What ever happened to offering a neighbor a hand? You have a crappy looking yard, you buy the material and beer and I’ll bring tools and a strong back.

That’s a fine sentiment except when you show up at the neighbor’s your are greeted with “No habla English”. How are you going to help someone you cannot even communicate with?

Granted, some folks really like their crappy looking yards.

http://consumerist.com/5015543/check-serial-numbers-on-used-service-gadgets-before-buying

The same is true for cellphones and cable modems, and practically any other electronic device (such as XM/Sirius radios) that’s associated with a contract and has an electronic serial number.

That is not to say that there aren’t people who buy this stuff and then find out that it’s basically bricked and they cannot use it. Once again…like the low-cost contractor–if seems to be too good to be true, it probably is.

Also, even with an access card, DirecTV and Dish both still need to know the serial number of the receiver.

This eBay guide suggests that Dish won’t activate a box that has a past-due balance associated with it:

http://reviews.ebay.com/Buying-Dish-Network-Equipment_W0QQugidZ10000000000733291

The equipment is pretty much useless without the service, anyhow. I expect that neither Dish or DirecTV will activate a receiver tied to an account with a past-due balance.

All they have to do is request a service under another name, tell the service they already have a receiver and say the card for the receiver was damaged and they need a replacement. You used to be able to buy your own boxes with a card and have the equipment activated. Believe you lease the boxes now from Directv but the same boxes can be purchased on Ebay. Maybe they are selling the equipment they steal there. In any event, a new receiver card is all you need to have the box activated.

For those who don’t know, the issue with FPE panels is that the breakers may not trip when they’re supposed to.

http://www.inspect-ny.com/fpe/fpepanel.htm

Many older houses in PW County have these panels.

Did the house you are speaking of have aluminium wiring and Federal electrical boxes?

Most of the homes over here have the above. With all the illegal renovating to turn many of these homes into flop houses, if those who buy these homes do not do a good job of fixing them and bringing them up to code it could spell disaster. Many of these homes are potential time bombs.

I was referring to the dishes here if anyone is wondering. What CAN you do with a DirecTV or Dish Network dish? I don’t think they can even be made into a halfway decent Wi-FI antenna.

“……and I bet you that whoever screwed up this house are the same people that are passing themselves off as “construction and drywall experts” and driving around in white vans with 20 ladders on the roof just waiting to tip over.”

Anyone dumb enough to buy that whomever did the awful work at that house is actually a “construction and drywall expert” deserves exactly what they’re going to get by being too cheap to hire someone who actually has the skills and training to do the job right.

Apparently whomever last lived in the house I was speaking of has a $1200 DirecTV bill they never paid, based on the collections notices they keep sending.

“If you want to know how may families are living in a single house just look on the roof and count the number of dtv dishes.”

That’s because they’ve never heard of a multiswitch.

Sign a 2 year commitment under a phony name for a free 4 room installation, free Mexican programming, pay one or two bills and then bail out of the house with the equipment.

“Many of these houses are now fire hazards waiting to happen due to spliced electric lines and non compliant building.”

……and I bet you that whoever screwed up this house are the same people that are passing themselves off as “construction and drywall experts” and driving around in white vans with 20 ladders on the roof just waiting to tip over.

Oh yes. They also put bigger circuit breakers in when they keep tripping due to overloading. I saw one house where the following happened.

This part is a guess:

Too many space heaters tripped the 15-amp living room and the 15-amp bedroom circuit.

So the two circuits were combined into one and put on a 30-amp breaker. Two wires were connected to the breaker. I suspect that the thinking was, “Well, if each wire can only carry 15, then if there’s two of them they each can carry 15 and so I can connect them to a 30″.

This part I’m certain of:

At some point the circuit was overloaded and the black (hot) wire’s insulation melted, touching the ground wire (inside the circuit breaker panel). Because this house was wired with the older Romex that only has a 16-gauge ground wire, and because the circuit breaker was twice the size it should have been, the ground wire burned away between where it was touching the black wire and the ground terminals in the panel. Yes, the ground wire MELTED.

As if that’s not bad enough, that part that hadn’t burned away was still touching the black wire so it was electrically live, so that any three-prong appliance plugged into this circuit became an instant electrocution hazard.

In this same house, I found a piece of Romex that was cut when a hole was cut in the floor between the upstairs bedroom and the basement, I found a piece of Romex that used to go to the outlet for the wall air conditioner that used to be in the living room (and was removed and drywalled over) just tucked into the wall (yes, it was live).

Also in this house, a wall was constructed in the basement to make an additional bedroom. The wall was constructed so that it blocked access to a junction box in the ceiling for a light fixture. The wall was torn out, and during the demolition it was noticed that the stud spacing was very erratic, some studs were spaced 3 feet apart and some 6 inches apart.

Also in this house, it appears that they were going to add a 5th bedroom in the rear basement and they had started wiring this room but never finished, leaving live, exposed Romex hanging out of the walls. From the date code on the Romex it appears that they did this sometime after 2005. I can only guess that the reason that they didn’t finish making this room into a bedroom is that the market for flophouse living space, well, kinda flopped.

I didn’t mention the shower valve that had been leaking long enough to rot out the backside of the house but I will. Apparently, it seems that they just let the water leak—and I will tell you it was obvious.

It cost only $15 for the replacement part to fix the leak, and it took 5 minutes to install. For want of a $15 shower valve and 5 minutes of time to replace it, the whole bathroom had to be redone.

That’s because they’ve never heard of a multiswitch.