LG John

I like a stat I must admit and I like to calculate the value in projects or the risks and express them as a saving or gain. This probably stems from my love for poker but that's another story. Anyway, my g/f and I have started to set the wheels in motion to redevelop our flat and this involves the removal of the woodchip wall paper that is conveniently on every wall in the flat (and it’s not a small flat!). To this end we cracked out the steamer and let rip on a piece of wall making slow but steady progress. The following night we test out another method which involves using wallpaper paste that is applied and left for 45 minutes. The paste method was probably a little quicker but there's a 45 minute lead time for each section.

At this point it would be easy to just use the steamer that we already have as it appears to be 6 and half a dozen in terms of time/hassle/effort. That is until you do the maths:

Each bag of paste is 98p and will do pretty much a whole room. At most you might need to spend a £7. The 2300 Watt steamer on the other hand would cost approximately £130 to do the whole flat by my calculations

Glad we didn't just wade in and took the time to run some calculations

STi wanna Subaru

iTrader: (1)

I want those 2 minutes back!

You must have a big **** if this is the stuff you come out with to your bird!

brumdaisy

but how the hell does dried up paste get wallpaper off a wall? Am I missing something

LG John

Nah, it's the £127 I spend on sweeties and flowers over the next 6 months that keeps her

I have no idea why wallpaper paste is good for removing wallpaper but it really does work and seems to come off a little cleaner than with the steamer. Might go and look up why it works.

LG John

Dude, you need to brush up on you reading skills if that took you 2 minutes to read

brumdaisy

please do and report back in time for my next project

Bubba po

How much would it cost if you hired a petrol Jenny for the electricity?

STi wanna Subaru

iTrader: (1)

Hey I had to get my abacus out to check your sums

Bubba po

The viscous paste keeps the moisture on the paper, allowing it to soak in, whereas plain water runs straight off and dries out.

LG John

Is that with or without octaine booster?

I suspect Bubbo Po is correct but I can't find any 'chemical' reason in a quick search on the net. It seems everyone has some sort of paste or solution that should do the same job. It's funny, I always wondered why the paper next to my bed as a teenger peeled like bugger

Nido

"Jenny" implies female. "Genny" is a male world of power

imlach

Err....£130 for electricity for a 2300 watt steamer?
If it's 10p/kWh, that's 565 hours....or 27 days of continuous steaming!!!

While the paste is probably still cheaper, you may like to recalculate your stats my friend

Bubba po

Generating your own electricity is rather like making love to a beautiful woman - with gentle finger movements you tease open the orifice; you plug in your industrial connector; you fill her up with the requisite fluid, give a good old tug on the nylon and wait for the sparks to fly.

imlach

I reckon a room needs 2 hours of steaming....so that's about 50p/room.
If you've got 7 rooms, that's £3.50. Even if 4 hours per room, you're matching the £7 for paste.

imlach

PS Handy hint if you don't know it...

Score the wallpaper in a criss-cross pattern so that the steam gets in behind the paper and the steam becomes more effective. Just don't score too deep otherwise it'll score your plaster.

Jay m A

iTrader: (2)

To be fair though, if my wife is anything to go by - it takes half an hour to remove about a square metre, then leave it on the wall too long to remove a steamer sized piece of skim plaster, then give up and go out and buy a pair of shoes.

By my calculations use the paste

J4CKO

iTrader: (1)

Oh **** he's started comparing power outputs for power tools now.

Dont get a Honda steam stripper for the walls, it wont be any good low down.

Nido

2000TLondon

What about the electricity used to write your post, and monitor the replies? Also, during the 45 minutes you were waiting for the paste to take effect, if you sat and watched TV during this time, and did this repeatedly for every wall, surely that would take a chunk off your savings? Well, maybe a pound. Did you have a beer or any food during the 45 minute period you weren't working? I think your calculations have only taken into account the most obvious aspects of this job, which IMO makes them flawed!

LG John

Rather that theoretical calculation based on what might happen I examined the difference that the steamer made on our metre. The reason we can do this is because we have been unsatisfied with the accuracy of our electricty bills (remember that thread) and have been taking readings of both metres every day for months. We nearly always use 10kw/h on the day rate and 4kw/h on the night rate. The day we steamed we did nothing different from our normal routine but used 33kw/h on the day rate. 23kw/h more than usual so strip a fixed area that I calculated to be about 1/70th the entire area of the woodchip to be removed. 70x23= 1610kw/h and I calculated at £0.08p per kw/h which I think is conservative by todays prices. That comes out at £128.8p.

This method used an examination of the actual effect that the steamer had on my electricity metre and then a calculation of costs based on the area we had to strip. In short STFU my maths is fine. The jury is still out on whether my electricity metre is playing the game though

LG John

That works out at approximately 140 hours of steaming by the way (even with the 'scratching' method). The stuff is proper welded onto the wall!

LG John

LMAO @ Bubbo's post

scoobynutta555

Bucket of warm water mixed wiith washing up liquid. Sponge on, leave to soak then peal it off. Less than a quid all in I reckon

DCI Gene Hunt

You could of bought a flat without woodchip wallpaper and saved all this hassle in the first place.......

dharbige

If you used the steamer for 10 hours then this would be about right for a 2.3 KW steamer.

10 hours to do 1/70th of your flat? Either it's one big-assed flat, or you're a terribly slow worker! Or you didn't actually use the steamer for 10 hours.

In which case, I think your meter is up the swanny. Or you're reading it wrong. Is it callibrated in KWh or KJ (or even MJ)?

DCI Gene Hunt

It's a geek invasion force...........

sbk1972

I had a 6 bedroom house + lounge + dinning room + kitchen + hall, including all walls / cielings to strip down. Brought two steamers from homebase, stripped down to my pants as shutting the doors / windows keeps the steam in, but makes that room damnnnnn hot :-)

Get a craft /stanley blade, run it up and across - cutting the wall paper in squares, spray the area with warm water, soak it, then starting from the bottom, steam up and scrap away. Try using a razor scrapper.

You think wall paper stripping is hard ? Well, nothing is as painful / hard as Nitromorsing an oak stair case that has over 10 layers of pain ! That took me 2 solid weeks to strip, sand, varnish and seal. Slipped down the thing twice, ending up with Nitromors over my legs / arms, burned like a git !



SBK

DCI Gene Hunt

Hopefully not in your pants though..........

StickyMicky

in my last job, we had to clean the isocyanate based spray glue off the robots every thursdaynight/friday morning with nitromorse week in, week out, apply with a brush, then scrape off.

got a little bit in my eye once

CrisPDuk

Is there such a thing as a 'pre-owned' property that has no woodchip in it?

Personally if I ever meet the **** that thought the ******* stuff was a good idea, he's going feet first into an industrial woodchipper