Author: oi_admin

Freshen your home the natural way and let the spring air enhance your living space.

1. Erase the trace. Cooked a strong smelling dish? Simmer some lemon slices in a pot of water to freshen your kitchen.
2. Twice as nice. Deodorize your carpet and vacuum cleaner - instantly. Sprinkle baking soda, wait overnight and vacuum up the smells the next day.
3. Cure your cutting board. Soap won’t lift some food smells, but parsley will. Chop a few sprigs of parsley and rub the pieces over the board then rinse.

Read more helpful tips in our latest edition of ePostNotes.

• Keep it in good shape: Your garage door will always require periodic lubrication and adjustment. An overhead garage door that is poorly maintained may pose a threat to your safety.

• Pinch hazard: Sectional overhead garage doors pose a pinch hazard to fingers. Never put your fingers in the space between door sections to close the door, use the provided handles.

• Security: The remote control for your automatic opener is like a key to your garage. When you move into a home, you should change the remote control settings just as you would change the locks on your doors.

• Educate children: Kids need to know that garage doors are dangerous. Mount the door activation button five feet from the ground, out of reach.

Read more tips in our latest edition of ePostNotes.

Your garage vehicle door may be the largest moving object in your home and could weigh up to 400 pounds. For your safety make sure it’s in good condition.

Overhead garage doors have gravity to deal with. In the absence of some type of balancing mechanism, the door would slam shut as soon as you let go of it. Older garage doors may employ a weight and pulley system to balance the weight of the door however virtually all modern systems use springs. Regardless of the method used, the door should balance. If you open the garage door about half way and let go, it should balance there.

Spring failure: The springs used to balance the weight of the door are under enormous stress. If a spring were to break, flying pieces of metal could cause serious injury. Modern spring systems incorporate safety features to prevent flying metal in the event of a spring failure. Extension springs should have a cable running down the middle of the spring to contain the spring upon failure.

Automatic opener: Automatic door openers are not a replacement for a properly balanced door. The opener is not powerful enough to lift the entire weight of the door. The opener works with the help of the springs or counter balance system. An automatic garage door opener should stop and reverse on meeting an obstruction. Many systems manufactured prior to 1982 may stop but not reverse, these older systems should be upgraded. Today, some form of external entrapment protection is required. An electric eye is the most common system used. If your garage door opener does not have an electric eye system, you may be able to upgrade it without replacing the entire system.

Emergency release: During a power failure the garage door may be impossible to open. Most automatic garage door openers have an emergency release to disengage the garage door from the opener. Once disengaged, you can open the door by hand. It is usually a short rope hanging from the unit. Pulling the rope disengages the door from the automatic door opening mechanism.

Read more helpful tips in our May 2016 edition of ePostNotes.

Food and soap scum can really gunk up a dishwasher. Cleaning the dishwasher isn’t something we tend to think of, but debris builds up over time which reduces its performance. Here are a few tips that’ll help keep your dishwasher in tip-top shape:

1. Get rid of Gunk - Clean the filter to get rid of caked on food and other debris to help with drainage and general cleaning.

2. Clean Up - Pour a cup of white vinegar into your dishwasher to wash away grease, grime and calcium deposits.

3. Freshen Up - Sprinkle a cup of baking soda along the bottom of your dishwasher then run it on a short, hot cycle.

4. Accessories - Don’t forget about the racks and cutlery baskets as they can also accumulate grease and food pieces.

Read more helpful tips in our May 2016 edition of ePostNotes.